College sports are affirmative action for rich white students according to The Atlantic

The article is interesting but it's got a number of stupid things in it and it's focus on Ivy League is also a little absurd (For starters, the Ivies offer need based financial aid and every school has a calculator so a student can apply early knowing how much aid they'd get). Many of the resposnes on here are stupid. Few people really get what is happening which is the following (Except I've added in the world academic in high-academic achieving):

Affirmative action for most wrote:

The students getting shafted here are non-athlete high-academic achieving Asians and Whites. If you are an Asian or white male with a perfect SAT score, all-state orchestra, valedictorian, blah blah, you're a dime a dozen in Harvard's application pool and will be rated lower on your 'personality' when you are interviewed. Unless you are going to play a sport or have something truly unique about you, good luck and have fun at Swarthmore/StateU/etc

They thing that really pisses me off about the article is their is no acknowledgement that the athletes bring something to the table - the ability to play sports. The author seems to ignore that contribution entirely. The schools view that as important (now why anyone cares about the field hockey, xc or soccer scores is another question entirely).

As someone who worked for 10 years in IVy League sports, please understand what I used to tell recruits. They Ivy League schools don't really want well rounded students - they want the "best of" a number of different groups. The students in the class aren't necessarily well rounded but the class as a whole appears well rounded because they get the best of a number of different groups.

The Ivies want the best minority applicants, they want the best athletic applicants, the best legacy applicants, the best rural applicants, the best chemistry applicants, the best orchestra applicants, the best overall students applicants etc .

It's really about standing out in a single label that gets you admitted. I mean if a quarter of the class is minority, another quarter athlete, then only half is regular students.

Now for atheltics or legacy, they aren't letting in the smartest athletics. They basically let the coaches tell them who they want as long as they are over a certain minimum. So the ivies admissions departments determine if the kids are smart enough to be successful and then the coaches pick amongst those.

rojo wrote:

The thing that really pisses me off about the article is their is no acknowledgement that the athletes bring something to the table - the ability to play sports. The author seems to ignore that contribution entirely. The schools view that as important (now why anyone cares about the field hockey, xc or soccer scores is another question entirely).

This. When an institution has been competing in most of the sports being recruited for for quite a long time, and has sought students that excel in these sports for as long, pointing fingers at the institution is backwards. Write an article about how low-income school districts (which lack the sought-after sports, and therefore recruits) are often disproportionately made up of POC, and what might be done about the bigger problems.

The best legacy applicants? Lol, they might not be good at anything, except their parents give the school a lot of money. ?

One thing that is never addressed is the lack of programs offered to promote the presence of more men in college. Since the early 80s, women have far outnumbered men in terms of the number of degrees earned:

https://www.statista.com/statistics/185157/number-of-bachelor-degrees-by-gender-since-1950/

I find it ironic that the article about promoting diversity on campus does not include the concept of getting more men on campus. Males make up 51.1% of the 20-24 year old demographic, but only account for 42.8% of those earning bachelor degrees. It's not a popular statement as we have been led to believe that women are an under represented minority in America, but the facts support the premise that the education system in America is failing men.

TrackFan19 wrote:

John Utah wrote:

Let me get this straight. 61% of the athletes are white in the Ivy.

General population of the USA is in the ballpark of 72% white.

I'm not a mathematician, so what am I missing?

(This is to say nothing about D1 basketball and football.)

Non-Hispanic whites are about 64% of the U.S. population and getting smaller every day.

Is that correcting for the number of kids who know who their father is?

The US population is 61% white, so to have 61% of all college athletes being white and 65% white at Ivy should be expected for proportionate distribution.

nah Legacy Admission is affirmative action for rich white students

anyone that argues against affirmative action but is for legay admissions is a classist piece of Sh*t these are just the facts chief

America might be the only country in the world that thinks athletics is an integral part of the university experience. In most other countries, universities are concerned pretty much with academics. This may be the underlying root of all of the hubub being discussed above

the430miler wrote:

Well here in the republic of texxxas we have rodeo as a college sport. No other place in the west has that

Wrong.

Texas is not the only state with collegiate Rodeo.

Must have went to school in TX

the430miler wrote:

Well here in the republic of texxxas we have rodeo as a college sport. No other place in the west has that

Montana Does.... you dope. Nearly every college/university. Montana is also further West than Texas.

While knuckle dragging along the desolate oil fields destroying the earth, the Texan proudly exclaims "wE iN tExAs Do It BeSt. EvErYtHiNg In TeXaS iS bIgGeR. errrrrrr."

2 things come from TX wrote:

the430miler wrote:

Well here in the republic of texxxas we have rodeo as a college sport. No other place in the west has that

Wrong.

Texas is not the only state with collegiate Rodeo.

Must have went to school in TX

This is the one.

As a non-American it's always hilarious seeing how screwed up your systems are and how brainwashed most of you are to believe it makes any sense at all.

Anyone who can't see the primary function of your collegiate sports system is to exploit black football and basketball stars and keep them working for free is a deluded mess. Anything else is a secondary impact.

It's so obvious that the rest of the college sports scholarships are effectively a transfer of value from the huge wealth black football and basketball stars generate, to rich white kids.

The level of brainwashing in Americans is so high, honestly. The way you guys likely think about North Koreans is the way I think about you lot when it comes to economics.

commonsensical wrote:

America might be the only country in the world that thinks athletics is an integral part of the university experience. In most other countries, universities are concerned pretty much with academics. This may be the underlying root of all of the hubub being discussed above

This is the one.

As a non-American it's always hilarious seeing how screwed up your systems are and how brainwashed most of you are to believe it makes any sense at all.

Anyone who can't see the primary function of your collegiate sports system is to exploit black football and basketball stars and keep them working for free is a deluded mess. Anything else is a secondary impact.

It's so obvious that the rest of the college sports scholarships are effectively a transfer of value from the huge wealth black football and basketball stars generate, to rich white kids.

The level of brainwashing in Americans is so high, honestly. The way you guys likely think about North Koreans is the way I think about you lot when it comes to economics.

Rojo, you are absolutely right that Ivies want best of various categories, those who really stand out in one area, not well-rounded students. They want potential world beaters, leaders, etc. But they do undermine their hopes of doing this by taking so many legacies, mediocre athletes (by D1 standards), foundation cases, prep school kids, and top 1% and .1% extremely wealthy kids. If you think about the fact that in college, you have to take a wide variety of courses and do well in all of them, and that you are simply not mature enough in most cases to choose wisely as to what you specialize in for your entire life as a teenager. The kids who do very well in everything will do the same in college, have a higher gpa, and eventually specialize and be outstanding at one thing as an adult. I seriously wonder whether they have really tested their own presumptions about successful applicants from their admissions policies vs. successful adults.

If you check my other posts, you'll see that 61/65% are higher than the white portion of college age population and of college students, which are 54 and 58%, I think.

Hey the white kids deserve something for all their ancestors did in making America the great country it is...........

especially the Celts and Anglos.........

joedirt wrote:

One thing that is never addressed is the lack of programs offered to promote the presence of more men in college. Since the early 80s, women have far outnumbered men in terms of the number of degrees earned:

https://www.statista.com/statistics/185157/number-of-bachelor-degrees-by-gender-since-1950/

I find it ironic that the article about promoting diversity on campus does not include the concept of getting more men on campus. Males make up 51.1% of the 20-24 year old demographic, but only account for 42.8% of those earning bachelor degrees. It's not a popular statement as we have been led to believe that women are an under represented minority in America, but the facts support the premise that the education system in America is failing men.

Men are not really cost-effective. Almost all of the campus crimes -- destruction of property, assaults, etc. -- are perpetrated by men. Same with academic cheating. Trying to educate most of them really isn't worth the investment.

The Ivies make it pretty clear that they don’t want diversity. Their ultimate goal is to have a university entirely comprised of minorities. They dont want diversity of thought. Ask any current students how they do in their classes if express convertive ideas.

No diversity here wrote:

The Ivies make it pretty clear that they don’t want diversity. Their ultimate goal is to have a university entirely comprised of minorities. They dont want diversity of thought. Ask any current students how they do in their classes if express convertive ideas.

Waah! Waaah! it's so hard bine a conservative!

LoneStarXC wrote:

Lol @ varsity sailing. Sounds like a bunch of rich kids getting a scholarship/admissions assistance just to sit on a boat and relax.

I sailed in college and no schools offer scholarships for sailing, it's part of the intercollegiate sailing association's rules and helps ensure that club-level teams can compete alongside schools that get varsity funding from their AD (ex. Cornell and Columbia are club and Georgetown and Yale are varsity but they race against each other). At most schools, the most a coach can offer you is to tell you it'll give you a leg up in admissions. Schools where sailing (or insert other white kid sport here) has varsity status usually have some sort of "in" with the admissions department and they can let in who they want. The people I knew who sailed for teams like Georgetown or Yale were filthy rich and probably would have gotten in due to daddy's money anyway, they just also happened to be good at sailing. Same for rowing and fencing and squash and some other rich kid sports, although the non-ivies actually do offer scholarships for that.

I would also like to point out to the LRC that college sailing (and olympic sailing) is actually pretty intense and requires a good deal of athletic ability. If you don't believe me look up Anna Tunicliffe or Ben Ainslie, they are jacked out of their minds.