<p>The gpa is nothing to be proud about. We thought he was done that term--failed a 5 credit course, got a D in a 4 credit course and C in another important course. If he had not taken two extra fluff seminar credits, he would have gone under full time status, plus his gpa was decimated. It was not a proud moment for him or our family. He retook the course in two 6 week terms in the summer along with a course similar to the 4 credit course and another similar course, as he worked a 45 hour a week job at a summer camp, gave private lessons and trained and worked as a busboy to pay for those courses. He did not have any fun that summer either. </p>
<p>I visited my son a random weekend when his season was in full swing. He could not meet me for dinner Friday night, just a quick, hello, as he went to practice, then dinner with team mates, pregame jam session. The next morning was team breakfast and then off to the neighboring college which was about an hour away. I went there to watch them that afternoon, and only saw him from the stands. Afterwards, he came to say a quick hi, and joined his team for dinner at a steak house enroute to home campus. MInd you, he did no school work, nor did anyone else on the team. It was total focus on the sport. That night was celebrating the victory, which he did forego and spent the time with me, but he did stop by to keep let everyone know that he was with them. When you are an athlete at an academically rigorous school in a sport that is not mainstream, it is important that the team internally keeps the spirit going, or you will lose support. In addition to a 20 hour a week practice schedule, each match, one a week entails a type of schedule as I outlined above, in fact, often more of a time commitment, if the event further. And then there are the regional and national events that entail missing school. All this for a sport that does not give a dime in athletic scholarship. In addition during the off season, they help with the other sports, in setting up, timing, scoring, holding measuring devices, essentially they are the athletic crew. So alums and other athletes who have gone through this know exactly what the drills and rewards are, and many have continued in the sport, if not still competing, as junior coaches,administrators, officials, front office and they do help out the young athlete. Many athletes get their first job through their support, most often in a gym, as an assistant coach or helper. That is no surprise. In summer camps, in after school programs, they are in demand. Full time jobs are hard to get. But at many good school districts a former athlete who wants to teach often goes to the front of the line if the school is looking for coaches, assistant coaches. It is a definite plus to have played a college sport in a case like that.</p>
<p>But there are times when there is a bias against athletes too. If the guy who is hiring feels that a way, an athlete is not going to get the job. From what hear in the corporate world, however, former athletes make great team players and because they know more people than usual tend to do well in sales. When I think bout this, I find that it is true with my son. He has been in leagues since he was 8, and has contact with many families and former athletes that love to hear from him even if they are no longer in the sport, or dropped out years ago. Also, even though we moved midway through highschool, it took little time before the new community knew him well, and we did get invitiations to join private clubs, summer clubs, country clubs through his contacts. I used a lot of those families as my first line when I needed to get a plumber, docter, you name it because all of those hours watching the sport together does provide a bond. You see the same people all of the time. And if your child goes to the state, regional and national level, you get to know all of those people. He can go anywhere, and know someone, give them a call, get a dinner and a place to crash from his athletic contacts. And when S2 was looking at colleges, he could always name a fellow athlete at that school that would take him under his wing for a tour, pick him up at the airport, take him to the airport, etc. The athletic world is pretty wide spread and they do stick together. You see many athletes who become successful in sales because of that. You do not see them in the more technical aspects of jobs, but companies consider them valuable in sales, marketing, customer relations. My son just moved to his new home far away, never having been in that city, and he is already very well connected. He could have dinner most nights at some family's home--he is invited all of the time as a coach for a youth league. Not to mention the young ladies he meets as he is not hard on the eyes. </p>
<p>There is a price to all of that. He come close to burning out a few times. He could never do a school play or be in the music ensembles, he missed class trips, school events for secitonals, regionals, playoffs, states, you name it. The sport had to come first. He was limited in his job in the summer as they had to intergrate with his training which is why he always worked for a sports camp that understood his sports schedule. He did not have much time off from training at all to get to his level and yet he did not get to the top of his game. He also has injuries and constant pain. He nearly lost a kidney because he is so used to pains that he did not think anything of it. When you train and work the body to its limits all of the time like he did, it hurts. A lot and often, and you get used to the pain. You cannot rest or take off for chronic pain or flu or not feeling well. And you can collapse from such ailments when you compete, because you are pushing the body to a point that no ordinary human does very often in a lifetime. I have seen him collapse, vomit, drink down more water/drink than you would think possible, vomit it up again, drink again and then go on. You collapse AFTER the game. He is likely to have severe arthritus and other problems that are related to the extreme stresses that he put his body under. He has undergone two surgeries from sports injuries And I won't go into the money WE spent as a family in getting him to that level in a sport. But he does get payback in some ways. He does have international and national connections, he is physically in top shape at least visibly and as far as any check ups go--the aches and pains don't seem to count medically, he is very healthy--can't remember his last cold or headache, or he doesn't notice those things, he looks good, socially very comfortable, always comfortable in coat and tie (has had to wear one for away games, awards for as long as he could remember), knows how to behave in all kinds of social situation, gets invited to Olympics, Superbowls, pro games of all sorts when anyone he knows gets tickets. Parent respect him, people tend to respect him when they know who he is--either as junior's coach or a former national player. When he pulled his shoulder last month in a city where he has not lived in for a year yet, the top orthopedic group saw him right away at his convenience. Gyms let him work out for free. </p>
<p>The big question in mind is not the benefits athletes get. I do feel they deserve them. THe question, however, is whether they belong in the college setting. Should they instead get a separate path instead of attempting to integrate them in the top colleges in this country. Does Yale need a top D-1 football team? Is it really appropriate for a school like Duke to make such severe concessions to have that basketball team? Should state schools be accepting kids to be on teams when it is questionable if they can even function high school level? Every attempt to shore up the academics have boomeranged back as the NCAA raises and reduces standards over one debate after another. Yet as I once mentioned when head admissions honcho at Dartmouth was big talking about reducing the importance of academics at that school and getting rid of the football team, he was directly reminded that the "ivy" designation is an athletic one, yes, do check on that--the ivy league is so called as an athletic term. And if they do not want to compete in that athletic league and want to move down to D-3 athletics and disband some of their sports (they tried to get rid of swimming and talked about football), they can leave the ivy league and give their sport to another team. That ended that talk ever so quickly. That ivy designation is priceless to Dartmouth. No way it wants to join the ranks of Bowdoin, Bates, Colby, Middlebury, Hamiliton even though I would say those schools are as fine academically. The main difference is that Dartmough is "ivy". I guess the question should be more whether the ivy league should be division 1 in sports as their emphasis is on academics, not athletics. </p>
<p>But as it stands now, an excellent athlete who is willing to put in the time at top schools, does get many rewards. As you move down the ranks, that is not the case, especially in low impact sports. Even olympic level fencers do not get the respect and benefits that a college level athlete gets in a main line sport.</p>