Conference 7.286::sports_90

    Northeastern University has been instrumental in getting former
    players to come back and get their degrees - from all schools, not
    just NU.  The program was, I believe, the first in the nation, and
    has been expanded upon.  Two of its principal founders were a couple
    of New England Patriots, who saw the need for players to get their
    degrees.  The program also specializes in teaching players nearing
    retirement, or recently retired, skills they need to go back into
    the 'normal' work place.  This model program has been expanded to
    satellite campus' all over the US of A.
    
    JD

The Center for the Study of Sport in Society at Northeastern started the
whole thing about having players return to their schools to get their
degrees. NU piloted the program which has spread to 54 schools. The catch
from the NCAA's perspective is that it normally does not allow the
tuition to be waived. To get around this, NU came up with the idea of
having the players speak to high schools  about the value of education.

TTom

    TTom,
    
    Thanks for jogging my memory.  GOod ol NU.
    
    JD

I know it's been talked about some but Boston Bruin Gord Kluzak got a 
bachelor's degree while he was injured.  

Gord is a perfect example of how important an education is to an athlete.  He 
started out with a very bright hockey future in front of him but injury struck.
Now a few years down the road he will be just another ex-athlete who won't be 
earning money playing a sport.  Having a degree (and more importantly knowing
how to put the knowledge gained fron it to use) will mean Gord will not
have to mope around reminicing forever while life passes him by.


My $.02

Scott

    
    Gord Kluzak's been injured so much he should have his doctorate
    by now.
    
    -Dick
    

    
    >Gord Kluzak's been injured so much he should have his doctorate
    >by now.
    
    >-Dick
    

Should there be a smiley on this?  I haven't heard of a lot of hockey players
that go get educations while they're injured.  I hope there is but I ain't neva
herd of dem.  

Of course I am sure that Gord knows enough about knee injuries that he could
perform knee surgury with his eyes closed.  Actually, I think I did hear that
he did his last operation himself....

Scott

    
    Yes Scott.  Here, have another one, I'm buyin':  8^)
    
    -Dick
    

    An article in the Wall Street Journal today, by Hodding Carter III,
    "College Sports Test: Define Oxymoron; Answer: Student-Athlete."  Read
    it....
    
    Some excerpts:
    
    "....the corruption of higher education by the demands of the 
    entertainment business that big time college and basketball have
    become."
    
    "....only 30% of National Football League players graduated from their
    institutions, and there is reason to believe their graduation rate was
    somewhat better than their less-talented teammates.  Of the 97 major
    college basketball programs, 35 have graduation rates of less than
    20%."
    
    "What happens to coaches on their way in and their way out is worth
    noting.  At Clemson, under scutiny for corner cutting in its football
    program, Coach Danny Ford was forced out, but with a $1 million
    settlement to console him.  At North Carolina State....the university
    paid him (Jim Valvano) $238,000 to go without a legal fight; the
    virtually autonomous athletic booster organization, the Wolfpack Club,
    paid him #375,000; the state's governor, James Martin, openly backed
    him against the NCSU administration.  When former University of North
    Carolina football coach Dick Crum was let go in 1987, the deal was
    facilitated by an $885,000 payout by the Rams Club, the university's
    independent sports boosters' organization."
    
    "The University of Florida's football program has had repeated
    scandals, suggesting something fundamental is amiss.  The university
    confronted it by paying its former Heisman Trophy winner, Steve
    Spurrier, $2.1 million over four years to coach the team.  He will make
    $70,000 more a year if he improves the team's graduation rate, low even
    by the abysmal standards of the Southeastern Conference.  The
    chancellor of the State Board of Regents says Mr. Spurrier is being
    paid for his integrity.  'I can't put a price tag on integrity,'
    Chancellor Charlie Reid said. 'It's too important.  Paying that out is
    money well spent.'"
    
    "It's a nice thought.  The way to restore integrity in athletics is to
    pay a coach more money than anyone else in the college.  It'll be
    interesting to see the value placed on Mr. Spurrier's integrity if he
    doesn't produce a winning team."
    
    "Those universities that want to have show biz athletic programs should
    be allowed to run them with professional employees at every level. 
    Their employees should not have to masquerade as students.  The other
    institutions of higher learning would opt out entirely, abandon
    preferential treatment and subsidies for athletes and restore meaning
    to the phrase 'student-athlete.'"
    

    	What do you expect from someone named `Hodding'.

    If I had the statistics, and gave a crap... I'm certain I could prove
    that the average Student-Athlete is academically more stable than the
    average `student' (sick)(tm).

    Mike JN

>    An article in the Wall Street Journal today, by Hodding Carter III,
 
Forgive my ignorance, but *who* is Hodding Carter (the Third) and why the hell
should we be convinced he knows anything about the problems with big-time
college athletics?!


>   "College Sports Test: Define Oxymoron; Answer: Student-Athlete."  Read
>   it....

Excuse me while I barf.  At the least, this is stereotypical.
Sure there are "schools" where this may be the case.  But there are many 
where it's not, so please don't lay this "Student-Athlete is_a oxymoron" 
crap_line on me.  It's degrading to those many athletes who came away with 
an honest-to-goodness diploma.
    

>    "....the corruption of higher education by the demands of the 
>    entertainment business that big time college and basketball have
>    become."

In many instances, I'd agree.  Exactly why this stuff belongs in The
Wall Street Journal is anybody's guess, unless they're trying to let
the "well-networked" individual know not to hire anybody who happened
to have played Division 1 basketball or football, or that advertisers
might want to slow-down their pumping of millions of bucks into college
basketball/football if they start cracking down on academics, cause the
quality of the product will deteriorate.  

    
>    "....only 30% of National Football League players graduated from their
>    institutions, and there is reason to believe their graduation rate was
>    somewhat better than their less-talented teammates.  Of the 97 major
>    college basketball programs, 35 have graduation rates of less than
>    20%."

I'd be interested to know what "reason to believe" means.  This would
seem to smack in the face of common sense, IMO.  If I had to guess (and
since nobody's putting any FACTS together on this I can feel free to do 
so) I'd say well over 30% of non-NFLers have picked up their degree.

As to the 35 schools with graduation rates less than 20%, there's a very
simple solution to this:  PUBLISH THE GRADUATION RECORDS.  True, the
sleazoid Tubb/Tarkanians of the profession object, but if you publish
the graduation rates I believe you'll see some changes.


>    Clemson example
>    NCSU example
>    UNC example
>    Florida example
    
Gosh I love it when every example that's used is a southern school.  Are
we to assume that a) Mr. Mok did a CBS-style hack/edit job on the article,
or that b) Mr. Carter (the Third, mind you) has documented proof that
southern schools are the only offenders of whatever he's defined as
being, what, immoral?  Wrong?  Against the law?  Against NCAA regulations?
What?


>    "It's a nice thought.  The way to restore integrity in athletics is to
>    pay a coach more money than anyone else in the college.  It'll be
>    interesting to see the value placed on Mr. Spurrier's integrity if he
>    doesn't produce a winning team."

Yes it is a nice thought.  It's also a concrete step in the right direction.
Mr. Carter's nice little brand of cynicism assumes that it's wrong to 
pay extra to get a guy with integrity (don't tell that to the guy who
just left Fidelity.  Imagine, a Wall Streeter *with* integrity!  Talk
about yer oxymorons!) and that Florida will be quick to can him when he
doesn't post some big-time wins.  Forgive me if I'm willing to cut Florida
a break and actually wait and see what happens.  

    
>    "Those universities that want to have show biz athletic programs should
>    be allowed to run them with professional employees at every level. 
>    Their employees should not have to masquerade as students.  The other
>    institutions of higher learning would opt out entirely, abandon
>    preferential treatment and subsidies for athletes and restore meaning
>    to the phrase 'student-athlete.'"

Mr.Carter assumes a mutual-exclusion between "show biz" athletic programs
and student-athletes.  Hate to bum him out, but there really ARE coaches
around who've known how to combine the two fairly well and, in fact,
have led by example (as opposed to writing stereotypical articles that 
trash everybody just to prove his poorly defined point).  Wooden, Dean, 
Paterno, Knight, Holland, etc, etc.  Why not ask these guys how they do it, 
instead of having  Hodding Carter (the Third) give us a no-solutions 
stereotypial bash?


- ACC Chris
    

    Re:ACC Chris
    Hodding Carter is a noted political commentator who often writes for
    the Wall Street Journal.  I believe he also was an official or an
    ambassador of some kind during the Carter administration.  I think he
    may be from the south and hence all his school references are
    concerning the ACC.  Lighten up, Chris, since he did mention a few good
    things that are happening, like the Presidents of the colleges trying
    to get more control, and the recommendations by a number of UNC
    professors to remedy the ills of college athletics.  I did not type the
    whole article in so to be fair to the guy please find a copy of the
    Journal and read it first.  Why did it belong to the WSJ?  Did you hear
    the radio spot the WSJ has been putting on the past year or so?  WSJ is
    not just for big shots with big account, but for everyone, and they
    have articles on things outside of business from Ninja Turtles to Monet
    to Purdue-Indiana rivalry.  
    
    Of course, I do not claim to agree with all Carter wrote, but it is
    worthwhile reading, a viewpoint from an outsider (and non-sportswriter
    if you will) for a change.
    
    Charles

> Hodding Carter is a noted political commentator who often writes for
> the Wall Street Journal.  

My point exactly.  This guy might know politics, but does this give him
credibility to write about big-time college athletics?  (No, but that
didn't stop that noted sports publication, "The Wall Street Journal",
from running the article.)

My own feeling on this is that the NCAA has plenty of outstanding role
models who know how to run a clean program.  Let's go to *THEM* and let
*THEM* tell us how it should be done, not to the college presidents (though
they should certainly play a role), politicians (yeack), or political
writers (double yeack).

You want a concrete solution to the problem.  Okay, have the NCAA put
together a Blue Ribbon panel made up of the All-Stars of the profession.
Let Dean and Bob and Terry Holland and CoachK and (whoever_else_is_out
_there_with_integrity) and let *THEM* make recommendations on academic
standards, distribution of CBS' billion bucks, etc, etc.  

> I believe he also was an official or an ambassador of some kind during 
> the Carter administration.  

Oh great.  Guess that makes him a sports expert, eh?  I mean, he *DID*
serve under that brilliant sports philosopher Jimmy Carter, who *DID*
make the incredibly insightful and effective decision to boycott the 
1980 Olympic Games, right?

> I think he may be from the south and hence all his school references are
> concerning the ACC.  


Oh, gee, I feel *so* much better.  BLAH.


> Lighten up, Chris, 

Can't.  Not when there's a media hatchet job going on.  (Sorry.)


> like the Presidents of the colleges trying to get more control, 

And this is necessarily a good thing?  Depends on whether the presidents
have integrity, now don't it?  (And please don't assume the answer to this
is yes.)  The only thing I've seen the presidents come up with is a bunch
of stupid self-serving rules that won't help a darn thing.  Again, go to
the people who know what needs to be done.  Heck, they just might tell
ya!


> recommendations by a number of UNC professors to remedy the ills of 
> college athletics.  

First we've got politicians solving athletic problems.  Now perfessors.
If this were a dart game we'd certainly not be zeroing in on the bulls
eye, now would we?


> WSJ is not just for big shots with big account, but for everyone, and they
> have articles on things outside of business from Ninja Turtles to Monet
> to Purdue-Indiana rivalry.  
    
Ah, so now we get to the bottom line.  The part where the self-serving
Wall Street Journal talks about college athletics becoming a big-time
business at exactly the same time their business paper decides to expand
coverage.  

I love it.  (Not really.)


- ACC Chris