Volume CXXXIII, Number 6 October 19, 2001 f

Examining college athletes
HUGH HILL

Last week's Orient article regarding relatively lower academic performance for recruited NESCAC athletes should come as no surprise. Even at a school as small as Bowdoin, it is a matter of common knowledge that those recruited to play certain sports do not face as stringent a criterion for admittance as the average student. There is a very good reason behind this. At all colleges and universities, certain sports, can mean a great deal to a school in terms of prestige and, more importantly, money. A championship team in one of these sports can translate into a financial windfall for the school in question in terms of ticket sales and fundraising, and, at the Division I level, television rights, advertising, and merchandising. These sports are clearly an investment that has the potential to reap huge rewards. Hence, the players should not be regarded as students, but as paid employees of the school in question.

Obviously Bowdoin should not do this; the mild discrepancies shown in the NESCAC report pale in comparison to the recruitment excesses of the larger, Division I schools. However, I feel it would be a great and good thing if, for certain college sports at the Division I level, the athletes were not regarded as students.

Why should this be so? In short, it will promote the integrity of the college and university system and promote honesty by drawing a distinction between certain athletes and students. For a number of sports, football and basketball in particular, the NCAA functions as the minor league. At the top-level, these Division I athletes are not students; they are professional athletes in training for a career in the big leagues. They have everything from tuition to housing to even spending money paid for by the universities they play for, not to mention the more luxurious perks they often get from alumni boosters. To meet the NCAA academic standards, special classes are given, tutors hired, and still there are periodic scandals of cheating and grade fixing.

Why go to all this trouble if these athletes are at the school to pursue sports and not academics? Why not just call a stick a stick and be done with it? Unlike the vast majority of the student bodies of these Division I schools, who are there to pursue academic and professional degrees, these athletes are not focused on academia. They are pursuing a career in entertainment by entering the minor leagues (aka the NCAA). It is insulting to the regular students that the athletes are put on the same level as they are. Just as it is insulting to the athletes to have to waste their time on something that is going to mean very little to them in their professional careers. By all means, if the athletes are qualified, let them pursue both their athletics and their studies, if they are up to par in both. But do not make someone do something they are not qualified for. Academic standards for these particular sports at that particular level are as patently ridiculous as requiring every member of a university or college to compete in Division I sports.

This is not the case at Bowdoin. The academic careers of our premiere athletes are not shams, as they are at so many big Division I schools. By virtue of our size and athletic conference, we do not face the problem of having academically unqualified athletes. Our tradition of student athletics is a great and strong one that we should strive to maintain. In keeping with that tradition, we should cancel our recruitment policies. Bowdoin is not a huge state university with Division I teams competing on prime-time TV in front of eighty thousand fans. We do not bring in millions every year in donations, merchandising, and advertising from our sporting teams. The primary goal of our institution is academic and intellectual growth. Sports can be a valuable component of this. When we recruit someone, we tell them that we are not so much interested in what's between their ears as in what they can do on the field. This is a mistake and an affront to Bowdoin's goal of fostering an intellectual community where knowledge is the highest goal.

The big Division I schools do not care about this for their athletes. Their athletes are the future stars in the arena of professional sports, capable of bringing in both money and prestige for their school. They are, in a way, a promotional vehicle for their institutions. Hence, they should not be treated as regular students. They are not there to study but to play a particular sport. They are professional athletes, not professional students. So, if any of you ever become the president of a major academic institution, consider this when you set your admissions criterion.