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NCAA News Archive - 2007
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Reform effort dismissed as rhetoric
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David Ridpath
Assistant professor, Ohio University Executive Director, The Drake Group
Assistant professor, Ohio University Executive Director, The Drake Group
The first-and-10 sports analogy that Robert L. Caret used with regard to college presidents and more presidential control in intercollegiate athletics in his recent editorial in The NCAA News (March 26) was almost accurate, but not in the context that Caret wants us all to believe. The reality is that the presidents are stuck in the first-and-10 mode and have been for many years, without any indication they are ready to snap the ball and win the game of reforming college athletics.
Caret touts the recent report by the NCAA Presidential Task Force on the Future of Division I Intercollegiate Athletics as a road map for curing the ills that plague college sports, such as excessive athletics spending, professionalizing college sports, academic values and standards, and a lack of leadership. What he doesn’t say, and what the Task Force report doesn’t say, is how that will be done.
As a member of one of the faculty groups that criticized the Task Force report as one of rhetoric and not action, I am curious what recommendations Caret is referring to that are “realistic and can be done,” when the report makes nothing more than cursory recommendations to best practices that are doomed to gather dust while the machine keeps moving down the dark recesses of a point of no return.
Caret does reveal what the presidents are really trying to say when he states the presidents are living in a real world, not an idealistic one. That is simply a fumble on his part. With this, he already has admitted that the presidents don’t want in the game and exercise the leadership to truly reform college sports by a statement like that. It is only idealistic because the presidents simply lack the will to enact changes needed. As Al Gore says with global warming, it can be changed, but we just have to have the will to act. It is time for the presidents to demonstrate that will.
Caret’s rhetoric demonstrates clearly what the Task Force set out to do — which is to continue to paint a façade that says things are actually getting better, when indeed they are getting worse. On literally a daily basis, we see out-of-control spending; sports getting dropped; academic scandals like the recent revelations by the New Jersey Nets’ Antoine Wright on HBO’s “Costas Now” with regard to athletes being clustered in certain majors just to remain eligible to play basketball and other sports at Texas A&M.
I do like much of what President Caret says and I truly believe that he wants something positive to happen. His comments on issues like tying athletics to the university mission; providing a quality, not athletics-friendly education; and transparency in athletics budgeting are excellent. However, his editorial, like the Task Force report, offers little in action and how to fix the problems, other than best practices that no one appears to be rushing to adopt. Much of what Caret is doing at Towson, like restructuring the role and reporting lines of the FAR, is admirable, but there is nothing that shows a roadmap to fixing the core issue of academic integrity such as freshman ineligibility, minimum GPA standards, institutional disclosure to prevent clustering, and to clearly — and transparently — balance the goals of integrity for the university and athletics.
President Caret is right when he states there is nothing inherently wrong with wanting competitive sports teams, but we must remember — it is supposed to be college sports that are an extracurricular activity while the athletes are actual students. Even though he touts benefits of increased enrollment and funding for an institution with a successful athletics department (although there is precious little empirical research to support this other than a short-term spike), actual access to an education and a “realistic model” of change in the structure of intercollegiate athletics to benefit the students first and foremost must be the goal and there must be an action plan to get there.
As a faculty member who has extensive experience in Division I athletics as a coach and administrator, I extend my hand to Caret and the other presidents on the task force to collaborate and enact a real action plan to put the college back into college sports, and not just rewrite another document of best practices that does nothing but continue to put lipstick on a pig. You have the ball, President Caret — don’t fumble again.
David Ridpath
Assistant professor,
Ohio University
Executive Director,
The Drake Group
Caret touts the recent report by the NCAA Presidential Task Force on the Future of Division I Intercollegiate Athletics as a road map for curing the ills that plague college sports, such as excessive athletics spending, professionalizing college sports, academic values and standards, and a lack of leadership. What he doesn’t say, and what the Task Force report doesn’t say, is how that will be done.
As a member of one of the faculty groups that criticized the Task Force report as one of rhetoric and not action, I am curious what recommendations Caret is referring to that are “realistic and can be done,” when the report makes nothing more than cursory recommendations to best practices that are doomed to gather dust while the machine keeps moving down the dark recesses of a point of no return.
Caret does reveal what the presidents are really trying to say when he states the presidents are living in a real world, not an idealistic one. That is simply a fumble on his part. With this, he already has admitted that the presidents don’t want in the game and exercise the leadership to truly reform college sports by a statement like that. It is only idealistic because the presidents simply lack the will to enact changes needed. As Al Gore says with global warming, it can be changed, but we just have to have the will to act. It is time for the presidents to demonstrate that will.
Caret’s rhetoric demonstrates clearly what the Task Force set out to do — which is to continue to paint a façade that says things are actually getting better, when indeed they are getting worse. On literally a daily basis, we see out-of-control spending; sports getting dropped; academic scandals like the recent revelations by the New Jersey Nets’ Antoine Wright on HBO’s “Costas Now” with regard to athletes being clustered in certain majors just to remain eligible to play basketball and other sports at Texas A&M.
I do like much of what President Caret says and I truly believe that he wants something positive to happen. His comments on issues like tying athletics to the university mission; providing a quality, not athletics-friendly education; and transparency in athletics budgeting are excellent. However, his editorial, like the Task Force report, offers little in action and how to fix the problems, other than best practices that no one appears to be rushing to adopt. Much of what Caret is doing at Towson, like restructuring the role and reporting lines of the FAR, is admirable, but there is nothing that shows a roadmap to fixing the core issue of academic integrity such as freshman ineligibility, minimum GPA standards, institutional disclosure to prevent clustering, and to clearly — and transparently — balance the goals of integrity for the university and athletics.
President Caret is right when he states there is nothing inherently wrong with wanting competitive sports teams, but we must remember — it is supposed to be college sports that are an extracurricular activity while the athletes are actual students. Even though he touts benefits of increased enrollment and funding for an institution with a successful athletics department (although there is precious little empirical research to support this other than a short-term spike), actual access to an education and a “realistic model” of change in the structure of intercollegiate athletics to benefit the students first and foremost must be the goal and there must be an action plan to get there.
As a faculty member who has extensive experience in Division I athletics as a coach and administrator, I extend my hand to Caret and the other presidents on the task force to collaborate and enact a real action plan to put the college back into college sports, and not just rewrite another document of best practices that does nothing but continue to put lipstick on a pig. You have the ball, President Caret — don’t fumble again.
David Ridpath
Assistant professor,
Ohio University
Executive Director,
The Drake Group
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