Intercollegiate Athletics
Research Paper
Intercollegiate athletics is an excellent public relations and fund raising arm for colleges, while providing education and training to future professional athletes.
Academic programs have always criticized college athletic programs. There are five main reasons or accusations as many will call it. First it is said that all major and some smaller colleges routinely lower the admission standards for athletes because of the exposure that they bring to the university. The Ivy League, for example, have on average some of the lowest SAT scores than what are recorded at many other prestigious schools. Many schools will admit that they do allow and recruit athletes with scores of 820 points, which is almost 200 points below the national average. Amazingly enough and a reason for these accusations is because it is much lower than the standards for non-athletic students. Some schools often reserve certain spots just for in coming scholarship athletes. Second, athletes often get far better treatment than academic students. Most schools will immediately enroll their lower scoring athletic students into tutorial programs to ensure that they meet the minimum standards without affecting the time they must spend on their sport. Third, many dollars are spent on athletic programs when compared to academic programs. The salaries of college coachers are now easily at $1 million a year or more at some of the more powerful, prestigious schools. Some colleges will raise more money for a new stadium to build a dynasty rather than educational equipment or libraries to build their graduation rates and test scores. Fourth, college to most athletes is a short trip and pre-requisite for the big money to come from professional contracts worth millions of dollars. College is only used to increase their status in the draft and the amount of money they can make. Lastly, elite athletic programs prohibit and discourage regular students to participate, not to mention allows
Intercollegiate athletics is an excellent public relations and fund raising arm for colleges, while providing education and training to future professional athletes.
Academic programs have always criticized college athletic programs. There are five main reasons or accusations as many will call it. First it is said that all major and some smaller colleges routinely lower the admission standards for athletes because of the exposure that they bring to the university. The Ivy League, for example, have on average some of the lowest SAT scores than what are recorded at many other prestigious schools. Many schools will admit that they do allow and recruit athletes with scores of 820 points, which is almost 200 points below the national average. Amazingly enough and a reason for these accusations is because it is much lower than the standards for non-athletic students. Some schools often reserve certain spots just for in coming scholarship athletes. Second, athletes often get far better treatment than academic students. Most schools will immediately enroll their lower scoring athletic students into tutorial programs to ensure that they meet the minimum standards without affecting the time they must spend on their sport. Third, many dollars are spent on athletic programs when compared to academic programs. The salaries of college coachers are now easily at $1 million a year or more at some of the more powerful, prestigious schools. Some colleges will raise more money for a new stadium to build a dynasty rather than educational equipment or libraries to build their graduation rates and test scores. Fourth, college to most athletes is a short trip and pre-requisite for the big money to come from professional contracts worth millions of dollars. College is only used to increase their status in the draft and the amount of money they can make. Lastly, elite athletic programs prohibit and discourage regular students to participate, not to mention allows
Bibliography: 3. Latrigue, Jr., Casey J. “Honorable Dropouts.” USA Today. June 30, 1999. 4. MacLeish, Gideon. “Time to Stop Pretending College Athletes are Amateurs.” Online. Sep 16, 2006. (http://www.wincustomize.com/articles.aspx?aid=130591&c=1) 5. Isidore, Chris 6. Whiteside, Kelly. “College Athletes Want Cut of Action.” USA Today. August 31, 2004. 7. Beauchamp, Rev 10. McCluskey, Neil. “Duke the devil in sports.” Online. March 9, 2006. ( http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=5973)