Another academic scandal; UNC is f-cked

Oddly enough, I can see where there'd be even more incentive to pull this stuff at schools with better academic reputations. Superjock has far less chance of holding his own academically against the general student population at Michigan or Cal than at Podunk St. Thus, the former have a greater need to separate jocks into "special classes" with special accommodations to keep them eligible.

 

Agreed.

But I have always found it hilarious that the Big Ten bills itself as a place where athletes can achieve academic superiority because the overall universities are better than those in the SEC or Big 12. That's great for the students, but their football and basketball players are as stupid as LSU's or Alabama's or Florida's.

It was most on display during the realignment shuffle, like when the Big 12 stiff-armed Boise because their overall academic standards were so far below the conference's. As if the hoops geniuses at K-State or Mike Leach's band of pirates were on their way to careers in law and investment banking.

 

Oh I agree that the schools don't require it themselves. They only do so (collectively) through the NCAA. But maybe we simply differ on what is meant by "functionally literate human beings."

 

This has nothing to do with your actual point, but your SAT numbers are pretty far off for today's players due to the changes to the test. It's out of 2400 now.

 

Obviously, you have never met any Northwestern athletes.

 

I don't know how that third part is calculated -- is it official or optional? my son isn't old enough yet for me to know that -- but everything I've ever seen about NCAA athletes refers to the old scoring metric.

If you want to multiply it by 1.5 to get today's numbers, that would be fine with me, as I don't think the overall picture is going to change much.

 

Yes, but most schools still only consider the verbal and math scores, which still total the traditional max of 1600.

 

I can't find any recent info, but based on the history you are probably correct. My oversight. I will add Northwestern to Stanford on the list of BCS-conference schools with actual students playing football and basketball.

I believe that would be the only addition necessary out of the 70-some schools in those conferences.

 

If that's true, I rescind my nit-pick. My sons are likewise not old enough (and I'm way too old) for me to know about such things firsthand.

 

I agree with you there.

 

My daughter started college last fall, so I have an idea how that stuff works. In fact, she scored 790 on the writing section so she was extremely pissed to discover most of the schools she was interested in didn't care about that part.

 

So you spend all this time working on writing, only to find out it doesn't matter? I applaud these colleges. They're finally preparing students for the real world.