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March 17, 2008

Race Gap Remains in Graduation Rates of Men's Basketball Teams in NCAA Tournament, Study Finds

Sixty-four percent of the teams competing for the national title in the NCAA’s Division I men’s basketball tournament graduated at least 50 percent of their players during a six-year period, while 22 percent of the teams graduated less than 40 percent, according to an annual study of the graduation rates of teams playing in the tournament.

The report, “Keeping Score When It Counts,” is produced by the Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport at the University of Central Florida and is based on the Graduation Success Rates calculated by the NCAA. The authors of the study are Richard Lapchick, director of the institute, and Eric Little. The institute will release the results of a separate study on graduation rates for teams competing in the women’s tournament tomorrow.

The study also highlighted disparities in the academic success of white and black basketball players. Though the gaps are “narrowing slightly,” Mr. Lapchick said in a written statement, “the ongoing and significant disparity regarding the academic success between African-American and white men’s basketball student-athletes is deeply troubling.”

Fifty-six percent of the teams playing in the tournament had at least a 10-percentage-point gap between the graduation rates of their white players and their black players, an improvement from 68 percent last year, the study found. Thirty-four percent of the teams had at least a 30-percentage-point gap, down from 49 percent in 2007.

If the tournament featured a Final Four based on the Graduation Success Rates of the teams competing, Mr. Lapchick noted, it would include Butler, Notre Dame, Purdue, and Western Kentucky. —Libby Sander

Comments

1. After Rutgers University’s men’s basketball team defeated Princeton and their legendary coach Pete Caril, he degraded himself and his team when he said, “ Now let’s see if they can beat us in a reading contest.” Richard Lapchick and the NCAA add to the nation’s racial divide when they argue that race and not socio-economic status determines one’s potential to graduate from college within six years. Lapchick and his fellow travelers also elevate white graduation rates as the gold standard to which black athletes should aspire. This nation is under the full control of white college graduates who have created a mess in the domestic economy, international relations and the environment. The fact that basketball has the potential to lift young people out of the nation’s slums and ghettos in spite of their horrible experiences in the violent failure mills called public schools, is something to celebrate, not condemn. To expect that poor children should hit the arbitrary finish line erected by Lapchick when they were far behind when the starter’s gun sounded is more evidence of the insensitivity present in this point of view. Let’s require student athletes to spend more quality time being students. When they fail to do so, the colleges and universities should be sanctioned not the student athletes. At the same time we need to recognize that many college students take more than six years to graduate.

   — DAVID J. HARRIS    Mar 17, 06:59 PM    #

2. Response to Mr. Harris:

   Just yesterday, my younger brother informed me of the death of one of those poor youth that top-level university sport “lifts” out of nation’s slums and ghettos. I estimate that the decedent was between 50-55. After finishing four years of eligibility at a division I school, he played in the NBA for a short period. Ten years after he entered the NBA he was painting houses. Local TV news crews discovered he was illiterate. His name is legion. As a formerly poor black kid with a doctorate (from an inistitituion with Division I and Research I status), I am thankful every day that my mother and father did not permit me or my brothers to invest too heavily in sport. Europeans seem able to train professional athletes without farming them out to their universities. Let’s do it here.

   — the jayhawk    Mar 17, 08:51 PM    #

3. There are valid points to both of the comments listed above. However, prior to sanctioning Universities for the failings of the entire educational system or stating that children from low socio-economic status can’t achieve success in college. We need to look at all sides of the picture. Better we need to get out of the forest so we can see the trees and understand the entire issue. I came from what I would call an extremely poor home. We did not have running water or a bathroom until 1987, yet I attended college, graduated with a BS degree in Psychology, have my Masters degree and I am working on my Ph.D. Too top it all off, I was an athlete (basketball) and used athletics to defray the cost of my undergraduate education. If parents, communities and school systems would stop pushing children with athletic ability through the system without providing them with the fundamental educational framework to be successful in life, then the colleges would not have to hire specialized academic support staff who work to help these children overcome the knowledge gap needed to be successful in college. Everyone is blaming colleges and universities for the problems, however the problems started long before the students set foot on the college campus. If we are really going to address these issues, we need to start at the root of the problem, not after 13 years of public or private secondary school education that is failing all of our children, not just athletes. The entire educational system is in shambles and we as citizens need to standup and talk with our legislators, senators, govenors, and President to demand a change for the benefit of our country and more importantly for the benefit of our children regardless of whether they participate in sports or not. Maybe sports is the only thing keeping them out of trouble on the streets. Maybe athletics participation is keeping them from becoming robber, murders, rapist and child molesters. Look for the good in people, demand a respectable educational system, and pay teachers for the jobs they do instead of hammering athletics as the reason why students can’t read, write, count or think beyond the moment. WE ARE OUR OWN WORST ENEMY AND ARE CUTTING OUR NOSE OFF DESPITE OUR DEPENDENCE ON IT TO LIVE! We need to focus on the total educational system for all of our children are suffering and falling behind other countries. Athletics in the proper context is not an evil thing. We commercialized it in a manner that tells our children this is the only way out of the slums and poverty. WE are the problems not our children, for our children buy into what we teach them and tell them is important.

   — James Wyatt    Mar 18, 08:44 AM    #

4. Response to Jayhawk: Quality parental involvement in the lives of children is not the issue here. Should the NCAA be allowed to generate billions of dollars in economic activity with its prime time March Maddness production while at the same time denigrating the talent that the public pays to see. Failing to graduate within six years is a trite standard to apply to the student athletes while the NCAA remains silent on the poor quality of the elementary and secondary schools that many of the division one stars were forced to attend. The public needs to hear more from the outfit that scores millions in “profits” from a system rooted in double standards. If paying the student athletes is not an option, the NCAA must do more to impose sanctions on the universities and colleges that take advantage of their students. Simply telling us that students from poor backgrounds are having more difficulty graduating
   within six years than their middle and upper class peers is like saying that the sun rises in the east.

   — DAVID J. HARRIS    Mar 18, 08:59 AM    #

5. Does the study account for players that leave to play basketball professionally in some capacity? It is not clear from the linked PDF. For instance, Florida (had they made the tournament) would have certainly been low on the list since three juniors (all three of which are black) left for the NBA last year. While certainly few players go to the NBA, it seems likely that many players (especially from top teams such as those in the NCAA tournament) go on to play in the NBDL or overseas, earning a decent (although not decadent) salary.

   Also, I’m a little unclear of the value added by focusing attention on student athletes instead of looking at the entire student body. Student athletes have access to academic resources (tutors, advisors, etc.) that the average student doesn’t, and the report itself says that minority athletes graduate at rates much higher than minority students in general. Isn’t it really minority vs. white graduation rates OVERALL that we should be concerned about?

   — Jacob    Mar 18, 09:17 AM    #

6. One of the eye-opening experiences for me, as a professor, was serving on the academic subcommittee that my university was required to put together for NCAA recertification, which occurs every 10 years. One of the most striking, and disappointing, observations we made that was echoed by this report, is that the graduation rate for male African Americans is so alarmingly low (37%). As all colleges try to raise that rate, it may be worth looking at athletics as one of the most successful graduation rate enhancement programs. Student athletes identified several positive factors when interviewed about how atheltics might help them to graduate: tutoring services, support from their athlete peer group, support and supervison from coaches, time management and being unable to party like other students. My own son is a Division III athlete, and I think that he has benefited from some of these same effects-peer group, time management, etc.

   Perhaps the most disturbing observation that I heard from many student athletes was that they felt very discriminated against by professors. Repeatedly in interviews students said that professors made harder makeup exams, graded papers more harshly, spoke to them in denigrating ways. In response to those comments, I did a very anecdotal survey of about 30 of my faculty colleagues. Over half my colleagues, including some of those I would have predicted would be most tolerant and supportive of students, made comments like, “Yes, I think those kids get a free ride, so I definitely make it as difficult as possible for athletes as soon as I identify them.” Were that sort of comment based upon ethnicity or gender, I could imagine that the person would be subject to termination.

   So, though I share many of the same reservations that other posters have expressed about big-time college athletics, I want to emphasize that we, as members of the professorate, should take a very informed and objective view of these programs to see how they can help us best serve our students. And, a careful look at our own expectations and behaviors.

   — Chuck    Mar 18, 10:06 AM    #

7. Amen to Jayhawk! As an African-American male I am sick and tired of people using the line of Athletics pulling “poor blacks” from the ghetto. In reality, the millions of African-Americans who were pulled out of poverty were able to do so by education. Contrary to popular opinion, sports play a significant smaller role than if you compare to just education. Because Blacks, men in particular are highlighted in the media and on TV, the belief is that is the case. Sadly, many Black men feel this way.

   As Jacob, the previous post pointed out, these athletes have access to superior campus resources. Just think if all students in need had the same level of support, the retention and graduation rates of these students would be through the roof.

   — D    Mar 18, 10:29 AM    #

8. The attitudes of a student’s professors has a lot to do with a student’s success. A friend (who holds advanced degrees from three Ivy League universities and literally cried over an A-) told me of how he was once given a B on a paper. This was totally out of character for him but, based on his experiences with the professor in class, he had a hunch as to why. So he and a white friend switched their names on the next paper. Sure enough, the paper with the white student’s name on it got an A while the paper with my friend’s name on it got a B. When the students confronted the professor, he had the grace to admit that he didn’t think that Black people could write. Individual effort is a significant part of academic success. But academic success also depends on whether those who teach you believe you can learn and whether those who teach you, who are given full reign to judge you according to their own subjective criteria, inject their own subtle or not so subtle biases and prejudices into their pedagogy. There is a prevaling undercurrent in our nation that Black people are stupid. The self-fulfilling prophesy that attitude engenders is evidenced by graduation rates. How many of those student drop out for truly academic reasons (meaning they really can’t just do the work) and how many are frustrated or demeaned out because of that constant whisper in the wind, “you really don’t belong here.”

   — Daisy    Mar 18, 12:35 PM    #

9. My post should read “. . . because they really just can’t do the work . . .”

   — Daisy    Mar 18, 12:41 PM    #

10. “After only five years of playing football, I got a college degree.” (Forrest Gump)

    — Mark de Goz    Mar 18, 12:47 PM    #

11. I applaud Dr. Lapchick’s independent research and wonder why David Harris feels as if he is another apologist for students who attend our nation’s public school system. Fact of the matter is, there are a number of very bright students who work hard in public school classrooms who do not earn full scholarships to prestigious colleges while athletes, who may or may not possess great academic potential, are given scholarships that include full tuition, room and board and well staffed academic units that are geared to keep them eligible rather than engaged in academics. There are too many examples to cite about how these academic units operate, however; the Ann Arbor media is currently doing a four part story about athletic academic advising that shows that students have been advised not to major in an area they may be interested in, rather to pursue a degree that will keep them eligible. Academic scandals at Georgia, Auburn and Florida State among others have shown an alarming disrespect for academic integrity in college athletics, units which by the way are supposed to be governed by university presidents. Dr. Lapchick is not holding up a white graduation rate as the standard rather just graduating period should be every student‘s goal. There is little doubt that our public school system needs fixing—plenty of it—but Mr. Harris’s response is akin to shooting the messenger. I truly believe that when we look back on this era of college athletics in history—a seventy-five year period in which we have expected less in terms of academic requirements and rigor from our student-athletes—historians will scratch their head wondering “what were they thinking”. Finally, it is great to hear all the stories of student-athletes (including myself) who have done their due diligence and benefited from the system, but Lapchick’s research shows there are not nearly enough of us. Academic potential, not athletic talent, should still be the basis for those admitted to our nation’s colleges and universities.

    — Thomas    Mar 18, 04:00 PM    #

12. I am tired of reading stories about statistics, and people guessing as to why the stats mean what they do. Can’t someone do some unbiased research that (unbiased meaning it’s not always the white man’s fault because it isn’t) gets to the reasoning of the racial divide? I have worked with successful people of many races, and I have seen the failures of people from many races (even white!). Is it personality vs race? Is it parent involvement vs peer pressure? Is it economic status? (I have seen poor/wealthy white’s and poor/wealthy blacks succeed). Where is the common link? It’s easy to pick on athlete’s, but if there is any student that should succeed in college it is the athlete population. Athletes (poor, rich, white, black, hispanic, etc) as has been mentioned before, have access to tutors, test samples, connections, and other things people don’t want to talk about. If athletes don’t succeed, you can’t blame anyone but the individual athlete. At this point it’s not a race issue, but an individual issue.

    — almost a graduate    Mar 18, 05:58 PM    #

13. Agreeing with – almost a graduate.

    It would be interesting to compare the graduation rates, based on race, of the student body as a whole versus the athletes of this study. The comparison would provide an indicator of how admission standards vary between athletes and the student population at large.

    Exploring the different reasons for athletes and non-athletes dropping out would provide additional insight. Two assumptions put forth for athletes dropping out are lack of preparedness and economics.

    If it is lack of preparedness, the question could more pointedly be asked; why were “unprepared” students admitted? Both the school and the athlete had a part in this decision. Both made educated decisions. Each is motivated by different factors. In most cases, only the athlete makes the decision to terminate the relationship. Personal accountability must be viewed as the prime issue. To do otherwise is imprudent.

    — Garrett    Mar 18, 06:51 PM    #

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