Week 4

During Student Populations and Experiences in Higher Education we touched on social issues such as race, gender, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, and many others. I would like to thing that sport provides us with a level playing field for all, but more than anything we drape sport in a veil of ignorance - we claim a level playing field without any foundation.

While reading “Game One” by Tom Farrey we were presented with the children that are pushed into their sport at increasingly younger ages. The pressure on these children often drives them to burn out. The growth of youth sports can be seen as a wonderful opportunity for kids to participate in sports early and often, but such advancement is also pushing youth toward professionalism or more accurately commercialization earlier than ever before.

The NCAA attempts to combat this trend through their commercials highlighting that the vast majority of collegiate student-athletes to not turn pro. Still, those of lesser backgrounds turn to sport as their chance to get out or escape their underprivileged lives. Student-athletes are turning to their athlete identity rather than their student identity in an attempt to secure their future. We as future administrators are face with the most difficult task of how to turn the focus toward the academic portion of the student-athlete experience.

I believe education is the greatest tool for future life. Many of the social factors discussed this week are leading student-athletes to attend college for their sport rather than to play their sport in order to attend college. While we as administrators may not be able to change society before college, we can certainly change the culture within our athletics departments.