No. I wouldn't go for that. 10% is too tight a window.
Schools would just adjust it enough to get the players they want in. Seems kind of pointless to me.Fair point. 20%?
Schools would just adjust it enough to get the players they want in. Seems kind of pointless to me.
I meant they would adjust the percentage.You think a scho0l with 1500-5000 incoming students is gong to adjust scores each year to comply with 30 athletes (BB + FB)?
Academic fraud is rampant. It happens at great schools (UNC), average schools (Minn) and crappy schools (FSU). (This list is obviously not exhaustive)
So, how do we stop it? Academics should be the priority, bar NONE.
You think a scho0l with 1500-5000 incoming students is gong to adjust scores each year to comply with 30 athletes (BB + FB)?
Academic fraud is rampant. It happens at great schools (UNC), average schools (Minn) and crappy schools (FSU). (This list is obviously not exhaustive)
So, how do we stop it? Academics should be the priority, bar NONE.
Such a rule could backfire. It would favor schools with poor academic standards. (I am of course assuming that most athletes will have lower scores). Duke would only get a few players who met their 10% window. So it would take an elite academic school off the radar of most kids and send them to poorer academic schools. Probably not a great message or precedent. On the other hand, it would probably just increase the cheating infrastructure put in place by agents and Nike.
I'm curious as to why you think a student with a lower test score or high school GPA cannot contribute positively to a University.
Academics are not and should not be the ONLY priority at a place of higher education. I think you've been socially conditioned to believe that. Why is it any less valid if a great basketball player comes to a university to learn to play basketball better? A university is there to provide education. Why is education in basketball completely invalid? What if they are from a disadvantaged upbringing or have a learning disability, and can't do better on a standardized test? Why does that mean they still can't contribute positively to a university? Universities are for-profit enterprises and should do whatever they can to maximize their brand value. Having great sports teams generally contributes positively to this brand value. Why do you think fraud happens everywhere? Maybe great sports helps universities? Do you REALLY think having a few "sub-par" students who excel in other areas in life will "cheapen" the value of your education that much? Really?
I'm really curious how people like you think about this stuff. It seems very narrow-minded of me. I personally believe a university should teach whatever the hell it wants to help people succeed in life, and moreover it should act in its own self-interest and maximize its value. If Julius peppers doesnt care for 1400s Literature, I do not give a . I'll go and continue to study Math and Economics. He is training to be a professional athlete, so let him learn those skills. He doesnt care about "academics" because 1400s Lit provides him zero marginal value. Who cares.
THe Ivies are pretty close to this. Of the BCS schools, Stanford is the only one that comes close. Not Duke, not Vandy, not Northwestern. Stanford actually comes close to not admitting athletes who fall outside this.Would you go for this proposal?:
A school can only admit a athlete/student whose SAT/ACT score is within 10% of the average score of admitted students?
Edit: Obviously, you can go above 10%.
Would you go for this proposal?:
A school can only admit a athlete/student whose SAT/ACT score is within 10% of the average score of admitted students?
Edit: Obviously, you can go above 10%.
THe Ivies are pretty close to this. Of the BCS schools, Stanford is the only one that comes close. Not Duke, not Vandy, not Northwestern. Stanford actually comes close to not admitting athletes who fall outside this.
What are you trying to do, make Rutgers a national powerhouse?Would you go for this proposal?:
A school can only admit a athlete/student whose SAT/ACT score is within 10% of the average score of admitted students?
Edit: Obviously, you can go above 10%.
There was just a report which showed that there are made up classes and majors at Stanford too, unfortunately. NOt saying that even the majority of kids take them, but they are there, evidently.You're right about Stanford. I am aware of a kid from our town that was a nationally ranked (top five in the country) cross country runner and he barely got into Stanford despite very strong SATs/grades. And I hear they are just as tough with the major sports as well. That's what makes their success on the football field so remarkable.
I think we had a towel chewer that did this many years ago in Las Vegas!Pretty easy answer, IMO -- drop academic requirements altogether. Here's the hypothetical: A kid in a bad neighborhood with a terrible educational background and even worse high school transcript is really good at basketball. Do we want him playing basketball somewhere, hopefully making at least nominal academic progress toward a degree and working to improve his game with the goal of at least playing professionally somewhere? Or do we want to just tell him, "sorry, you're not smart enough to play with the future brain surgeons on our hoops team."?
I see it as a no-brainer. Let a coach admit whomever he wants but make an earnest effort to hold those kids accountable for making decent academic progress toward a degree. If it doesn't happen then an administration can make a decision -- stick with the coach who appears to care more about hoops or make a change to someone more responsible for the players he brings in.
I literally couldn't be judging less -- couldn't care less if these kids are cheating on every test or not. At the end of the day, excluding kids based on SATs and academic record makes no sense, particularly since it doesn't exactly weed out the miscreants from the group.
I think we had a towel chewer that did this many years ago in Las Vegas!
Ahhh, yes and the world came tumbling down because of it. And no one respects a georgetown degree b/c of allen iverson. The point is that it's up to each athlete how seriously they take their education. So you can have a lacrosse player from Boys Latin with the requisite scores, a strong nuclear family and all the right activities. And that guy could be a complete coke fiend who spends most of his time in fights, cheating on tests, and generally being an a$$hat (not rare, by the way). And you could have a kid with an undiagnosed learning disability, no access to actual text books (common in Baltimore city schools), one parent who was on public assistance and perhaps had a substance abuse problem. That kid may want or learn -- or he may not and athletics are about his only way out. Is he somehow less deserving of a chance?
Denying kids a chance at bettering themselves strikes me as completely defeating the purpose of education in the first place.
And what's the cutoff -- SU lets kids in with sub-1000 SAT scores all the time. Who cares? Who does that possibly hurt? And a kid with a 900 SAT score is absolutely deserving but a kid with a 790 isn't?
It's all 100% arbitrary.
Forcing Julius Peppers and hundreds like him into phony courses of study = denying kids a chance at bettering themselves, no?
The system needs standards. An SAT cut-off may not be the right one, but there are too many people willing to write off the importance of a strong education for all - including those with 99th-percentile athletic ability.
I've always wondered why "well-rounded" resumes and diversity of experience (including extra-curricular interests, a wide sampling of academic coursework, and athletic participation) are popularly cited as essential for two-parent kids with 1540 SAT scores, yet the idea that the athletically-gifted needn't be bothered to broaden horizons or challenge themselves with academic work outside of their wheelhouse is dismissed as a luxury, some sort of pointy-headed snobbery. (Not saying you're guilty of that, but it's something that comes up frequently in this and similar threads; the diminished expectation that many fans and pundits hold for athletes strikes me as terribly unfair and counterproductive.)
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But my point is that if universities want to make the term student-athlete less of a joke, it's not about admission -- it's about academic requirements to remain eligible at the university.
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So, the point I'd argue, is that I agree with you on encouraging kids to make true progress towards a degree regardless of their pro prospects. The two things I don't agree with are:
-- That the NCAA can actually legislate a change in culture. To tha end it's up to the universities themselves to encourage true academic achievement even if it is programs geared specifically toward athletes in the big sports like baseball, football and hoops (schools they largely don't truly pursue this, even for non-revenue generating sports). and ...
-- Stop barring kids from school. Did it help winifred walton that he no longer had the opportunity to play hoops in college? Wouldn't everyone have been better served if he had been in this structured environment and at least making some nominal progress towards a degree of some sort? Did it really help anyone that Erick Barkley wasn't allowed to return to SJU after he wasn't drafted (I couldn't care less if he signed with an agent)? I don't know what will happen with Aquille Carr, the Seton Hall recruit accused of domestic violence, but I'd wager $100 that he's much better off on campus -- maybe with strict stipulations -- then fending for himself in East Baltimore next year.
My thought is get them into school and even if you only have a true success rate of maybe 10% (half still flame out and never make it; 40% cheat their way through for a few years and go pro), you're still doing far more good than you are harm.