@Nrdsb4 In my experience, “preferences” is often code for who they really hire, and in a private company it is a free country unless it is a protected class, and athletes are not protected.
I think that what people were objecting to was the assumption that someone who you believe was popular or an athlete was therefore a horrible bully and its okay to reject them for a job on that basis. I wasn’t popular in school, (nor is my special snowflake popular or a jock) but I’m not sure what I’d say if asked in a job interview. If you are seriously asking applicants if they were popular, you might be rejecting a bullied kid who isn’t comfortable telling a stranger they were bullied or unpopular. Traumatic experiences are always going to shape how you see the world and yours sound pretty horrible; but everyone should try to avoid projecting the past on people they know nothing about. That’s not blaming the victim, that’s suggesting that you’re taking your revenge on the wrong people.
The comment above is referencing the very really problem that people who haze (serious violent hazing) almost always justify their behavior by explaining that they were hazed too.
I’ve not particularly run into employers who love athletes, although I guess it might pop up at some corporations. The dumb jock, frat boy, and sorority girl stereotypes are quite common in the workplace. Back in the late 80s, my old law firm had an applicant for a summer clerkship with good grades from a top 10 law school who also was participating in a state Miss America pageant. We (both the women and the men) were ready to toss that application in the trash because who puts that on their resume? But then we met her and she was a smart, serious person who happened to be financing her expensive private school tuition by entering scholarship pageants (she also had an undergrad degree in women’s studies). We did counsel her about putting it on her resume for future jobs, but we also had some serious discussions among ourselves about our knee-jerk reaction to the tall, pretty blond girl and that stereotyping her was just as sexist as the behavior of the male attorneys we routinely complained about. She wasn’t a bitchy, queen bee bully, snotty “popular girl” (which we had all experienced in high school), which was obvious once we actually judged her on her own merit and actions. I really think that’s all people are suggesting.
@Cupcake - You seem to be very frosted about these issues. Punishing innocent people is a very half-baked idea. I think you knead to speak to someone who can give you a better recipe for dealing with your past bad experiences. Maybe getting some counseling will help you rise to the occasion; it’s the yeast you can do.
Cupcake: Nobody said or implied you are evil, just that you are being unfair and perhaps punishing people that don’t deserve your wrath. It is just not possible to know whether a kid is a bully or popular, based on whether not he played a sport.
Cupcake’s post supports my typical argument about applying to a lot of reaches: you never know what the decisionmaker’s past experience is with somebody like you.
Our school occasionally disrupts classes for “Pep rally”. The students are expected to scream enthusiastically in support of the football team. There’s never been a Pep rally in support of any of the girls sports. There’s never been a Pep rally in support of the math team or the academic team or the kids going off to compete in arts competitions. Unlike these other students, who excel at what they do and routinely bring home awards and trophies, the football team is terrible. Maybe they just need encouragement?
I’ll take it a step further, our high school does not have a valedictorian or a salutatorian, but we do have plaque with national merit scholars name on it.
just read the first post and it sucks that they took down the pics. just wait until the S or D of the parent you secretly know complained graduated and then it will be back up. hell honestly i wouldn’t wait i would go to the school board. you have a case.
My son’s high school is very good about recognizing everyone. The top 5% have their pictures in the front entrance of the school so everybody can see them. In two weeks there will be an awards ceremony for the senior class that everyone can attend. The school website always shows any accomplishment in any area with a picture and story. The valedictorian and salutatorian will have their names put on the wall in the cafeteria which is pretty neat. My son will be the first male athlete (will play in college) to be valedictorian in recent memory and will be attending MIT in the fall. Guess some athletes do have brains.
I really wonder how much of this is just parents and how much the kids actually care. I went to see my daughter perform in the spring play last week and there was a really cool photographic montage stretching across the entire entry way into the gym. It was apparently done as a senior project by some IB fine arts kids. Instead of just saying wow, that’s cool, there were parents counting the different pictures to see the relative representation of different activities. When I tried to explain to one mom that the likely reason there were no pictures of the plays was because the ability to get good, sharp images of kids on stage was beyond the equipment and skill of the kids who took the pictures, she just stared at me and walked away. Some people are just going to be offended.
@Ohiodad51 “there were parents counting the different pictures to see the relative representation of different activities.”
Those parents want to know why there are more pics of the lead actor than of their kid who played a part called “Leafy Green Bush.” lol
Tell him to stay away from @cupcake .
Wow, that’s kind of remarkable to me. My S’s year, the val was a 3 letter winner in track and soccer. Last year the val was a softball player and she went to an Ivy (not to play but to study engineering). This year the sal is headed to an Ivy and was also a 2 sport athlete. I think most of the top 10 in our HS played varsity sports.
At my HS graduation they called out the names of the NMFs… unfortunately there was a mix up and somebody else’s name was called instead of my own. 
“The thing that irks me is the double standard. Athletes work hard and deserve recognition, but so do these kids.”
I disagree. I was a NMSF/NMF/NMS and I worked not one bit for it. I showed up and took a test that my school told me to sign up for. I didn’t study for it. My parents had never heard of it. I didn’t know what NMSF meant until I got it and my counselor told me. I didn’t work hard for it in any way.
VickiSoCal, I agree with your point that many National Merit Scholars do not have to work hard (or at all) specifically to score high on the test.
However, I disagree with the underlying premise. You probably spent a lot of time reading, while other students were spending their time differently, and reading less. My guess is that you worked on the concepts in your math class until you got them. That’s all it takes. But it is work, of a sort.
You might object that you enjoyed reading, so it was fun and not work. On the other hand, many athletes enjoy the training and practices, too, so those are no more work for the athletes than reading was for you. And the athletes get a great deal more recognition from people throughout the years (especially during and after games) than you probably got for working along through the years.
@cupcake said:
The other day I was looking up something about Cory Booker, the senator from NJ. He went to Stanford and played football. He was a PAC 10 (at the time, now PAC 12) academic scholar, he studied at Oxford and then went on to Yale law. I think those were good years for him, but don’t think he considers the best of his life. Who was that guy who became president after playing football? Oh yes, Gerald Ford. And don’t forget Byron ‘Whizzer’ White, who played football and then made it to the Supreme Court.
But don’t hire any of those people. They are all bullies and peaked early.
I heard lawyers who were former athletes find big law jobs easier, for their expected contribution on lawyer’s sport leagues, if not for their assumed dedication and hard working habit.
^mostly it is for the competitiveness. Lots of athletes are used to pressure, and “grinding” and are comfortable with the win or lose aspect of the legal practice. I believe that is why investment banking, etc tends to draw a lot of former athletes as well.
I guess I sort of understand some people feeling that doing well PSAT on a particular day is not as deserving as other athletic or academic awards which take a lot of time and effort. However, it should be noted that some people are very good at sports naturally, and there are many smart kids who do not need to study that much to get all As. However, I think schools should recognize all kinds of achievements when possible, just to be inclusive. I always feel this world’s value system is screwed up because the general public doesn’t know and cannot applaud or root for many scientists/researchers who dedicate their lives to solve cancer or cure diseases, but an NBA athlete will receive all kinds of attention from the media and the general public.
It’s also true that many smart kids who usually do very well on standardized tests for one reason or other did not make NMSFs. My kid said many smarter kids than him in his HS for some reason did not make it; he thinks he just got lucky on that particular day and managed to make NMSF cutoff in CA. So in some sense, my kid got lucky on that particular day. But there is nothing wrong with using your luck to apply to schools who give scholarships just because you are a NMF. NM competition has been around for ages, so it’s just another form of competition, just like Spelling Bee. [I have no idea why winning Spelling Bee competition is so prestigious and covered on TV because I personally don’t think it’s all that productive endeavor – I rather have my kid read more books or watch movies – but different strokes for different folks.] My kid’s NMF status just might save us over $100K in tuition in 4 years, so I am super GLAD about that. I feel like my kid just won an option of attending a nice school on an athletic scholarship to a school.
Not 100% certain, but there is a REAL chance that my kid will choose to go to a college that gives him a lot of merit scholarships over Stanford/UCLA/UC Berkeley even if he gets into these colleges. [No, he has not gotten in.]