Why have we combined minor league football with a college education?

With all the talk about unionizing college athletes last week, I question why we ever combined sports and education in college.  I am not talking about intramural sports nor club sports where the participants generally pay their own way.  I am talking about how we have combined minor league NFL and NBA programs with college. For most of us that is the way it has always been.

Granted, a few student athletes get a great education.  But this seems to be the exception.  Instead the institutions work at perpetuating the myth of the “student athlete” and the only goal is to find a way for the star player to get the minimum passing grade in his classes (which frequently are on a par with high school) and then coddle the athlete so he can retain his athletic eligibility. 

College Football and Basketball are big money – a $16 billion a year business.  And every time you have big money, the temptation is to cheat for a bigger share of the pie.

Why not move college sports into separate minor league teams that are loosely affiliated with colleges?  The business  would receive no financial support and receive none of the revenues of the minor league franchises. That way colleges could concentrate on delivering a great education at a competitive price (I know – you never hear about this second criterion.)

This story about a college football player’s A- final term paper might cause you to question the system we have created.

What is she trying to achieve?

On Charlie Rose Show March 28, 2014 at Bloomberg:

As Charlie Rose introduced Drew Faust, President of Harvard, he said “In her installation address, she said: ‘A university is not about results in the next quarter, it is not even about what the student has become by graduation. It is about learning that molds a lifetime, learning that transmits the heritage of millennia, learning that shapes the future.’”

Here is my question:  How in the heck do we know if the President is achieving her goals?  How would we know if she is an utter failure or a grand success with her stated mission?  Do we have to wait until the President and we are all dead?

It is a noble sounding mission statement.  But is it possible that it is all puff? Pure BS?

Maybe we should state the goals and the mission of the university in more down to earth terms. Perhaps we should express it in simple language such that when the President of Harvard is failing we will know it and we can replace her. Maybe we should be able to measure the results rather than rely on her "gut feeling" or the President's gut feeling as proof of success.

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Johnny graduates from college

Are you excited about attending nephew Johnny’s college graduation?  He was an average high school student.  His parents were so pleased when he attended the local U rather than getting a job or entering a life of crime.  

            He has lived at home for the last six years and finally graduated with a degree in Physical Education.  He got an A in over half of his Physical Education classes (magna cum laude). Johnny never asked if any PE majors were actually getting jobs upon graduation. Guess what? Not one of his fellow grads is getting a job offer (except those drafted into the NFL or NBA).

By the way, Johnny now has $50,000 in college loans, and his parents have guaranteed most of them. The entire family is screwed (although Johnny does know the proper technique for a sit-up).

Poor Johnny – he was brainwashed from the get-go that he was a failure if he didn't attend and graduate from college. 

Maybe next time (Generation Z), we can give Johnny's younger brothers and sisters a few more practical options.  

Peter Thiel on College

Peter Thiel: We’re in a Bubble and It’s Not the Internet. It’s Higher Education.

"I can say that with confidence because it’s about Peter Thiel. And Thiel – the PayPal co-founder, hedge fund manager and venture capitalist – not only has a special talent for making money, he has a special talent for making people furious."

"Instead, for Thiel, the bubble that has taken the place of housing is the higher education bubble. A true bubble is when something is overvalued and intensely believed,” he says. 'Education may be the only thing people still believe in in the United States. To question education is really dangerous. It is the absolute taboo. It’s like telling the world there’s no Santa Claus.”"

"Like any good bubble, this belief– while rooted in truth– gets pushed to unhealthy levels. Thiel talks about consumption masquerading as investment during the housing bubble, as people would take out speculative interest-only loans to get a bigger house with a pool and tell themselves they were being frugal and saving for retirement. Similarly, the idea that attending Harvard is all about learning? Yeah. No one pays a quarter of a million dollars just to read Chaucer. The implicit promise is that you work hard to get there, and then you are set for life. It can lead to an unhealthy sense of entitlement. “It’s what you’ve been told all your life, and it’s how schools rationalize a quarter of a million dollars in debt,” Thiel says."

By the way - a the full price of a Harvard Education today is much more than a quarter million dollars.