<p>Well, then, Alabama shouldn’t complain when they try to raise their academic profile in the rest of the country (by offering significant scholarships and the like) and they have a hard time finding takers.</p>
<p>Why not find out the facts before you post something like that. Hard time finding any takers??? LOL… Bama had over 12,000 applicants this year that qualified for those scholarships. </p>
<p>Last fall, Bama moved to Top 10 for NMFs that go to a public U. Bama’s frosh class this year had nearly 500 freshman who took the Presidential scholarship alone (which requires a high SAT/ACT/GPA). </p>
<p>PG…do you just write stuff just hoping that it <em>might</em> be true because you so, so, badly want it to be true?</p>
<p>Fair or not, there is a general perception that some schools sacrifice their academic souls in order to succeed in football. The usual defense—which isn’t unreasonable—is that athletic funds and general university funds are separate, so that success in one does not preclude success in the other.</p>
<p>However, the headlines are full of examples of the academic consequences of an overemphasis on athletic success: the admission of academically unqualified athletes; the admission of criminals; dubious correspondence courses being accepted for university credit; tutors doing the athletes’ homework for them; professors being pressured to award passing grades that were not earned.</p>
<p>The more a university *appears *to worship the game of football, the more it is *perceived *as being prone to these unscrupulous practices. And nothing says worship like a statue of the current, mercenary head coach after only his third year. This can be justified—“Bama has a statue of EVERY coach that has won a national championship”—but that doesn’t change the perception.</p>
<p>That’s what I mean when I ask, “What does this say about the University of Alabama?” It may not be true that 'Bama cares about football more than academics, but the football-mad culture, with the sky-high coach’s salary and the statue, do indeed say it. And for some students and parents who believe, with some justification, that athletic success comes at an academic price, the University of Alabama will be eliminated from consideration.</p>
<p>Oh dear, you’ll soon find out what Ole Miss thinks about football…and then what are you going to do? and if you wanted to eliminate Bama over Ole Miss, then that’s fine…but it certainly was not a decision based on academic superiority.</p>
<p>While the Bama naysayers continue with their spiel, Bama will just continue doing what it’s doing…improving its school</p>
<p>*And for some students and parents who believe, with some justification, that athletic success comes at an academic price, the University of Alabama will be eliminated from consideration. *</p>
<p>Ha ha! Bama will have received over 20,000 apps this year. About how many will Ole Miss get?</p>
<p>Just checked…Ole Miss will receive about 9,000 apps this year of which they will accept about 80%. People who live in glass houses, should be very careful of where and to whom they throw stones.</p>
<p>I’m doing my best to have an objective discussion here, but you’re not making it easy. If Ole Miss erects a statue of Houston Nutt next year, you can bet I’ll be just as critical of them.</p>
<p>The point is that there’s a ***PERCEPTION ***that big-time football schools sacrifice academics in their drive to build a better football team. Do you disagree that people have that perception? I hope you’ll respond with something other than, “Ha-ha, people at Ole Miss are too dumb to perceive anything, har-har, yuk-yuk!”</p>
<p>I don’t give a rat’s patootie that some people have perceptions about ANYTHING. Some have the perception that UVA is somehow responsible for the death of a young girl. Some have the perception that the South is full of racists. Some people have the perception that Asian parents are too hard on their kids regarding academics. Some have the perception that NE people are big snobs. Who cares what some people’s perceptions are of ANYTHING??? Some people are just wrong.</p>
<p>The fact is that Bama was drowned in apps this year and the previous few years. The donations are coming in by the millions. The school will soon be completing a Science and Engineering complex that will rival what anyone else has. The scholarships are being accepted by the hundreds. Obviously, the perception by some isn’t hurting them one tiny bit.</p>
<p>That Alabama chooses to erect statues of all its football coaches is not a defense to the practice. It merely shows how much they value football, which is the point. So you want to value football. Go ahead. It’s your state. The same state where ads are running saying Bradley Byrne shouldn’t be the GOP’s candidate because he supports teaching evolution and has said the Bible is only partially right. But you do have statues of all your football coaches.</p>
<p>Please read the previous posts correctly. Bama does NOT erect statues of ALL of its football coaches. It only does for the very few that have won national championships. And, BTW, most of the country has no idea that Bama even does this, so it couldn’t possibly have any real affect on anything.</p>
<p>*Ah, to heck with it. You’re right. I wish my son had chosen the University of Alabama. *</p>
<p>Oh, no. Be glad that your son is going to Ole Miss - a school where you think you won’t have to worry about “others” thinking poorly of it.</p>
<p>Not sure what college you attended, Pizza Girl, but should I conclude that it sucked because it produces students who don’t check their facts before they spout invalid opinions? Alabama is having no trouble finding takers for its scholarships. The university has hundreds of National Merit Scholars. My son will be one of them this Fall.</p>
<p>Regardless of where you stand on the Saban statue issue, asserting that sports fanaticism cannot, and does not, co-exist with academic excellence means that Michigan, USC, Duke, Penn State, Texas, Notre Dame, and countless other universities are academic weaklings whose students are poorly educated because their school is immersed in the big business of college sports. </p>
<p>And just so you know, during our visit to Alabama this past March we met with the university president, who informed us that the University of Alabama intercollegiate athletic program (all of it, every sport) is entirely self-sustaining and actually returns a profit to the school. It does not siphon off money from academics. Can your university say the same?</p>
<p>“the perception by some isn’t hurting them one tiny bit.”</p>
<p>I don’t think you can conclude that. You can conclude that it isn’t hurting them badly. I don’t think there’s any doubt that all the big football powerhouses lose some potential students (and especially, potential faculty hires) due to the perception that football is king at that campus. Each of those schools has made the determination that the football program helps more than it hurts. In Bama’s case, the facts suggest that they’re making the right call. That doesn’t mean it’s all pro and zero con.</p>
<p>I mean, looking at the schools at the other extreme, there are some desirable candidates who avoid the Ivy League each year because they want a college with big-time sports. On balance, the Ivies are attracting plenty of the kids they want, but I’d never say their policy doesn’t hurt them one tiny bit. It just helps them more than it hurts them.</p>
<p>My D who is a NMF just committed to attend Bama this fall based on the academic opportunities available through the honors college, the cutting edge technology and incredible science facilities. </p>
<p>FYI to all of the haters: The SEC, of which UA is a member, has higher academic standards than a number of other conferences. </p>
<p>And why is this concern about athletics rarely brought up in regard to college basketball. Don’t Duke, UNC, and other elite schools, have some of the best Bball programs in the nation? </p>
<p>Finally, Coach Saban has given millions to UA’s academic scholarship program since becoming coach there. He and Terry love Tuscaloosa. He has said that this is his last stop, but even if it isn’t, UA fans are, and will contine to be grateful for his service. And though we love Coach Saban, the majority of UA alumni also continue to love and respect Coach Mike Shula, Saban’s predecessor, who won far fewer games than Saban has.</p>
<p>If I saw anyone in the Alabama library during a home football game, I would certainly ask “Why are you here instead of at the game?” Nothing like SEC sports, and I’m glad 'Bama has strengthened its honors program so much. I know a number of very bright kids from the Nashville area who have picked Alabama Honors over more prestigious and much higher cost options.</p>
<p>Count me in as another mom with a NMF who happily accepted her full tuition, full housing, laptop, study abroad and stipend from the University of Alabama! The statues in front of Bryant Denny stadium (on the Walk of Champions Plaza) are only of the coaches who won a National Championship while at UA. Coach Sabin did that this year so he will get a statue. Sabin is the 5th coach to win a National Championship at UA (although the team has 13 National Championships) so his statue will be unveiled in August to join the 4 statues currently in place. </p>
<p>Yes, football is big down in SEC country. It is in our high school too, yet we have 1 of 3 IB programs in the state of TN and guess what? 3 IB students were on the football team. Athletics and academia do not have to be mutually exclusive. </p>
<p>So my D gets to be in 2 honors programs and have fun too. While UA is busy adding additional seating in the stadium, they are also in the process of completing a 900,000-square-feet of new state-of-the-art science research and teaching facility. They are growing their student body by recruiting top students and faculty. Unlike many universities that were hit hard because their (previously) large endowments were sitting in exotic financial instruments. I work for a Top 20 school; I know the types of cutbacks that are being implemented at other top schools as they try to stop the hemorrhaging due to fund losses combined with ambitious building plans. If all the money at UA was going towards athletics, I’d say y’all might have a point, but President Witt has demonstrated that academics are his priority. So it’s the best of both worlds :)</p>
<p>My son is another one that is considering UofA as an NMF Scholar next year. He couldn’t care less about the football team. He couldn’t name the football coach if his life depended on it. When we visited recently I had to remind him that Bama won the National Championship this year. Also, he had never heard of Bear Bryant so I filled him in on that as well. On our tour he barely noticed the football stadium however he was quite excited about the new Shelby Science Complex and the tour of the biology labs. Bama’s got a lot more going for it than just a football team and as a result is attracting some of the top students from around the country.</p>
<p>While I agree that Bama has a lot going for it besides football, football is a HUGE part of the culture and if I truly was not interested in the sport or the school’s success in it at all, I would have second thoughts about Bama as my school. I think it can be hard to swim that much upstream, although I’m sure some do it.</p>
<p>I suppose if one were strongly “Anti Football” one might have problems in that culture. However, my son is more indifferent to it than opposed to it. Also, other schools such as Notre Dame, Duke, UNC, Stanford, etc seem to be able to blend strong athletics with strong academics so I don’t see it to be that big of an issue.</p>
<p>If the academics are that strong, then let’s look at the graduation rates of those athletes at Alabama. I would love to see Coach Saban make sure that ALL of those athletes graduate and in a timely fashion. And, by the way, not a BAMA hater–respect Coach Saban a lot, just think there could still be some improvement with regards to academics, esp among the athletes!</p>
Nothing like SEC sports, and I’m glad 'Bama has strengthened its honors program so much. I know a number of very bright kids from the Nashville area who have picked Alabama Honors over more prestigious and much higher cost options.</p>