Essay Contest

The Top 12 Questions Frequently Asked of Sports Reformers

The popular stereotype of today’s sports reformer is that of a person who doesn’t like athletes or sports competition and would like to see youth, scholastic, amateur, and collegiate sports greatly reduced or eliminated. Not only is this stereotype inaccurate, but it is the exact opposite of what most sports reformers are like today. Many of those in the sports reform field are former athletes, coaches, and athletic administrators. They have a strong appreciation for what it takes to be top athletes and to succeed academically. Their dedication to sports and their desire to end exploitation and abuse of athletes motivates them to seek change. Indeed, it can be said that the most stable, loyal, and empathetic friend of the athlete is the sports reformer. Listed below are some of the most frequently asked questions of those involved in the sports reform movement in our country.

1. I don’t understand what you mean when you say that athletes, especially at the big-time college level, are being exploited. Because they are on scholarship, they get a free education as well as room and board. How is this exploitation?

Scholarship athletes at big time sports colleges are heavily exploited. They are entertainers in every sense of the word since colleges, the NCAA, and many college coaches are making millions of dollars off of their dedication and hard work. While the athletes receive a scholarship in return and a paved road to a college diploma, it is often the case that no education is actually delivered. Many do not attend classes or they take phony courses in watered down and often meaningless curriculum. This "hidden" curriculum is designed for the sole purpose of keeping athletes barely eligible. Still others that are academically capable simply do not have the time to spend studying because of the demands of their sport. Many do not graduate and only a very small percentage make it to the professional leagues. This exploitive system is especially damaging to many African-American athletes where graduation rates are especially low. There are too many stories of athletes being kept barely eligible by a complicit faculty, only to end up with no diploma and no prospects for a good job down the road. One of the biggest myths in our current sports culture is that these individuals are student-athletes. It is sad to say but nothing could be further from the truth for many athletes at big time colleges and universities. The problem of academic hypocrisy and exploitation is not just a college issue. Our public schools and prep schools are no better off than colleges and universities in perpetuating academic corruption. Few schools have rigorous standards for athletic participation. and gross educational deficiencies frequently result in the need for academic "deals" to be struck for a high school diploma. The end result is that many high school athletes are ill-prepared for college work. Reformers want to end this hypocrisy for our young people and only major changes in our sports culture will achieve it.

2. You claim that commercial interests in sports are undermining our colleges and universities. Don’t colleges and universities make lots of money from their athletic programs and don’t they funnel that money into supporting their academic programs as well as non-revenue generating sports. Why is this a bad thing?

Colleges and universities ae very clever at cooking the books and making the public think that revenues from sports have a posiive spin-off for the rest of their institution. However there are many myths surrounding college sports financing that you need to be aware of. First, let's get things straight. Only a very few institutions actually make money. The vast majority of colleges and universities in this country lose money or break even on their sports programs. Second, revenues from sports programs go right back into athletics and rarely if ever go into academic programs. While it is true that sports revenues are also used to support non-revenue sports, ask any collegiate soccer player, golfer, or volleyball player if they enjoy the same scholarship benefits and comforts as their classmates on the football field or basketball court. The fact is that they aren't treated the same and they are largely second-class citizens in the college athlete hierarchy. Third, because of an arms race to see who can build the best sports facilities and therefore get a leg up on the recruiting wars, there is a never ending sea of red ink at most institutions. Fourth, donations from boosters and large corporations don't come without strings attached. Colleges and universities are beholden to these large contributors to athletic programs and increasingly they (the contributors) have undue influence on important institutional decisions. Colleges and universities were never meant to be in the entertainment business but that is exactly what has happened. They have sold their souls to the highest bidders and are now close to the point of no return. As a result, many of our institutions of higher learning now focus more of their time and energy on entertainment than they do on academics. Regrettably, some of these same trends are also seen at the prep and high school level.

3. I like to bet on college and high school athletic contests, so I don’t see what is wrong with sports gambling and the publication of betting lines? How is this possibly hurting anyone especially the athletes playing the games?

There is probably nothing wrong with a small wager that you make on a game with a friend of yours. However, it is the cancer of legalized gambling that poses such a threat to the integrity of college athletics and to some extent high school sports. Millions of dollars are legally bet every year on college football and basketball games and there are numerous examples now of how organized crime has persuaded some college athletes to throw games and shave points. Gambling and the seedy environment that surrounds it is the antithesis of what we are trying to teach in our colleges and universities. The integrity of sport is constantly being challenged if we continue to allow legalized gambling on college sporting events. It is further exacerbated when point spreads for both college and high school games are routinely published in newspapers.

4. What’s wrong with the fact that athletes take illicit substances to assist them in competitions? Hasn’t this been done for many years and don’t almost all athletes engage in it at some level?

While it is true that performance enhancing drugs have been a part of our sports culture since the 1940s, it has only been recently that we have learned enough about them to make informed judgments regarding their usage. There is no justifiable reason why illicit substances should be tolerated in athletics today. From an ethical point of view, it robs sports competition of any semblance of fairness. From a scientific/medical perspective, performance enhancing drugs can have serious and long-lasting physical and behavioral effects. Our sports culture, with its win at all costs attitude, has fostered the use of performance enhancing drugs at almost all levels of competition in many different sports. Sports reformers are in favor of strict prohibitions and penalties on illicit drug use and they are in favor of changing the current culture that fuels their usage.

5. You say that the behavior of athletes, coaches, and parents is at an all time low and that sportsmanship and ethics is rapidly deteriorating. Aren’t youth, scholastic, and collegiate players just copying what is going on in the pros? Isn’t it just a part of sport these days and we must learn to accept it?

At the professional level, there is no question that sportsmanship is at an all time low. Likewise, the behavior of many scholastic, collegiate, and professional athletes off the field is both disturbing and disappointing. It certainly does not help that athletes at the youth levels of sports see older athletes acting in such an irresponsible way. However, this alone is not the cause of misbehavior in young athletes. Those in a position of authority in our sports culture, such as coaches and school officials, must do more to reward good sportsmanship when it appears and discipline misbehavior when it occurs. Not only must our culture be more proactive about what is acceptable and what is not acceptable behavior, but it must be clearly spelled out to our young athletes the minute they begin playing a sport competitively. Also, we can no longer give athletes special treatment when they exhibit illegal behaviors that should be punished by our society. They must be treated by our system of justice in an unbiased, non-preferential manner. Likewise, the same holds true for coaches, fans and parents. There should be zero tolerance for poor sportsmanship exhibited by adults. Sports reformers do not accept the notion that poor sportsmanship and misbehavior by our athletes, parents, coaches and fans are just normal parts of our culture and that little can be done to change it. Our sports culture places a very high priority on winning athletic contests and does not do enough to promote things like sportsmanship, fair play, and citizenship. This needs to be reversed immediately if we are to make progress in this area.

6. My child wants to play a sport in college but I am unsure where he should attend? With all of the hypocrisy going on with academic corruption, is he going to receive an education that is worth anything? Maybe my child should not even consider playing a sport in college.

It is a perfectly worthwhile goal for a boy or girl to want to play a sport while in college. However, at the highest level of college athletics such as Division I where athletes receive scholarships to play their sport it is more like a job than anything else. The pressures to win are enormous and oftentimes academic expectations are low or absent. Even in cases where athletes enter an institution with solid academic credentials and high expectations, they soon learn that their sport must come first if they are to retain their scholarship. As a result, this means that there is far less time to spend on academics. Unless your child is a certifiable “blue-chipper”, many sports reformers would highly recommend that you consider a program where the pressures are not as great and the environment for academic success is more serious. Many Division III schools (exemplified by the New England Small College Athletic Conference (NESCAC)) fit this profile as well as some Division I programs such as those institutions in the Patriot and Ivy Leagues.

7. My child is 8 years of age and already is showing signs of being a skilled athlete in one sport. I want him to concentrate on the one sport as much as possible. If that means he devotes almost all of his free time to a single sport and doesn’t play other sports I am OK with that. What’s wrong with concentrating on a single sport at an early age?

One of the biggest problems that we have in our current sports culture is that we rob our youths of the carefree years of their early development. These are years that should be devoted to unstructured play and exploration of a variety of different athletic pursuits. Instead, more and more, the early years of development are devoted to a single-minded obsession with getting better at one particular sport. Fueled by parental pressure and the possible reward of an athletic scholarship or professional contract down the road, young kids are pushed into specializing at an early age. Sports reformers call it “professionalization” or “early specialization” and it is becoming more and more of a problem with each passing year. Burnout at an early age and injury due to overtraining is often the result. Sports reformers are strictly against youths concentrating on one sport at an early age.

8. Our local newspapers and television programs spend a considerable amount of time covering local high school and youth sports. The coverage is quite extensive and often there are in depth stories about teams, individual players, and coaches. What is wrong with this? Who does it hurt?

There is a time and a place for everything. Unfortunately, local media coverage over the past 10 to 20 years has done the same thing that parents and organizers of scholastic and youth sports have done. Namely, they have attempted to professionalize young athletes by reporting on them in the same way that they report on Michael Jordan, Bobby Bonds, and Brett Favre. There is no code of ethics it seems when it comes to reporting on youth and scholastic sports. The coverage is excessively detailed and distorted and tends to make myths out of young players, many of whom have not even reached puberty. A certain amount of media coverage is OK but it seems as though good taste and setting limits has been erased in the name of selling papers and sensationalizing the lives of young athletes. The media coverage of young athletes is also unbalanced. For example, let’s take the case of a young person who does not play a sport but is an excellent student. When was the last time you saw a newspaper or television program chronicle that student’s every move from freshman year to their graduation as they decided on where they wanted to attend college and what academic scholarship they were thinking of accepting? Because this rarely happens, we end up reinforcing and giving attention to athletes and their endeavors far more than we cover the exploits and accomplishments of non-athletes. The message to parents and young people is that sports are more valued and more important than academic endeavors. The media also is at fault for the excessive amount of coverage devoted to the physical and violent aspects of sports. We are routinely bombarded with bone-crushing hits from football, gortesque blood-filled fights in hockey, unruly fans attacking players and officials with snowballs and bottles, and bench-clearning brawls in many sports. Nothing seems to be sacred, not even the reporting of just about every aspect of the private lives of athletes. The media to date has taken very little responsibility in policing itself in these important areas.

9. Title IX is one of the best things to have ever happened to sports because woman now have the same opportunities as men. You say that there are still gross inequalities going on with respect to sports opportunities. Please explain this to me because I thought Title IX was producing a much better sports landscape for everyone.

Title IX has definitely improved opportunities for woman in athletics and has been a positive force in our sports culture. However, we should not be deluded into thinking that 100% equality for woman has arrived. This clearly is not the case in many areas of our country in which woman still lag behind men in the resources devoted to athletics at the youth, scholastic and collegiate levels. Moreover, while not its intent, Title IX has had damaging effects upon some male sports and has actually diminished opportunities for males in some areas. Apart from Title IX, there are other inequities in sports opportunities that are related to race, age, and socioeconomic status. Poorer inner cities as well as rural areas often can not provide the same athletic opportunities as middle class and upper income suburban areas. Some minorities do not have equal access to coaching and administrative positions. Also, the trend toward supporting select, elite, and other highly competitive teams means that community-based and intramural recreational opportunities are actually diminishing. Consequently, our sports landscape still has many inequities which are not even close to being resolved.

10. Why is there increasing concern about sports injuries? I thought collegiate, scholastic, and youth sports were safer than they have ever been.

Sports related injuries can be physical or psychological (emotional) in nature. Regardless, they are escalating for almost all levels of athletics and not enough is being done to prevent them. Our athletes are becoming more skilled and are training harder than ever before, but we do not devote adequate resources and attention to health and safety issues. The pressurized win-at-all-costs sports environment that our young athletes are exposed to can lead to emotional and overuse injury. Likewise, many studies now show that equipment and training changes could effectively prevent many physical sports injuries. However, many sports governing bodies do little to incorporate these changes because of cost, tradition, pressure from equipment and insurance companies, and the benign neglect of our federal government. We have a decision to make in our country. Do we want to continue to abuse the health and safety of our athletes and jeopardize their long-term development, or do we want to make more of an investment in prevention of sports injuries?

11. Athletes in our country appear to be more skilled with each passing year. Yet, you say that overall fitness and health are declining. Please explain to me how you can make this conclusion?

There is little question that our athletes are getting more skilled all the time. Watch any Olympic, professional, collegiate, or high school sports contest and you will certainly notice a higher skill level than 5 or 10 years ago. However, while our select and elite team athletes are getting better, overall fitness of the average young person is actually going down. This is due in part to the fact that we no longer place an emphasis upon physical education and fitness, intramural sports, and overall recreational and health-related activities. Instead, both locally and nationally, resources are being directed toward athletes-in-training versus those who are not. Because most school and college athletic budgets go to support competitive teams, the vast majority of individuals hardly benefit from the facilities and equipment that are available for sports activities. We need to direct more of our sports resources toward the non-elite athlete and, if needed, diminish those that are devoted to athletes-in-training.

12. What can I do on an individual level to get involved with reforming sports and ending the exploitation and abuse of our young athletes?

Anyone who wants to become involved with sports reform must first recognize that there are multiple problems and that they exist at every age level of sports, in every region of the country, and in every sport that is played. On a local level, become involved with your own community and participate in the dialogues that take place in school athletic associations, school committees, booster groups, youth and amateur leagues, as well as collegiate groups. The health, safety, and welfare of kids should drive all decision making for pre-professional sports. Ironically, however, one of the most significant problems in sports reform these days is that there are not enough individuals involved in sports governing bodies that think this way. Too often, the policies that end up directly affecting young athletes are made by individuals who have competing agendas such as the winning of games or commercial interests. On the national level, become a member of the National Institute for Sports Reform. One of the goals of the institute is to help athletes and prevent their exploitation and abuse.

Tell Us How You Would Reform Sports

Do you have a proposal for reforming our out of control sports culture? If you do, you are invited to submit a short essay to the National Institute of Sports Reform (NISR) for consideration. Your own experiences as an athlete, fan, coach, official, parent, sportswriter, sportscaster, professor or secondary school teacher, or administrator may help to provide insights into reforming our sports culture.

Just what are we looking for in your contribution? A short essay or story (no more than 10 pages double-spaced) on some experience that shaped your thoughts on how sports can be reformed to make it better for our young athletes. We’re looking for true, interesting, inspirational, or humorous stories that illustrate the spirit of sports reform today. In particular, essays that address major problem areas in our sports culture will be welcomed.

For example, your essay could propose solutions to problems like academic corruption and exploitation, commercialism, overemphasized media coverage, performance enhancing drug usage, athlete misbehavior and declining sportsmanship, escalating burnout and sports injuires, early professionalization and specialization, and legalized sports gambling. Importantly, the essays will represent real life experiences of those in and around sports and they will provide practical solutions to some of the problems that presently plague our sports landscape.

We will select the best essays for publication in a book on sports reform. If selected, each author will receive $200 for their essay. The author of the best essay will receive a $500 prize and an all expenses paid trip to present their work at the biannual NISR meeting. The winner of the contest will be announced during National Sports Reform Month. The first winner will be announced in March, 2005.

Send 3 copies of your submission to NISR, Reforming Sports Essays, PO Box 128, Selkirk, NY 12158.

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