Football player scholar, an oxymoron?

A NY Times article reveals massive corruption at Auburn University, where football players receive high grades in classes that require little, if any, work.

From this article we learn that college faculty can be just as corrupt and immoral as business executives or politicians.

The only way to ensure that football players are honestly taking classes and doing work is to have verification by independent auditors. This is why the stock exchanges require that the numbers in annual reports be audited. Everyone knows that business executives will cheat if they can get away with it. Even verification by supposedly independent auditors doesn't prevent the occasional Enron from happening.

One shouldn't give colleges any benefit of the doubt that corporations don't get. This is why I suspect that the job placement figures given out by law schools are inflated.

Regarding the specific issue of football players, I don't understand why they have to learn something besides football. Why not just give out degrees in football?

Comments

[superdestroyer]

HS,

I support the idea of independit auditors. Universities always lie about their graduation rates. The rate reported for most sports programs is that (number of athletes in a particular sport getting a diploma)/(number of athletes who have used up their eligibility). Thus, universities benefit from players transferring/dropping out/or being run off.

Remember, in NCAA Div 1 football, a school gets 85 scholarships but can award 25 per year and with redshirt years, many athletes play for five years).

[Peter]

It's easy to say that athletes should get no special academic treatment, but the fact of the matter is that the demands of playing football at a Div. 1-A university leave precious little time for anything else, at least during the season.

[Half Sigma]

"the demands of playing football at a Div. 1-A university leave precious little time for anything else, at least during the season."

Right! That's why I wrote that the schools should just give out a degree in football.

[spungen]

Take away the "Oxy-" and we agree.

Of course law schools lie about their job placement stats, and their incomes. And individuals collude in this scam by lying themselves. That's the problem with America, people would rather lie than admit to not having what they want, even on an anonymous survey, even to themselves.

[Fred]

Rather than give out degrees in football, I suggest that college sports programs offer scholarships which can be used at any post high school educational institution, from a vocational school to a community college to an easier or more attractive (to the athlete) university. They could play for Auburn on Saturday, but study at any local comunity college during the week. Yeah, they might not have time to commute, but the scholarship should also be usable for some period of years after the athlete has completed his eligibility. Lots of college athletes think they have a shot at the pros, and spend most of their time focusing on their sport. Once the draft passes them by and they realize they're going to have to earn a normal living, they could use their scholarships to learn how to be, for example, an air conditioning repairman or a physical therapist. Why not?

[JewishAtheist]

The whole problem is that college football has nothing more to do with college than the Knicks have to do with NYC. In the old days it was a little different, but now they're basically (ideally) unpaid professional athletes. That they're simultaneously "students" is simply a feel-good anachronism and a revenue maker for schools. Some sort of minor league system (where players are allowed but not forced to take classes at a nearby college) would be far superior for everybody involved, especially the athletes, who would get fairly compensated and wouldn't have to pretend to be students, except of course for the schools and alumni nuts.

[superdestroyer]

JA,

Football at most schools is a money loser. For every Notre Dame or Auburn, there are ten UTEPs that are losing money.

Besides, any money made by the football team stays inside the Athletic Department and does not benefit anyone outside of the Athletic Department.

[Peter]

Football at most schools is a money loser. For every Notre Dame or Auburn, there are ten UTEPs that are losing money.

I've heard that about half of Div. 1-A football teams make money and the remainder run at a loss. The thing is, the teams which make money tend to make a lot, while the money-losers have relatively small losses, so overall football is profitable at that level. Needless to say, almost every team below 1-A loses money, as does every sports team in every sport with the exception of Division I men's basketball.

[Douglas Knight]

What do you all mean by a school "making money" on football? Are you talking about ticket sales, or donations? And are you talking about donations targeted to athletics, or donations overall? My impression was that schools believed that football was cost-effective in increasing donations, but that it was very hard to tell.

I'm pretty sure that once a prominent sport exists, donations are correlated with how well the team does. I've heard that this creates an (actually exploited) niche for bad teams to be paid to play teams to boost those teams records.

[SFG]

"I've heard that this creates an (actually exploited) niche for bad teams to be paid to play teams to boost those teams records."

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