“Fouled Out” By Eyal Press lengthily discusses the beliefs of longtime university educator Murray Sperber concerning the current state of American education. According to Mr. Sperber’s beliefs, the quest of various colleges and universities for athletic supremacy has caused a decline in the quality of education across the country. It is this controversial belief of his, as he discussed on a special CNN/Sports Illustrated television interview that has almost cost him his life in the state of Indiana where he first made his beliefs public.
As I read his story, I found myself agreeing with him on many counts. We all know that the educational facilities of the country are in bad need of repair and that a number of after-school activities are often cut from the budget in an effort to curb spending costs. However, schools always seem to decline to cut the athletic department budget. Case in point, most high school students do not aim for academic scholarships to various colleges and universities, they aim for athletic scholarships instead because it is almost like having a job while you are in school.
Take for example the case of Shaquille O’Neal. Everybody knows that he did not make his wealth while playing professional basketball. No, he made the majority of the money during his college basketball playing days. Indeed the face of education has changed. These days, even college-level athletes get all sorts of multi-million dollar product endorsement contracts while the schools practically pay them a regular salary to play for their school teams. Education is put on the back burner as the student instead becomes a play for pay member of the school. Even if the school needs a new set of computers for the laboratory, that can wait because the basketball or football team needs the cash for an out-of-town game.
The quality of education declines in such instances because there is simply no money for the college or university to keep up with the needs of the student body. Education is sacrificed in the name of instant school glory. I remember that there was a time when school glory came from the public success of their graduates. These students who go on to own their companies, become powerful politicians, or discoverers, were the ones who brought real glory to their schools because their success and fame came from the foundation of their education, the school where they matriculated from. Not from the brawn they used in throwing a ball or what have you.
I find it sad that education will continue to be sacrificed in the future because colleges and universities have lost track of what a real educational system is. A system of education that considers sports to be only part of the educational process and is not the be-all and end-all for the survival of a school. Maybe there still are schools out there that do not value sports over education. But they are few and far between. As mentioned in the same article, Mr. Sperber is not convinced that there are more schools that value education over sports. These are the schools that often have to fight to keep the real educational curriculum alive in the face of an ever-growing athletics-oriented trend in education.
In conclusion, I would like to quote a passage from the article as mentioned by Mr. Sperber himself and quoted by Mr. Press. The entry reads this way:
At schools like Swarthmore and Williams, he says, most students will still receive a quality education, and sports do not play a remotely comparable role in shaping the culture.
My belief is that these schools will eventually lose out to their athletics programs as more and more schools prefer instant popularity and students prefer the easy money that athletic performances provide.