<p>...according to final rankings for the 2005-06 directors' cup (formerly the sears cup). the rankings use NCAA championship placings to assign points and thereby rank colleges' entire athletic programs. princeton placed 47th in the country in this year's version. six other ivies (columbia being the lone outlier) placed between 66th and 88th. princeton has now been the the top-nonscholarship program in 11 out of the cup's 12 years, and the only non-scholie program to ever crack the top 25 (several times).</p>
<p>It's not terribly relevant, "scholie" or not.</p>
<p>Both scholarship schools and non-scholarship ones accept substandard athletes.</p>
<p>relevant to what, this board and its readers? if so, i disagree. many college aspirants and applicants value intercollegiate athletics, even if the extent of their expected participation is as spectators. i should think you know this, as a student at the school that's long had the top (scholarship) athletic program in the country.</p>
<p>Fair enough. My assertion was more about the relevance of scholarship v. non-scholarship schools. </p>
<p>But in case you were interested, I have found that students at Stanford are apathetic about sports most of the time. The Cal student section was twice the size of ours at our stadium for the football game, and we won't sell out Maples Pavilion for basketball unless we're a good team, which in that case means we imitate Duke.</p>
<p>But that was a random tangent.</p>
<p>well, that distinction, too, is pretty "relevant." it's a heck of a lot easier to recruit top athletes with full athletic scholarships to give.</p>
<p>princeton's press release, only two weeks late:</p>