Jonathan Shazar: A short-sighted view of athletics

Last month, the eight Ivy League presidents met for their biannual conference and, as when they met in June, the future of Ancient Eight athletics dominated the conversation. Following new regulations promulgated last summer, which include a mandatory seven weeks off from practice during the offseason and fewer football recruits for teams whose rosters contain many more names than will ever see time on the field, the leaders discussed more sweeping changes. The presidents were driven by the fear that participation in varsity athletics is having too detrimental an effect on those students' performances inside and outside the classroom, even though sports and recruiting are already more heavily regulated in the Ivies than anywhere else. University President Judith Rodin called it "the first meeting since I've been president that it's been truly contentious." There's little surprise in that. Athletics is, after all, the reason that this whole Ivy League thing exists, even if more people today associate the Ancient Eight with genius than with gridiron. It also neatly crystallizes what makes the Ivy League different from any other group of schools -- athletic or otherwise -- in the nation. The changes -- and, more importantly, the potential for future changes -- have met with stiff resistance and grim proclamations from many, including a multitude of student newspaper columnists. It seems that any "de-emphasis" of sports in the Ivy League portends the decline of Western civilization. The Harvard Crimson's Anthony Freinberg argues passionately that sports have an important place on Ivy League campuses. On that count, he's almost certainly correct. But for Freinberg, it seems that there are only two aspects to college life: the classroom and the playing field. Apparently, writing for the newspaper or singing in an a cappella group count as "academic pursuits." Freinberg writes that "athletics should have every bit as important a role to play in undergraduate life at Harvard" -- and, presumably, every other college in the country -- "as academics." Again, how other extracurricular activities fit into this equation is unclear, but Freinberg certainly does not seem to want athletics relegated to their lowly position. Not every columnist is so shortsighted. One gimmick, a fictionalized account of a forced seven-week hiatus from newspapering, was so clever that two Ivy papers -- the Crimson and The Cornell Daily Sun -- managed to come up with it. You might even say that these hopelessly self-aggrandizing pieces have a point, if you ignore for a minute just how different athletics are from any other extracurricular activity. Hyperbole, however, is not limited to the aforementioned storytelling. Per Ostman, a rower at Cornell, writes in the Sun that "they are killing me. They are threatening my way of life. 'They' are the members of the Council of Ivy League Presidents." For good measure, he throws in that the presidents "are trying to kill all Ivy League sports." I'm going to give Ostman the benefit of the doubt and assume that he recognizes just how absurd that assertion is. I think it's probably fair to say that every Ivy president recognizes just how important athletics are. But perhaps the most egregious example comes from the pages of our very own Daily Pennsylvanian. Last week, an article about the December meeting actually told us that "Penn's student-athletes have had successes in the classroom as well. Elisabeth Kwak-Hefferan, a Daily Pennsylvanian columnist who was named to the first-team All-Ivy volleyball team, has an over-3.9 GPA," as if the experience of one athlete singlehandedly disproves a book full of evidence. That book, The Game of Life, by James Shulman and former Princeton University President William Bowen, shows "a consistent tendency for athletes to do less well academically than their classmates -- and, even more troubling, a consistent tendency for athletes to underperform academically not just relative to other students, but relative to how they themselves might have been expected to perform." To be sure, Bowen and Shulman's book is not completely unproblematic. Many have thoughtfully criticized not only their conclusions but their evidence as well. Still, it's probably safe to say that there are many fewer Kwak-Hefferans than the DP would have you believe. The Game of Life includes some profoundly disturbing findings about the role of athletics in admissions and in the classroom. For the Council of Ivy League Presidents to ignore them would be irresponsible -- in all likelihood, there are more than a few truths contained within its pages. Change happens, even in sports, and it can be healthy. When Penn signed the Ivy League pact a half-century ago, it was an athletic powerhouse. It's not anymore, but I would argue that the benefits of Ivy League membership far outweigh our decline in sports prowess. The fact is, athletics are not going to be eliminated in the Ivy League. At the same time, the disturbing revelations from The Game of Life and other similar studies cannot be ignored. But those statements are not mutually exclusive -- change is not inherently evil; the Ancient Eight can maintain its long and glorious athletic tradition, even if it reduces the role of sports on campus. And the fear-mongering that has defined this debate is both irresponsible and deceptive. Jonathan Shazar is a senior History and Political Science major from Valley Stream, N.Y.

Please note All comments are eligible for publication in The Daily Pennsylvanian.