I have a dirty little secret: I’m glad that U of T’s Varsity Blues lost their football game to York this past Saturday. I take pleasure from knowing that their epic streak of ineptitude is still intact, now at a robust 28 games.
I don’t say this out of spite, mind you. My smug sense of satisfaction stems from what this streak represents: student athletics in its purest form. This streak proves to me that the dedicated students on the team are students above all else. If the preceding statement seems self-evident to you, then you must not be familiar with the sordid and thoroughly un-academic world of American college sports.
Warning: the following paragraphs are intended for mature audiences only. They contain scenes of sex, violence, and plagiarism.
There is a glossy veneer to NCAA athletics in the United States: the players are more passionate than their professional counterparts, the skill level is impressively high, and games are unpredictable and exciting. Beneath this glittering surface, though, lies the distasteful reality that some of the supposedly finest scholastic institutions in America are willing to subordinate their academic interests to the athletic.
Over the last ten years, American universities have committed sins aplenty in the name of athletics. Potential football recruits at Colorado University were treated to raucous parties at the school’s expense. Colorado’s anything-goes attitude towards the behaviour of recruits has resulted in nine alleged rapes since 1997.
At Baylor University, basketball player Carlton Dotson was recently given over 30 years in prison for murdering teammate Patrick Dennehy. Also, Baylor coach Dave Bliss was implicated for failing to disclose the results of drug tests administered to his players, and for lying to investigators working on the Dennehy case.
These incidents suggest an unconscionable permissiveness on the part of American universities towards the behaviour of their athletes.
Almost incomprehensibly, some universities were willing to countenance the ultimate academic offence in the name of sporting success. In 1999, Jan Gangelhoff, tutor of the basketball team at the University of Minnesota, admitted to writing more than 400 essays on behalf of at least 18 players over the course of five years. Did I mention that this was done at the behest of university officials?
This year it came to light that, at the University of Houston between 1995 and 2003, coordinator for student-athlete academic support Alex Brown procured at least 25 improper grade changes for athletes upon prompting from coaches.
More ridiculous than that, however, was a case from the Deep South. A couple of years ago, University of Georgia assistant basketball coach Jim Harrick Jr. taught a physical education class on the principles of college basketball. Many of his players took the class and all received A’s. Multiple choice examination questions at the end of the course included, “How many halves are in a college basketball game?” and “How many points does a 3-point field goal account for in a basketball game?”
An even more pervasive issue is the question of eligibility. The NCAA requires only a minimum of a 2.0 high school GPA to qualify for lucrative athletic scholarships. This means that in many cases athletes are being accepted ahead of other applicants who better meet the academic requirements of the university. I would be willing to forgive this injustice if I saw that sports were creating meaningful opportunities for those who would not otherwise have them. Unfortunately, this is simply not the case. At some of the most prestigious universities in America-including the universities of Pittsburgh, Texas, North Carolina, Iowa, California, and Michigan-fewer than half of the football players actually graduate.
Why are these institutions of higher learning willing to sell their academic souls for athletics? The answer is greed, of course. College football and basketball yield massive financial rewards from television contracts and prize money-$14-17 million to each of the eight schools that qualify for the Bowl Championship Series in football this year.
University athletics are a much different story here in Canada. Outside of Ontario, schools can award scholarships on the basis of athletics only for the cost of tuition (American schools also cover room and board). Moreover, athletes cannot receive these scholarships in their first year unless they have an 80% average.
In Ontario, regulations are even more stringent. Scholarships are limited to $2,500 per year and are not available to first-year students. Only returning students with an average of 70 per cent are eligible.
All of these figures mean one thing: in Canada, academics are actually treated as the priority. We have student-athletes, not (student)-Athletes.
When I look at the regulations for university athletics in this country and the results of our Varsity Blues, I know that here, at least, nothing has gone wrong.
