Tech's Academic Record for Athletes Under CPJ

JacketFan77

JacketFan77

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Why you should respect it ...

"They're pushing them through," said Billy Hawkins, an associate professor and athlete mentor at the University of Georgia.

"They're graduating them. UGA is graduating No. 2 in the SEC, so they're able to graduate athletes, but have they learned anything? Are they productive citizens now? That's a thing I worry about. To get a degree is one thing, to be functional with that degree is totally different."

Hawkins, who says in his 25 years at various universities he's witnessed some student-athletes fail to meet college reading standards, added: "It's too much for students reading below a college level. It's basically a farce.
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Don't think you'll ever see Tech's student athletes talked about like that.

http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/07/us/ncaa-athletes-reading-scores/index.html?hpt=hp_t1
 
If you don't think change is going to happen with athletics and academics, you'd be lying to yourself. I have a feeling this is going to be a hot topic this year, and it's already made the front page of NYT, Businessweek.com, etc.
 
Linda Bensel-Meyers, who worked for Tennessee until 2003, said a university-hired psychologist would diagnose learning disabilities in athletes and put them in a program without the graduation requirements set for other students.
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Learning disabilities is where a university can really cheat. All you have to do is "diagnose" someone as learning disabled, then they get significant academic advantages such as untimed tests, flexibility on deadlines, etc.
 
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This is why GT struggles to get top athletes. If all colleges and universities had to tow the line, it would level the playing field. Most colleges and universities are nothing more than minor leagues for the pros !!!!

Good article.
 
MadTownJacket said:
If you don't think change is going to happen with athletics and academics, you'd be lying to yourself. I have a feeling this is going to be a hot topic this year, and it's already made the front page of NYT, Businessweek.com, etc.
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Nope, too much money involved.
 
That professor better hold on to his tenure tight, because UGA isn't going to stand for smartboy talk like that.
 
Why do you guys think we can't find players who are capable of handling a degree program at GT? The problem that we have is that there is a smaller population of them and we have to compete with everyone to get them - not just the Stanfords, Northwestern's, Notre Dame, etc. But, these guys that we want may also want to give the NFL a shot because it could be big money for a few years.

So, having a program that demonstrates the skill set the NFL is looking for has an advantage with these recruits.
 
As a graduate student at UNC-Greensboro, Willingham researched the reading levels of 183 UNC-Chapel Hill athletes who played football or basketball from 2004 to 2012. She found that 60% read between fourth- and eighth-grade levels. Between 8% and 10% read below a third-grade level.
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Jesus... I knew it was bad, but that's unbelievable.
 
I have a feeling...this is bs. Call me when GT decides to not schedule these assholes for any athletic competition....oh right not gonna happen. It's only going to get worse.
 
I was tempted to start a kickstarter project to try and track down and investigate the lives of recruits after college to see which colleges and alumni networks do the best job of helping their recruits after school. I think this is one place we could improve to help our program as fans. I'm not talking about giving guys free rides and telling them to sit around, but real meaningful internships and impactful work experience when they're available.

In any event, I like to think that we avoid this kind of behavior, and that for the most part when our players gradaute they are competent students, but I have no real way of knowing/proving that.
 
GTgrad86 said:
Nope, too much money involved.
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Bingo! With this amount of money in play, they will develop a way to allow to skirt the system. The learning disabilities is prime example. The question becomes does the MSM, public, fans, alumni, etc. finally have the balls to call them on it as a farce. Or do we just look the other way since we finally got that 5 star lineman in which we can crush our rival for the next for years?
 
The article said 22 uga football players weren't college literate. It divided that number by the total number of players on the football team (~180), but does anyone doubt that number is made up entirely of athletic scholly athletes? That is an entire class of players who can't read at a high school level.

The worst part is that uga looks like Harvard compared to unc.
 
johncu said:
Jesus... I knew it was bad, but that's unbelievable.
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It has become apparent to me that UNC is the biggest bunch of cheaters outside the SEC in all of college sports.

It wasn't just in the Butchy tenure but it is long term and systematic.
 
Somehow, even if the charade is fixed and schools are forced to no longer admit barely literate students, I somehow think Tech will end up getting shafted.
 
Gurney, who looked into the situation at the University of Oklahoma, put it bluntly: "College presidents have put in jeopardy the academic credibility of their universities just so we can have this entertainment industry. ... The NCAA continually wants to ignore this fact, but they are admitting students who cannot read.
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I agree, but i'm not sure that public perception is taking a significant hit. UNC is laughed at for the cheating, but it's not seen as a bad school because of it.
 
"And then another came with this request: "If I could teach him to read well enough so he could read about himself in the news, because that was something really important to him," Willingham said."


Wow. Stupid AND self centered. This guy's a double threat!
 
I think we should avoid making fun of the players in these cases, and instead hold the administrators and Athletic Associations who do these things responsible.

I can't imagine being raised in an environment where teaching your children how to read was not seen as a priority.
 
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