Is Time on Our Side?
In an nod to the Rolling Stones one has to wonder if time, meaning time to be actual college students while dealing with the rigor that is college athletics, is really on the side of college athletes. According to recent NCAA report entitled the NCAA GOALS Study of the Student Athlete Experience Initial Summary of Findings, published in January 2016, it is clear that college athletes at all divisions in the NCAA structure are spending more, much more than the mandate of no more than 20 hours a week on athletically related activities. For example, the average NCAA Division 1 athlete reports spending an average of 34 hours per week on athletically related activities, with FBS football players reporting an average of 39 hours plus per week. Even more stunning is many are reporting spending as much time on their sport in the off-season as they do in-season.
At the 2016 NCAA Convention, the delegates punted on any legislation designed to free up some well-deserved free hours away from athletically related activities for college athletes. Many reasons were given for not enacting any legislation this year but predictably the responses ranged from "need more study" to "forming (yet another) another working group of mostly non-competing athletes, re: administrators to make the decisions. I feel it is just another delay to figure out to give the athletes more free time without sacrificing competitive equity. Good luck with trying to do that. It does not need to be so complicated.
Who Should Make Choices on Any Changes?
Who should be making the call on how much time a college athlete can or should be spending on his/her athletic endeavors? That is a difficult one but certainly you need an athlete voice, better yet several athlete voices, to properly ascertain how much time should be spent on any formal practice and competition activities. On the other hand, I don't know too many athletes who don't want to spend more time to get better at their craft, but that too can take away from academic primacy. So it is a bit of a kerfuffle, but let's try to make it simple rather than over complicating it.
College sports is supposed to be about education first-right? Yet almost everything we do with regard to athletically related activities in college sports is usually done for competitive and not educational aspects. Due to the insatiable thirst for television exposure, winning, and revenue generation, teams are playing at all hours of the night, more often that not on school nights, and the travel demands have increased exponentially with conference realignment. In other words--athletic success and exposure are driving the athletically related time demand decisions we are making on college campuses every day and the chance to be an actual college student is becoming less and less.
I know many, including many athletes, will still agree with that approach and in many ways I don't see it as completely bad since educationally based sports make up about 90% of the sport development options in the United States. What other choice do many have, especially those who are elite in their sport? However we need to make some decisions about our educationally based sports model in America and re-frame our thinking. With regard to intercollegiate athletics I have continually stated that the current model we have does not work. I could spend days discussing the flaws and reasons for reform, but to keep it concise we must finally admit that what we are doing does not work and it is time to consider other approaches to sport development in America. In college sports we have to make a decision-is it about education first, or athletic success first? Then we must go one way or another and we cannot continue to dip our toes in both sides of the water hoping for the best. The current model will implode and it is not a matter of if, it is a matter or when it will happen.
Other Models?
To be practical in this post, I am going to recommend some changes that can be made in the current model to better maximize the time demands that college athletes currently have. I know I want the model to change, but making needed changes in the current model can have a net positive effect on initiating needed changes. Many coaches, athletes, administrators and fans will likely not like these suggestions and my response is you either adapt and evolve or go do something else. That would not be the worst outcome either as I strongly believe if we enforced the educational part of school based sports many would want and should be able to compete and participate in other models, such as a European style sports club system.
Alternative systems would manifest themselves and that is not a bad thing at all, in fact I would say it needs to happen and school based sports can be about education first without debate. I surmise we will still watch the games and many agree with me. Even Mike Aresco, the current American Athletic Conference commissioner once told the Knight Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics that stricter academic standards would not harm the college sports product, it would actually help it because fans want to believe they are watching actual students. So let's use that well educated premise as a template to better manage athletic time demands in higher education.
Again--Think Outside the
We need to think more broadly and consider some simple and some radical things to give the athletes more time for academic and social endeavors to enable them to be more integrated into the student body. I do think that there are some common sense changes such as giving the athlete another day off per off week-currently the standard is one day off per week and many times a travel day is considered the day off. Nothing would dramatically change by giving the athlete another day off. Certainly the fans would not notice a thing.
Other simple changes are many if we truly desire the educational model. Break down specific time allowances into in season and out of season activities like a major block of time off after season is over. Strictly enforce a 25 hour a week model for all required athletic activities and end the practice of "required voluntary" activities. We can also drastically reduce out of season activities and non traditional seasons to help the athlete with their academics and better integrate them into the student body. It is clear to me that we do not need year round sports and shockingly why not free up the athlete to even do other sports instead of specializing in just one?
We also need to free up the summer completely outside of standard fall camps for fall sports. Surely the athletes can work out on their own and most will do just that. Summer is prime time for academic alignment and we are taxing our athletes more and more in the summer months and requiring time consuming things that takes away from the academic opportunity. Give the athlete the choice to do things on their own, be a more involved student, participate in other university programs, and still be an athlete. It will help them grow as a person and be a more effective citizen in the future. Again we will still watch the games if we do many of these things and we probably would not notice a difference in quality of play.
Now I can hear many loud guffaws out there and many saying it will never work. OK, if that is the case then let's go the other way and maximize athletic activities and minimize time spent academic endeavors-or at least significantly change and/or delay the relationship. What would be wrong with not requiring any academic attendance, satisfactory progress, percentage of degree and a certain GPA to be eligible and just offer a lifetime learning credit to all athletes. Those who want to attend school can continue to do so on their own time while they are competing but they can take as many hours as they like based upon how much they can handle with athletic demands. An athlete would be free take a semester off, and have as much time as they want to finish their degree program, or just simply wait to attend college after their playing days are over.
We Will Still Watch!
Whatever way we go will work and we will still watch. Having a full time enrolled student competing is not a critical issue in my view, if it was we would be outraged right now at the state of academic integrity in college sports. If it is important, it can be done and we will still watch under the more education centric first option. In the more athletically friendly second option, the educational promise is there for the athlete to take if they want to do it. If not, so be it. It is their choice. The free educational opportunity would be there for a lifetime and I bet most would take it and even be better prepared for college on their timeline. Does it matter if a college athlete is a student now or later? I don't think it matters and for me, as long as the current model changes I really don't think we care. We will still watch.
