Abolish College Sports

[majic]

"how many are actually graduating? "


Don't let a few bad examples fool you.  There is no doubt that there are abuses in basketball and football programs, but there are quite a few more sports with scholarships than those.  


This is according to the NCAA website:

"A graduation rate (percent) is based on a comparison of the number (N) of students who entered a college or university and the number of those who graduated within six years. "

All student grad rate: 56%
Student athlete rate: 58%

Because of the six year rule above, this data is for students who entered in 94/95.

[streakeagle]

The whole college system is worthless. I have just wasted two years and $30,000 dollars finishing a BSEE I started way back in 1987.

In the end, I have killed quite a few trees, lost a lot of sleep, gone into debt, and generally feel like crap so I could get a piece of paper that certifies that I know what I already knew before I went back to school. I learned more in 3 years of working as an industrial controls engineer than these people have learned in a decade of going to school and teaching others. I know what I need to know for the real world. I don't need some "teacher" telling me what I need to know and making me lose sleep practicing math problems that I know for a fact I will never have to solve in real life.

The kids are only here to get the piece of paper as well. Even the majority of "A" students graduate without really knowing anything. They memorize stuff, get their "A", and dump it to make room for the next course without ever getting a real understanding of the material they were supposed to learn. I have seen Electrical Engineering seniors that still can't tell you what the voltage or current is at a given point in a simple circuit because they can't even tell what it is or what it does by looking at it. At best, college proves you can put up with 4 or more years of working hard for low to no pay doing whatever some idiot tells you to do... maybe that is good preparation for the real world

The average guys that couldn't cut college but join the Navy, get comprehensive electronics schooling, and apply it for 4 years in a challenging evironment get a much better education, and the Navy pays them to do it Funny how they are looked down upon by the degreed engineers whose only advantage is knowing how to use a fancier calculator (if even that).

Of course I am an exception. I have both sets of knowledge and experience and never let my college instructors forget it whenever they start teaching crap that just isn't true.

If kids can get an opportunity they otherwise wouldn't just by being able to run fast or handle a ball well, more power to them. The schools are all about profits and sports (especially football) bring in tons of cash, which ultimately helps out the entire school. Who cares if someone else is exploiting the system for personal gain as long as the kids are getting what they came for.

[Dinger]

Gotta disagree folks.  I'm not saying student-athletes aren't a good idea in theory, I'm saying it doesn't always work that way in practice, and in many places, the pressures are on anything but academic work.

Graduation numbers mean nothing when the NCAA requires student-athletes to have certain graduation rates.  Trust me, there's someone in the school whose job it is to ensure a certain graduation level, by any means necessary.  And the hardest way to do that is to make the student work. The easiest way is to find a means of changing grades.

Fatty, sure, plenty of people go to Universities for vocational training; it happens in part because there are way too many jobs in the world that require a college degree, even if, in fact, that college degree doesn't make the person any more qualified technically to do the job.
But if students are going to universities for vocational training in sports, where the university is making tons of money off of them. why the hell not have minor leagues instead?  That's what they're there for.
And in any case, the cases are a little different.  Some students actively seek easy courses that don't challenge them.  Others follow their interests.  Many of the student-athletes here don't have that choice -- they're steered away from challenging courses and into a phony major so they can have time to practice.  You call this a university education?

You can cite all the "good students" you like, and talk about the "minor sports" that don't garner the headlines and may have less pressure on the students, but having seen and dealt with both students and athletic departments, I maintain the students are getting screwed.  A scholarship isn't enough; they are professionals first and students second, and should be paid that way.

Heck, if you want to have "student athletes", do it this way: pay the students for their years of eligibility, AND give them the option of a full scholarship after they've left the field.  The current system does nothing but screw the students and corrupt academic standards.

[streakeagle]

Hard to corrupt something that is already corrupt.

Schools are a pump not a filter (old quote from the Navy, but certainly applies to Universities).

People pay money for 4 to 6 years, kid gets piece of paper. End of story.

That some teachers actually try to do a good job and some students actually learn something along the way is the exception to the rule.

You pretty much have to really piss somebody off poltically to get kicked out of school without a degree... unless you stop paying. Then you are gone in an instant.

Do the majority of students who take more "challenging" courses actually learn any more than athletes? I would argue they both get a piece of paper with slightly different wording. Of course one played his/her heart out in a sport while jumping through larger academic hoops whereas the other partied while squeezing through smaller academic hoops.

Same difference. When they show up for their first job, they will quickly realize that what they were exposed to in school just isn't going to be all that useful towards what they will be doing the rest of their life. That's true of both business and engineering degrees. I don't know about liberal arts stuff, do those count for anything in any way other than teaching positions?

[Fatty]

But if students are going to universities for vocational training in sports, where the university is making tons of money off of them. why the hell not have minor leagues instead? That's what they're there for.

I lost this thread, but Dinger, surely you are not suggesting universities sever all ties to corporations?  After all, they should have on the job training if they're going to make money for the university.

Or is it only a problem when the universities are making the money from athletics?

[funkedup]

Streak you must have gone to a crappy university.