<p>corbett,
I know that Ivy standards for athletic recruiting are tighter than those for the broader NCAA, but this fantasy that all of the Ivy athletes are academically the same as the rest of their students is bunk. Such suggestions are so rich as to give me a stomach ache. </p>
<p>Btw, interesting that you picked on Rice and its football team. If you compare the most recently available Academic Progress Rates of Rice football and Princeton football, you would find that both schools graded out exactly the same (level of 979).</p>
Ah, but now you are making an entirely different argument. I never said it wouldn’t lower rankings, I said it wouldn’t lower the academic quality of the university. Those are two very different things. Do you really think the other students at Rice get a lesser education because there are football players that don’t measure up otherwise? I sure don’t. In fact, you present a fascinating point. All these people that scream that schools are only out to manipulate their USNWR ranking just got trumped, at least in the case of Rice and any other school where having a fairly significant number of lesser qualified students will actually impact their ranking. Thanks!</p>
<p>I have no doubt Rice and many other schools have made the decision to essentially have “semi-pro” teams that “employ” lesser qualified students than their peers at the same institution. It certainly is no secret that at many schools they are students in name only. This only means they are not placing their USNWR rankings as the be-all and end-all of their existence, and that they feel it doesn’t huhrt them in terms of perception as an academic institution. Rice is very highly thought of, and I don’t think having a D1 football team makes them any less highly thought of. Of course, they are terrible, so that helps, lol.</p>
<p>Corbett, Stanford leads Big Game wins 55-46. These things tend to go in streaks…Stanford’s longest win streak was 7 from 1995-2001 (I suffered through this era as an undergrad).</p>
Highly unlikely. Besides, as ahs been demonstrated many times on here, Harvard is still far more known and highly thought of than Princeton even when it wasn’t ranked #1. Honestly, within a certain range, it is ridiculous to differentiate like that. Stanford has a world-class reputation, hence HYPS. Sports makes no difference one way or the other.</p>
<p>This is a straw man argument. No one, at least on CC, shares this “fantasy.” Most of us know very well that even the Ivies relax their admissions standards for athletes as well as others with notable (non-curricular) talents. But there is a difference between relaxing or even compromising those standards and SACRIFICING them. </p>
<p>No school in the USN&WR top 20 or 30 that admits athletes who are minimum NCAA qualifiers should be taken seriously as an academic institution. We’re talking about kids with SAT scores in the 800’s or gpa’s below 2.5. It’s clear why some schools (you know who they are) do this because they partially built their academic reputations through their bread-and-butter sports. But the price that they pay is that they will be known primarily as sports schools to the general public and unfortunately looked down upon by the social, cultural and educational elite.</p>
<p>meangirl,
Please provide any data points on colleges in the USNWR Top 20 that have students playing today who had 800 SATs and sub-2.5 GPAs. </p>
<p>I’ll concede that there are weaker students being admitted (just like in the Ivy League), but from what I can glean from the various NCAA sites, the academic performance of the student-athletes at the top privates that compete in major Division I sports is pretty darn good.</p>
<p>I don’t know isn’t that what Corbett already said??</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I think the difference between Stanford and some of these other schools is that its academic reputation preceded its athletic reputation. That Stanford’s athletic tradition didn’t add to or enhance its academic tradition. Whereas for schools such as USC or Notre Dame, this is not necessarily the case. An argument could be made that these schools would not be top 30 schools if not for their football. This is why both schools are willing to compromise if not sacrifice their admissions standards for football recruits. USC barely graduates half of their football players and recruits the same football players as the likes of Alabama or Oklahoma. While Notre Dame has stopped accepting minimum NCAA qualifiers (the school used to when they were called “Prop 48” athletes), they are not loathe to admit athletes with 800 SAT scores. That’s why to many people, USC and Notre Dame are known more as so-called “football factories” than as elite academic institutions. That’s the price they pay for lowering their standards so much.</p>
As indicated above, I fully agree. But I would further conclude that a school with a world-class reputation (like Stanford) doesn’t really need to bother with the expense and admissions compromises that major college sports necessitate. And if sports quality makes no difference, why not lower athletic standards, cut the athletic budget, spend the money on more profs, and substitute higher-SAT admits for lower-SAT athletic admits? </p>
<p>It’s obviously a viable strategy, because the Ivies and UChicago have done exactly that. And it seems to have worked out successfully for them.</p>
I think you’re probably right on both points. Football has historically been a big asset to both schools. That’s great, as far as it goes – but football only takes you so far.</p>
Kudos to Rice football. However, I also notice that football was one of only two men’s teams at Rice (along with indoor track) to get NCAA Performance Recognition Awards (which are based on APRs). Princeton men got eight awards (including football, basketball, baseball, and soccer). </p>
<p>The Princeton women’s teams also earned more awards than Rice, by 10 to 5. But it was a bit closer for the women. It wouldn’t surprise me if Rice lowers the bar further for male athletes than for female athletes, since male sports tend to be higher profile. </p>
<p>Corbett - as far as that Rice prof, if he lowers his standards of teaching because there are football players in the class, that is his fault. Besides, there are always students, football players or no, that fail classes and are well behind other students. Profs don’t lower their standards for them. Seems like a ridiculous argument. Rice students rave about their education, and I think they would know.</p>
<p>you keep on harping on about Stanford. But really, Stanford is the exception which proves the rule. </p>
<p>Further, let’s examine Stanford’s athletic record more closely. The two dominant collegiate sports by both TV viewership and overall revenue is easily football and basketball.</p>
<p>Football
The ultimate American sport. The Cardinal has won a grand total of 1 national championship way back in 1926. That’s 84 years ago.</p>
<p>Now if you are even going to count that far back, then in all fairness, you have to look at the entire history of college football, in which Princeton University can lay claim to a whopping 28 national championships (no. 1 all-time) and Yale can lay claim to 26 (no. 2 all-time). Even Harvard (6) and Cornell (3) have more national championships than Stanford and Dartmouth and Columbia each have the same number Stanford:
[NCAA</a> Division I FBS National Football Championship - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NCAA_Division_I_FBS_National_Football_Championship]NCAA”>College football national championships in NCAA Division I FBS - Wikipedia)</p>
<p>More closer to its home territory, looking at the PAC-10, Stanford hasn’t won their own conference in over 10 years. Their last Bowl victory was 14 years ago in the underwhelming Sun Bowl.</p>
<p>Now, I’m not saying that Stanford athletics isn’t good. It absolutely is. It has a strong athletic tradition, it has won the second most national championships across all sports (second to UCLA). So, yes, absolutely acknowledge this. </p>
<p>But when you are talking THE big time collegiate sports? It’s not exactly a history of awe-inspiring success: one football championship 84 years ago and one basketball championship nearly 70 years ago.</p>
The SF Chronicle came to the same conclusion in 2007:
In fact, Stanford has re-examined its admissions policies, and has enjoyed more athletic success since that story was published. However, not everyone is convinced that it’s in Stanford’s best interests to compromise their admissions standards so that they can compete more effectively with (Tier 3) Oregon State.</p>
<p>So prestige and corbett, you are making the argument that unless a school wins national championships they really can’t be an example of an elite school that has success in athletics? I had no idea that was the premise. Personally I reject that, and I would also argue that in the overall landscape of college football and basketball, Stanford is clearly competitive and successful. Some years are clearly better than others, but this is not the pros. By your definition we should just tell everyone that is not pro caliber to stop playing, they are clearly unsuccessful and wasting their time. Wow. I just keep shaking my head at the whole attitude. Honestly, I don’t think their goal is to inspire awe in you with their sports program. But hey, call and ask them. Maybe they really do live to meet your definition of success in college athletics.</p>
<p>I am also having a very hard time understanding how Stanford is “the exception that proves the rule”. Huh? I don’t think that applies here, not to mention you also have schools that are very competitive in basketball at least that are in the top 25. Again, these schools will not become Harvards even if they dropped athletics tomorrow, which was the whole silly srgument to begin with. They are extremely excellent schools academically and the athletic program don’t make them better or worse in that regard, other than to the extent they make money that is used in improving academics. Some very elite students will be attracted by big time sports and choose them over Harvard et. al. because of it, some will reject them for the same reason, probably a wash.</p>
<p>But if you are looking for exceptions, you have Stanford, Duke, Georgetown, Northwestern (OK, they have not been extremely competitive most years but they have had a few good ones, including this year), Vandy, UCLA and UVa. All of those have had competitive basketball programs some or most of the time, and some also in football, yet they all rank in the top 25 of USNWR. That’s a lot of exceptions, Stanford is just the highest ranked of them. Once again, I will go back to the statement made (paraphrased): These schools would be better academically if they dropped whatever focus they had on athletics and redirected it towards academics. Believe that all you want, but I think achieving top 25 status shows they are extremely good schools, and by definition not everyone can be #1. Thank goodness we have schools that can offer both a great academic experience and an athletic one.</p>
<p>Ooops, forgot Notre Dame in the “exception” list.</p>
<p>In thinking about it some more, it also sounds like your argument is we should, pretty much by definition, create a complete divide where we have schools that are focused only on academics and not try to have sports at the highest level, and schools that basically say forget top level academics, we want to win national championships and that is all that we really care about. OK, that is hyperbole and exaggeration, but you are basically saying the two either can’t or shouldn’t coexist. I really cannot understand that position at all. Institutions are capable of doing 2 things at once, quite often.</p>
<p>It also occurs to me you are using the USNWR rankings as the definitive measuring stick of academic prowess. I also reject that. It is but one definition of what makes a school good, and it has its arbitrary aspects for sure.</p>
<p>Fallenchemist, your exceptions are all excellent. I would add Boston College, Cal, Georgia Tech, Michigan, UIUC, UNC, UT-Austin and Wisconsin. Although those 5 universites are not ranked among the top 25 according to the latest USNWR, they are all among the very best universities in the nation and certainly qualify as universities that offer students a challenging, rewarding, highly regarded and well rounded education while remaining competitive in several sports. Along with the 8 universities you listed above, that’s 16 of the top 40 or so universities in the nation that have relatively strong athletic traditions.</p>
<p>But even stripping out national championships as a metric (which, let’s face it, isn’t their strong point) let’s look at other metrics:</p>
<p>Take football as an example. Last Pac-10 championship? 1999. That’s a full decade plus. Last Bowl win (in an era where just about every eligible school goes to a Bowl game)? 1996 in the Sun Bowl – and even that was 14 years ago. That’s ancient history by today’s collegiate standard.</p>
<p>Before this last season the Cardinal’s last winning season was in 2001. That means the Cardinal registered seven straight losing seasons from 2002-2008 – they are a whopping 25 wins to 55 loses during this recent stretch. Winning % of 0.313. That is downright awful.</p>
<p>I mean what are we talking about here, you are arguing that Stanford football is “clearly successful”? Really? It’s about as clear as mud.</p>