<p>thought this guy summed it up pretty nicely: [Texas</a> A&M’s move to SEC evidence of NCAA’s lost mission | Jeff Schultz](<a href=“http://blogs.ajc.com/jeff-schultz-blog/2011/08/13/texas-ams-move-to-sec-evidence-of-ncaas-lost-mission/?cxntfid=blogs_jeff_schultz_blog&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter]Texas”>http://blogs.ajc.com/jeff-schultz-blog/2011/08/13/texas-ams-move-to-sec-evidence-of-ncaas-lost-mission/?cxntfid=blogs_jeff_schultz_blog&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter)</p>
<p>Wait… did I miss an announcement that the Aggies have left the Big 12??? Not in the same conference as Texas??</p>
<p>Teriwtt, I suspect that announcement will come on Monday on whether or not they will leave and join the SEC. They will no longer be in the same conference as Texas.</p>
<p>teri, they all but gone. We’ll know for sure Monday. I’m glad they’ll make a lot of money to lose all those games in the SEC.</p>
<p>The problem with college football (and basketball) is that some of the players can barely read, some are criminals, many of them have their work done for them, and the colleges are facilitating all of this.</p>
<p>There is nothing wrong with college football or other college sports, the issue is with big time college sports. Sports do a lot for students, students even in non big time sports like lacrosse and so forth can get athletic scholarships and be able to go to school and get an education and I think it also helps them as people.</p>
<p>The problem with big time college sports is that they are huge, money making operations and schools make decisions based on that, rather then on the fundamental mission to educate students. In college, basketball and football at the division 1 level are basically the feeders for the pros, the farm system, so the emphasis is on building a program that sends athletes to the NFL or NBA. More importantly, big time college football draws money and what they as prestige, between selling out stadiums that can hold 100,000, merchandising and tv contracts they can bring in many millions of dollars. Schools now will shift conferences based on the popularity of that conference for broadcasters, the SEC has one of the largest tv presences around and gets a lot of money from those contracts, for example. I think U of T either just formed or was the chief beneficiary of a Texas sports television (seems to be kind of like the Yankees with the YES network), and so forth. Notre Dame became an independent school so they could choose their own schedule, and also sign their own tv contract rather then taking the conference one (this happened years ago). Basically, college football and basketball on that level are de facto commercial sports ventures, not college athletics as is practiced by 80% of the students who do it.</p>
<p>The problem? It perverts the whole mission of college sports, quite frankly. College is supposed to be about learning first, but with big time college sports it is sports first and the learning is often a joke (want proof? Auburn got hit with major sanctions, when they disovered thanks to a whistleblower that members of the football team were majoring in sociology I believe, and the head of the department kind of made sure they didn’t have to go to class, they all were on 'independent study"…). </p>
<p>Personally, I think that for big time division 1 athletics that they should just admit what it is, a farm system for the pros, and turn it into a commercial venture without the pretense of being for education. Teams could be associated with the schools, and if a player wanted to get an education, fine, they could do so, but the rest of it, the idiotic NCAA rules to maintain "amateur’ status and so forth, would be replaced by professional contracts and such. Considering the fact that the money these programs bring in generally goes right back into the program itself and doesn’t, despite claims to the contrary, bring general funding to the school, it wouldn’t be any big loss.</p>
<p>It is hard for me to get worked up over the lost academic potential of 100 students out of Texas A&M’s undergraduate population of 40,000. They are receiving other valuable benefits and opportunities from playing on the team. I do think they should receive a decent monthly allowance of spending money, however.</p>
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<p>Why is that?</p>
<p>The problem with college football is that…we like it.</p>
<p>Mini for the win.</p>
<p>Pierre - I understand that you all could also soon be getting pounded by Alabama instead of feasting on my Demon Deacons. :)</p>
<p>The problem with college football is that it is absolutely ridiculous for the schools to be making hundreds of millions of these “college students” without them getting a sizable share of the money. I believe the students should be getting a paycheck every month. Coaches making $5million dollars and the kids getting what? $25,000 “scholarship” this is ridiculous. </p>
<p>If you dare sell your jersey to a booster, the morally bankrupt NCAA will come after you like the way they “go after” (sarc) the coaches who break the “rules”.</p>
<p>I find the way they treat these athlete morally wrong, most of these “students” are not students in any usual way we define students. They are at the university to perform a job which brings the university millions of dollars, and it’s about time that they got a bigger share of the pie.</p>
<p>[SEC</a> quashes talk about football expansion - College Football News | FOX Sports on MSN](<a href=“http://msn.foxsports.com/collegefootball/story/Southeastern-Conference-nixes-talk-about-expansion-including-Texas-A%26M-081411?gt1=39002]SEC”>http://msn.foxsports.com/collegefootball/story/Southeastern-Conference-nixes-talk-about-expansion-including-Texas-A%26M-081411?gt1=39002)</p>
<p>Doesn’t look like the Aggies are going anywhere, for now.</p>
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<p>Check your numbers. There are plenty of these groups in the “general student body” too. And many of them are receiving scholarships. It’s not just a sports thing like anti-athletic individuals like to push.</p>
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<p>Wow, you almost make that sound like a mitigating factor. If all or any of those things are true, these schools are essentially stealing from their students. If these athletes are bringing in millions, the minimum they’re entitled to is a decent education and money to survive (and the students who aren’t bringing in that amount still are entitled to a shot at an education too). The fact that there are problems outside the athletic world doesn’t vitiate the problems within the athletic world. If the system is failing one group of students, it’s hardly a defense to point out that they’re failing other groups of students at the same time. To me, that makes it worse, not better!</p>
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<p>The point you missed is that it’s not a matter of the universities failing the athlete. It’s a matter of the universities failing the student. Also, you’ll find that athletes have a higher graduation rate than nonathletes at many schools.</p>
<p>I didn’t miss that point. However, I believe that schools with large, powerful sports programs have a special responsibility to their athletes in their roles as athletes as well as in their roles as students. For some schools, sports is big business yet the athletes are pretty much left out of most of the benefits of being involved in big business. I don’t see how that’s fair to the athletes and it’s a problem that exists independently of the graduation problem. </p>
<p>I’d like to see a source on your second claim too. I’ve seen discussions like this before and I get mixed results when researching graduation rates (such as in [url=<a href=“Economics | Illinois Wesleyan”>Economics | Illinois Wesleyan]this</a> report<a href=“PDF”>/url</a>. While you’re right that most athletes (those in non-revenue earning sports) do have a higher graduation rate, athletes in many revenue-earning sports (for example, some players at the Big Ten) fall behind non-athletes.</p>
<p>Ever heard of the APR in athletics? Academic Progress Report-- each NCAA team gets a grade every year based on their student-athletes progressing toward graduation and graduating from college. If the team does not meet certain requirements, they get in trouble through the NCAA. These requirements are not your “walk in the park” requirements people think they are.</p>
<p>yes, and how many big time athletic programs have a huge staff of tutors to “help” their athletes maintain the required GPA?</p>
<p>soccerguy, if these athletes bring millions into the school, what’s wrong with the school spending extra on tutors to give the athletes an actual education? </p>
<p>At my daughter’s school, I don’t know about extra tutors (or at least, “huge staff” of tutors), but she said that there were people connected with the university who followed the students to class, and kept logs to make sure they got to class on time, didn’t bug out early, and participated in discussion. If they acted up, these people kept them in line. Seemed like a win for the students, and a win for the school.</p>