The Game of Life : College Sports and Educational Values

Rating:
Summary: Ignore the star ratings... for now.
Review: As promised, I am coming back to you with my observations after having read through most of the book.

Sadly, for all the hype and all the praise the book has received, I am beginning to wonder if a) reviewers actually read the book, and b) if they did read it, did they actually question the merits of the authors research and conclusions. After having read most of it, I conclude that they did not.

I could go point for point, but alas, because of space I can not. A number of troubling points however -

First, the authors take liberties with anecdotes and too frequently back up their claims with them. For example the discussion about the Williams College Lacrosse team, or the Ivy League Lacrosse player.... I think it is a mark of dishonesty that the authors quickly point out the poor state of collegiate athletics because they read a story in a university newspaper... as was the case in the Princeton players instance.

Second, in graduate school we were always told never to overlook footnotes. After reading through most of them, I am glad I did. In a number of instances, there conclusions are based upon data that was compiled at one school in their universe of thirty. Or that an anecdote used as an illustration, was actually from a instance taken from outside the universe of schools they used.

Third, I think they demonstrate a disdain for athletes when they question at length their value to the diversity of campus. In their mind, because of a whole host of issues, they don't add to the amount of diversity in a university.... what are some of those issues? Political inclination (Not Liberal or Far Left), choice of major (economics or Poli Sci), tend to group with other athletes. Which begs the question, what type of student do the authors believe add to the diversity of university.

Finally, there is a terrible lack of balance. If you knew nothing else before you read this book, you would finish by thinking athletes are a lower caste of intellectuals that for some reason were admitted into these universities, not based on their academic abilities of course. That universities have made some sort of deal with the devil to accept these sort of intellectual anchors to improve their markting and PR machines that are built solely on athletics.... which begs to ask....

Where is the critique of these institutions and their pactices? And why is it only athletics that is responsible for losing money, while all the other departments are deemed as critical elements in the mission of the university? Sadly, these are questions that aren't answered but should... if athletics is going to be put under such scrutiny, shouldn't the rest of the university be submitted to the same rigours?

Anyhow, I will be back. If you are interested in my notes, feel free to email me ...

Rating:
Summary: Great data but a slow academic read
Review: Higher education is full of many injustices. Prior to a 1991 antitrust ruling, Penn, Harvard, MIT, Princeton, Brown, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, and Yale conspired together to ban all merit scholarships and set tuition artificially high. When Princeton awarded $1000 research scholarships to top students, the Overlap met in January 1987. Princeton denied that it had violated the Overlap pact. Dartmouth called the denial "sophistry." Yale's president, Benno Schmidt said, "This looks like a blatant merit scholarship to me." The president of Princeton, defensively replied, "I would really not have thought a person as well trained in the law as Mr. Schmidt would make such a blatantly foolish assertion." Now, William Bowen, no longer president of Princeton, has co-written a much more courageous defense of intelligence and merit, The Game of Life.

It couldn't have come at a more critical time. UC president Richard Atkinson has recommended abolishing the SAT I from college admission considerations. Seattle public schools are considering abolishing the letter-grade system. Defenders of Affirmative Action are calling the notion of merit, itself, into question. It should be obvious that we, as a society, have grown very uncomfortable with the very idea of intelligence. Yes, intellect can be subtle compared to a touchdown, but to read The Game of Life is to bear witness to pure genius.

Don't be fooled by the multitude of facts and figures. This book is a thought-provoking work of art. Bowen and Shulman commit blatant acts of philosophy regarding such subjects as the definition of "leadership." (Can a pushy leadership style compensate for a lack of vision?) They slay myths that fools so glibly declare, such as the myth that athletic success inspires alumni/ae giving. The book is worth every penny alone for offering a window into different professional strategies.

Everyone should read this book, but it is especially essential for anyone in a position to make important decisions in higher education. If one seeks to uphold the mission of a university, then it is important to learn from this book what athletics cannot do. Then, one should put down the book and consider what athletics does do. For instance, it is proven that athletes contribute to a culture of binge drinking on campuses. In recent years, I've watched in disbelief news reports of university students literally rioting in the streets for drinking privileges. How many more alcohol poisonings does it take before we shall change the culture of higher education?

The Game of Life proves that, in our current system of athletic scholarships, the stereotype of the dumb jock is absolutely true. So long as we continue to waste educational resources on these sub-par students, I can't believe that we are a truly civilized nation.

Rating:
Summary: Great data but a slow academic read
Review: I was enlightened and educated by this book. My starting opinion was directly opposed to college athletics as they are at many major universities. However, through this research, I've come to see the differences between "big-time" sports such as basketball and football, and most other college sports. This agreed with my college recollections where I knew many athletes in "smaller" sports who worked hard as schoolwork and their sport. They played their sport for the love of the game and the camaraderie, but most knew that their careers ended at graduation. I continue to admire them and wonder why some many universities continue to hurt those sports to maintain the larger sports.

College football and basketball, in particular, are fully-subsidized minor leagues for the NFL and NBA. If the NCAA drastically changes the way it does business, those leagues will have to find another way to test and screen athletes. This won't hurt the schools at all; in fact, the schools will benefit. Good student/athletes will still get a college education (as many baseball players do today), and pure athletes will still have a chance to compete and become professionals.

This book substantially helped shape my opinions on college sports in a well-researched and documented manner.

I recommend this book for anyone who wants a balanced yet critical look into college athletics. [e-mail]

Rating:
Summary: An important book but written in bureaucrateze
Review: Last week I delivered a letter to the president of the University at Buffalo faculty senate that began: "I write to recommend that the University at Buffalo withdraw from Division IA athletics. I base much of my argument for downgrading at least to the university's former Division III status on the recently published book THE GAME OF LIFE by James L. Shulman and William G. Bowen (Princeton University Press)...."

It is not often that a book can have as major an impact on a reader as this one has had on me -- and, I add, should have on everyone interested in education. It makes a compelling case that Division IA athletics is bad not only for a university's academic community but for the community at large as well. And it has led me to take this drastic action. I only hope that the university students, faculty and administration will have the wisdom to act favorably in response to this recommendation.

THE GAME OF LIFE is a myth destroyer. The authors bring to bear statistics gathered from 90,000 students at 30 colleges that are selective enough to have to turn away many well qualified applicants. "Every spring," the authors say, "valedictorians with straight A averages, and applicants with stellar SAT scores who may have conducted original laboratory research or made a full-length documentary film, are rejected because there are only so many spots in a class. Because there are so many outstanding candidates, a place in the entering class...is a scarce resource."

Basing their conclusions on a massive ten year quantitative research program that includes data collected in 1951, 1976 and 1989, these authors effectively destroy such accepted convictions as college sports programs pay for themselves, playing sports builds character, athletic contests encourage alumni support, and college sports play a major factor in the integration of underrepresented minorities into higher education. The authors brought to their task impeccable qualifications. Both are officers of the Andrew F. Mellon Foundation and Bowen is a former Princeton University president. Earlier they drew on the same resources for a widely respected study of race-sensitive college admissions called THE SHAPE OF THE RIVER.

Here are a few of their conclusions: Scholarship athletes not only arrive at college with poorer credentials (a 237 point SAT deficit in IA schools) but, despite their special tutoring programs and gut courses, they achieve even poorer records once on campus. It is rare for an athletic program to pay for itself even when the teams are winners. They site the University of Michigan where the teams did very well in 1998-1999 but the program lost $3.8 million. Their bottom line: "athletics is a bad business." College expenses for all other extracurricular activities represent a tiny fraction of those for athletics. Minorities are not well served by athletic programs. And, perhaps worst of all, the special entrance attention given to athletes has a strong negative effect on the attitudes of secondary school students.

Required reading for all concerned about the future of education.

Rating:
Summary: Partial Review (Star rating to be ignored)
Review: Let me start out by saying, I am only about a third of the way through. I am also a former student athlete and current coach. But it seems as though someone should chime in with their views on the book since no one else has. So with that in mind, take my initial observations as such.

While I am struck by the depth of analysis and the thoroughness of their methodology, I am also struck by the sense that the authors have decidedly taken the view that college athletics, in of itself, is an entity unto itself. And that in the instances cited, are incongruent with the mission of an educational institution. While there certainly is merit in the academic performance analysis, it is unfortunate that they fail to see the merits of athletics in the educational environment. While it is easy to quantify the development of a student in a classroom, it is impossible to quantify the role of collegiate athletics in the development of the individual student. Does devoting 12 hours a week to studying for Western Civ. add something more, something more fundamental to the student that spending 10 hours a week on the practice field does not? Regretably, academicians have spent more time dismissing the value of athletics, rather than creating methodology to judge its worthiness. And while classroom performance remains something tangible and quantifiable, no one has endeavored to quantify the merits of working within a team for a common objective, experiencing leadership within a team environment, and all the ancillary benefits that are brought about from participating in collegiate athletics. Instead, they are quick to point out and highlight everything that is detrimental, but not unique to, collegiate athletics (alcohol, violence, etc.).

My overriding concern is one that may or may not have merit and could potentially be dismissed by the end of the book. Written by and for academics, it is with great concern that this will be adopted by institutions of higher learning to justify the alienation of student-athletes based upon quantified generalizations. This could very well become the classic coffee table book that so many quote and act on, but have never read.

I will be back for another review when I am struck with the additional thoughts that inevitably come from reading a book of this nature.

Rating:
Summary: Slanted and dull read
Review: This book resembles two men with a vendetta over people with a solution. Using a lot and I mean a lot of statistics they turn the data to favor their arguments. If one school out of many supports their claim, that is the stat they use, ignoring the stronger evidence. The authors do not offer solutions beyond "there should be changes made nation wide." These are the same people who write the mellon report, so getting additional attention is their goal, over informing a reader.