College bound students around the world are in search of an easier route to be accepted into college. What about college athletes? These students are those who stand out. Many college athletes feel as though they deserve a “reward” for enhancing the school’s program. Though they may deserve acknowledgement of their participation, lowering admission standards will lower their effort in school as well. Intercollegiate athletic programs corrupt their educational institutions by advertising a double standard and devaluing scholarships in favor of athletic competition.
The lowering of admission for student athletes is not beneficial for one’s academic standing because it encourages the student(s) to be lazy. Often, entire programs are implicated to academic scandals, which leads to professors changing grades without proper authorization (Gurney). In a Atlanta Journal- Constitution article, the reporter does extensive research on the gap between an average accepted student to an athletes SAT scores. There is nearly a difference nearly 200 points from those students who were average of the student body. In Alison Go’s article “Athletes Show Huge Gaps in SAT Scores,” she states a similar problem occurring in many colleges:
Now the Atlanta Journal-Constitution has gone ahead and quantified that by comparing average SAT scores and grade-point averages of athletes with the rest of the college's student body. Not surprisingly, football and men's basketball players came out on the bottom, and some averaged hundreds of points lower on SATs than their classmates.
The Journal-Constitution studied 54 public universities, "including the members of the six major Bowl Championship Series conferences and other schools whose teams finished the 2007-08...
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...eyond college. If administration does decide to raise the standards for student athletes, the students will be well-prepared for the future. the institution will not only have a successful athletic program, but also successful academic standings.
Works Cited
Atlas, Ben. "Admissions requirements for athletes should remain lenient." The Oracle. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 Nov. 2013.
Barker, Jeff. “Special admissions bring colleges top athletes, educational challenges.” The Baltimore Sun. 22 Dec. 2012. Wed. 8 Nov. 2013.
Gurney, Gerald. "Commentary." The Chronicle of Higher Education. N.p., 12 Apr. 2011. Web. 11 Nov. 2013.
Lederman, Doug . "The Admissions Gap for Big-Time Athletes | Inside Higher Ed." The Admissions Gap for Big-Time Athletes | Inside Higher Ed. N.p., 29 Dec. 2008. Web. 11 Nov. 2013.
Port, Rob. "Say Anything." Say Anything. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 Nov. 2013.
College athletes have a goal that they pursue. The jump to the professional sports leagues is an accomplishment that most college athletes wanted to achieve. But most college athletes go to college and forego completing their senior year and don’t get a degree. In basketball most athletes are one and done. This means they go to college for only one year then enter the NBA draft. For the NFL players have to be out of high school for three years and necessarily don’t have to go to college.
In today’s college atmosphere equality is stressed but is there a double standard for the college student/athlete. In the paper I will briefly outline the various ways college athletes are among the chosen ones in the college realm.
GRADUATION RATES AT NCAA DIVISION I INSTITUTIONS. [e-book] Indianapolis: NCAA. Available through: NCAA Web http://www.ncaa.org/sites/default/files/GSR%2Band%2BFed%2BTrends%2B2013_Final_0.pdf [Accessed: 11 Mar 2014].
Throughout the country young men and women are losing their priority for an education. To attend a university should be a highly cherished privilege, and it should be an even greater honor to play athletics for the university. Therefore, the writer supports the decision that the “student” comes before “athlete” in student-athlete. Playing for pay should be considered a job for “professionals”. In the rulebook, the NCAA views college athletes as armatures. This statement sums it up best. When athletes go to college, not all of them go in with the mindset that athletics is going to be their future job....
Beginning in the 1920s, public interest towards college sports sky rocketed with the growing opportunities of higher education for everyone, regardless of social status. This effect caused the Carnegie Foundation for Advancement of Education to take a closer look into this fast growing industry in the “Carnegie Report” in 1929. The report made a plea to the NCAA to reduce the level of commercialization and improve academic integrity for all student-athletes. This is just the first time the NCAA receives this very recommendation. Post World War II brought another increase in college attendance with government financed aid to veterans. Widespread availability of televisions and radios lead to broadcasting of college sport events, bringing in a multitude of fans as well as the expected friends and family of athletes. Soon gambling and excessive means of recruiting tempted the industry and the NCAA was forced to...
"College Athletic Programs Undermine Academics." Student Life. Detroit: Greenhaven Press, 2011. Opposing Viewpoints. Gale Opposing Viewpoints In Context. Web. 27 July 2011.
College sports are a major revenue producing industry. Athletic programs and their student-athletes can achieve national recognition and generate millions of dollars in revenue for their university. Colleges use this revenue to invest in players, pay for their education, and provide state of the art training facilities, which are used to improve their athletic performance. As revenue driven colleges begin to prioritize athletics, the emphasis on the quality and standards of an undergraduate education are diminishing. Compromising their academic acceptance requirements, universities have now found that the educational ability of their newly accepted student athletes are inadequate, to say the least (Gurney). The same universities must then spend millions of dollars to provide these athletes with “learning specialists”, who in turn helps them to meet academic requirements and maintain their eligibility (...
Pennington, Bill. "Expectations Lose to Reality of Sports Scholarships." nytimes.com. New York Times, 10 Mar. 2008. Web. 17 Dec. 2013.
Schneider, Raymond G. "College Students' Perceptions on the Payment of Intercollegiate Student-Athletes." College Student Journal 35.2 (2001): 232. Questia School. Web. 3 Feb. 2014.
Lee, Brian. "Are college sports worth the cost?" PBS (2011): 2. online. 20 November 2013. .
Student athletes should not be paid more than any other student at State University, because it implies that the focus of this university is that an extracurricular activity as a means of profit. Intercollegiate athletics is becoming the central focus of colleges and universities, the strife and the substantial sum of money are the most important factors of most university administration’s interest. Student athletes should be just as their title states, students. The normal college student is struggling to make ends meet just for attending college, so why should student athletes be exempt from that? College athletes should indeed have their scholarships cover what their talents not only athletically but also academically depict. Unfortunately, the disapproval resides when students who are making leaps academically are not being offered monetary congratulations in comparison to student athletes. If the hefty amount of revenue that colleges as a conglomerate are making is the main argument for why athletes should be paid, then what is to stop the National Clearinghouse from devising unjust standards? Eventually if these payments are to continue, coaches, organizations, and the NCAA Clearinghouse will begin to feel that “c...
Weistart, John C."College Sports Reform: Where are the Faculty." 4 12-17.Aug. 1987. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40249956. Web. 22 Apr. 2014
Around the country, college athletic programs are pushing their athletes more and more every day. The NCAA (National Collegiate Athletic Association) is an association set up to regulate the athletic programs of colleges in the United States and Canada such as eligibility, sportsmanship, and play. Due to NCAA rules, the “student” comes first in “student athlete.” This means that in order to be a full time student, 12 credit hours a semester are required, and in order to compete in athletics, students must maintain a core GPA of 2.3 or higher. It may seems easy right now but throw in lifting, games and practices, along with team meetings, and you’ve got yourself a full time job on the side.
For decades there has been a debate on student athletes and their drive to succeed in the classroom. From the very beginning of organized college level athletics, the goal to want to succeed in athletics has forced students to put academics to the back burner. In spite of the goal to want to succeed over a hundred years of attempts to check limits of intercollegiate athletic programs on colleges' academic standards still seems to struggle to this day. This brings to surface one of the most asked questions in sports, “What effect does college sports have on academics and economics?” Herbert D. Simons, Derek Van Rheenen, and Martin V. Covington, authors of “Academic Motivation and the Student Athlete” researched the topic on whether athletics and academics benefit each other. Bryan Flynn, the author of “College Sports vs. Academics” poses the question “Should institutions of higher learning continue to involve themselves in athletic programs that often turn out to be virtual arms races for recruiting talented players who bring big money and prestige, but put academics to the back burner?” Although both authors agree that sports have an impact on an athlete’s academics, the focus of their argument differs.
Students are more focused on sports during college than their education. Which in the long run will affect them more. While the standards are increasing and student athletes not taking education serious enough there can or will be at risk. Standards for the incoming freshman class of 2016 are being increased. Many schools have decided that students who want to participate in sports need to have better grades.