May-June 2002

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Athletes and Academe

Dick Hoffman

To The Editor:

John Gerdy’s polemic, "Athletic Victories, Educational Defeats," in the January–February 2002 issue of Academe perpetuates the schisms between athletic directors and university presidents by characterizing athletes as dumb jocks and their supporters as morally bankrupt opportunists. How else are we to interpret the following passage? "Today, reform is about the cultural values we will pass on to our children and grandchildren. It is about ensuring that we prize and reinforce honesty, intelligence, and civility over athletic prowess."

Rather than smear athletic prowess as some vice in opposition to honesty, intelligence, and civility, why not recognize the common ground these virtues share? To imply that athletes lack values dismisses the exceptional effort put forth to compete at the elite Division I level in National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) football and basketball. What if schools captured the values of creativity, perseverance, and athleticism in an accredited curriculum for elite sports? Universities award degrees for the performing arts, why not for sports?

This common ground might provide the academic control John Gerdy calls for with accreditation, while awarding student-athletes academic credit for elite performances. Revenue-producing student-athletes are playing twelve football games or thirty-four basketball games each season. They practice daily, watch films, analyze opposing teams, evaluate past performances, create new schemes, learn new assignments, and develop new reads. Moreover, they lift weights, rehabilitate injuries, maintain elevated diets, attend media events, and work on individual skills. These sports physically and cognitively consume their participants.

Athletes’ intellectual efforts to plan and execute game strategies against intimidating opponents in front of thousands of spectators need not go ignored. Instead of perceiving some clash of values, we should trumpet the shared values between academe and athletics, and structure athletics under the governance of academics. The Drake Group, the Knight Foundation, and the NCAA need to consider the student-athletes and their perspective.

Dick Hoffman
(Ed.D. Student)
University of Southern California