Wed 26 Apr 2006
With each passing year, I not only feel more connected to the larger sense of what Williams represents, I also increasingly appreciate the idea of the New England Small College Athletic Conference. It’s hard to imagine a comparable conference in all of college sports. Geographically (well, ok, Hamilton seems like something of an interloper), in size, scope, mission, philosophy, student body, and place in the academic hierarchy, NESCAC is a unique manifestation of places that, The Game of Life be damned, still try to do it right and succeed a lot more often than they fail.
As a former athlete at Williams, I feel an affinity with Middlebury and Bowdoin and Tufts, hell, even with Wesleyan and Amherst. (OK — I admit, I feel somewhat dirty typing that last bit.) I am apparently not alone in my sentiments about the conference, and not merely Williams’ (dominant) place within it. NescacNation.com is, in its own words, “a community connecting NESCAC students, alumni, and fans.” NESCACNation gives a pretty good feel for not only the vibrant goings-on in the conference, but also of the nature of NESCAC. Plus, it doesn’t hurt that Williams features prominently on the site.
April 26th, 2006 at 7:40 pm
I don’t want to get started on NESCAC. So I won’t except to say that I believe that in the scheme of things it is a net negative.
April 26th, 2006 at 8:09 pm
I’d be curious to hear some reasons why the NESCAC could be a net negative.
April 26th, 2006 at 9:03 pm
Frank:
I’m curious about your thoughts as well. Something tells me that you probably have a unique, and interesting, perspective. I suspect I may not agree with it, but I bet I would find it intellectually challenging.
If memory serves, do you favor getting rid of conference recruiting regulations and just letting each college (and the free market) sort things out for themselves?
Sidenote: the link on the NESCACnation.com site to Trinity’s financial crunch is quite interesting. Six page artice in the school paper detailing the President’s budget cutbacks. Lots of stuff on per student endowment, excessive endowment spending, financial equilibrium, yadda yadda. I love that stuff.
April 26th, 2006 at 11:52 pm
As a Williams senior who, up until 45 seconds ago, did not know what NASCAC acronym stands for, I would disagree with your assertion of its importance.
April 26th, 2006 at 11:53 pm
…oupps, excuse me. NESCAC, not NASCAC (how ironic).
April 27th, 2006 at 12:05 am
You must not be an athlete, current Williams senior.
April 27th, 2006 at 8:44 am
I believe you mean “jock,” current Williams athlete-scholar.
April 27th, 2006 at 12:37 pm
I too would like to see an elucidaion of what Frank thinks about NESCAC.
I will say that I can see a hint of anti-athlete sentiment emerging. If any of the anti-athletes want to take the intellectual Pepsi challenge, I welcome them to step up to the plate. I’m sure there are quite a few of us dumb jocks more than welcome to defend ourselves if we can just pick out knuckles off the floor and get beyond our ridged brows furrowed with confusion.
I’m afraid that one current Williams senior being unaware of what NESCAC is hardly makes for a sample size of any note. I would gather that there are lots of important things out in this world of ours and even in our own little Williams community that the senior does not know about. I’m not certain that his or her awareness is the foundation of significance. (And if you are going to diminish the significance of something you presume that I posit as important, it may be useful for you to use the word “ironic” properly. One would expect someone who has never heard of “NESCAC” not to get the acronym straight. If anything, your misspelling/typo is the opposite of ironic.)
Beyond that, do I actually assert NESCAC’s “importance” in my post? (I do not. So we’ll add poor reading comprehension to misusage of the word “irony” in our senior’s list of sins. I hope he or she is a science major.) But let me do so now:
Since NESCAC’s founding, thousands of young men and women have been part of the conference. Thousands of us recognize its uniqueness and what its existence has meant to our lives. At minimum, thousands, probably tens of thousands, of people have passed through the conference. At minimum, NESCAC is cenral to the sporting experience of student-athletes at Williams, Amherst, Tufts, Middlebury, Bates, Bowdoin, Colby, wesleyan, Trinity, Connecticut College, and Hamilton. While it may not have the same media cache or sporting status as the Big Ten or Pac Ten, given the commitment of NESCAC schools to offer a wide variety of sports, it is likely that more athletes participate in intercollegiate sports in NESCAC than in these uber-conferences.
I would never let anyone sit back and diminish, say, the Williams Octet alumni (of which I am a member) and I doubt that anyone would. Why, then, would anyone try to diminish something like NESCAC’s significance, which by any measure far surpasses that of the Octet in terms of people involved or lives touched?
I look forward to Frank’s comments (I do not include him in this little show across the bow and I suspect that he’ll have provocative things to add) and hope that we can keep the cliched anti-jock tirades to a minimum.
dc
April 27th, 2006 at 2:19 pm
That, IMO, has been the true failing of the NESCAC and its member schools. Before the NESCAC came along in 1971, the member schools were mostly single-sex male schools. Their athletic programs were scaled appropriately for the size of the male student body and operated, for the most part, as adjunct extracurricular activities complimenting the primary academic focus of these schools. There were no captain’s practices conflicting with class schedules, no missing classes for NCAA championships, etc. Success in athletics was measured by Little Three rivalry games, not systemic pressure to compete successfully on a national level in multipe sports against much larger, less academically focused schools.
Fast forward to the early 1970s and most of these schools went co-ed without ever considering the implications of their athletic programs. The same number of male sports had to be supported with fewer male students and the number of sports doubled with the addition of women’s sports. The result is the highest participation in varsity and junior varsity sports of any schools in the country. The formation of the NESCAC turned formerly informal competitive traditions into conference championships and resulted in lowest common denominator admissions practices. The recruiting rules of the NESCAC force colleges to emphasize athletics in admissions more so than they would if simply left to their own individual choices.
In many ways, I believe that the NESCAC probably has the most irrational balance of athletics and academics in the United States with a scale that undermines the academic mission of these schools. The disproportional scale inevitably leads to campus culture problems (athletes versus non-athletes) that should not and would not exist if the NESCAC and its member schools had been more proactive in reconciling intercollegiate athletics with the change to coeducation. The whole thing is out of whack: the most academically focused schools in the country now have proportionally the heaviest emphasis (in terms of admissions and campus accomodation) on varsity athletics.
This is not inherently an athletics problem. Many of the same issues would apply if 50% of the student body were involved in any single extracurricular activity, i.e. if 50% of the students were in the symphony orchestra or if 50% of the students participated on 25 debate teams. With small enrollment, it is even more important that student interests be spread somewhat evenly across many interests. If half the school is primarily identified by a single interest, polarization becomes inevitable.
April 27th, 2006 at 3:08 pm
Frank –
I think there are several flaws with your argument.
First off, I’m not certain that “athletics” can be broken down into “a single interest.” perhaps the squash team and the football team are engaged in fundamentally the same endeavor. I do not think so. I cherish athletics in toto, to be sure, so I am not fully separating them, but to lump it all in as one interest is to lack subtlety.
You’d need to show me evidence that sports were somehow less important in the pre-female days at Williams, and that the place was more academically focused. You’d need to show me evidence of that “scale” that sounds to me an awful lot like gauzy romanticism and not a reflection on reality. How many men’s sports have been added since Williams became co-ed? How many have been subbtracted? And if the answer is in both cases “not many,” then what does one do to give women equal opportunity? Again, this wistful appeal to an era that never was does us no good when we recognize what Williams is — a coed college, and far better for it.
Do lots of captain’s practices conflict with class schedules? Is their an epidemic of students missing classes because of NCAA competition? For those who are missing some classes, are we really saying that the classes they miss are so much more vital to their lives than what they get from competing at that level and the opportunity that provides? I tend to think not.
As for whether sports have watered down academics (and again, I ask: watered down from what?) I can only speak anecdotally. My fellow track captains from the 1992-1993 season? There were three of us. Two PhDs and an MD. Among our other seniors that year? We have a prep school teacher, another doctor, a Hollywood set and costume designer, yet another doctor . . . etc. (The two football captains from that year that I know of became a doctor and a prep school teacher.)
Yeah, those two seasons of athletics and all those captains’ practices I pulled together — they sure screwed us. Williams must be ashamed. NESCAC too.
dcat
April 27th, 2006 at 4:39 pm
Derek: I believe that you are confusing me with hwc and his reasoning.
April 27th, 2006 at 4:47 pm
Mae culpa. You are right.
April 27th, 2006 at 7:49 pm
I looked up the numbers from the WebCASPAR database. In 1970, Williams had 1299 male students. This year, I believe the number is 986.
That’s about a 25% reduction. I don’t believe that any male sports have been dropped. I believe that Williams has more JV sports now than it did in 1970.
April 27th, 2006 at 11:14 pm
Adding JV sports is not really an addition of new programs. JV athletes are part of the same program, and in any case, most varsity sports do not have JV programs at Williams. Williams has maintained the same number of NCAA teams over time, and in order to become a coed college, the number of men dropped somewhat in order for Williams to be able to reach a workable but still cozy number of 2000 students. Meanwhile I think it is fairly safe to say that as a national caliber institution Williams is as highly regarded as at any time in its history. That it also happens to be highly rated in athletics is a good thing. I’m still not certain what the problem is. But I’m just a dumb jock without the sort of higher reasoning skills that the non-jocks possess.
April 28th, 2006 at 2:08 am
I actually go to Tufts, but I stumbled on this site from the link on nescacnation.com and I’ve done a fair amount of research into NESCAC and why it was founded and how it’s changed itself and how it’s changed the institutions.
I think the NESCAC schools themselves tend to attract kids that did it all in high school, and that includes a large number of athletes. And yes, there are some fishy admissions processes going on, but nothing NEAR like what you’d find at a DI or a lot of other DII and DIII schools. But I’ve also found that athletes at NESCAC schools don’t just play sports. Many of them are on the paper with me, they are involved in community service, etc.
Also, I disagree with the idea that athletics have ruined the academic and institutional integrity of NESCAC schools. Not that I don’t think there are some athletes here that aren’t as smart as some other students here (and probably some that didn’t get in), but the presidents are aware of it and always reexamining the issue. I know you guys switched from a 72-tip system for athlete-admits to a 66-tip one in 2002, and every few years we do a huge study of athlete GPAs.
Don’t get me wrong - I’m not trying to convince you that athletes are all geniuses. I am not one, but I almost played here (as I’m sure many people in NESCAC schools did) and I am friends with and work with many of them. There are a lot of things about the athletic culture that should be changed, but I don’t think we’re anywhere near the problems that DI schools face.
April 28th, 2006 at 7:56 am
I don’t think we have anywhere near the problem that most other D3 schools face either. Why is this? Because most NESCAC schools are appealing enough that we attract incredible numbers of smart and involved athletes. I think you’ll be hard pressed to find any schools outside the NESCAC with athletes who perform as well academically and are as committed in other non-athletic activities.
To build off of what our little jumbo above said, it’s not fair to label someone a jock simply because they play a varsity sport. Many, if not most of these students are seriously committed to other extracurriculars as well…like the newspaper for example. Furthermore, it is not fair to group EVERYONE who plays some sport together in the same category; the sort of commitment and participation required in swimming is drastically different than what is required for varsity football (and not necessarily more or less or better or worse…just different).
In other words, hwc, what you’re doing is not fair. It’s like grouping together all students involved in any form of community service–the college council reps, ACE members, and Lehman board together. In fact, someone on ACE is probably far more likely to also be involved with Lehman than a tennis player is to be on the cross country team (and I purposefully picked these two teams, as generally they each have reputations of generally allowing any committed and interested student to be a member of the team).
I think it’s fantastic that so many people at Williams (and Tufts and Amherst…) play sports, just the same way I think it’s fantastic that so many people play music, write for the newspaper, and are just generally involved around campus. I’m proud of the fact that most people at Williams are involved in activities (usually more than one) in addition to their coursework. A student not wishing to do anything other than study and talk about their studies doesn’t have to come to Williams–there are plenty of acdemically strong schools out there that have a much more singularly-focused student body than Williams. HWC, rather than trying to make Williams into one of them, why don’t you take your discussion back to where it’ll be more appreciated: Swarthmore.
April 28th, 2006 at 1:48 pm
That’s a strawman argument. I don’t think even William Bowen would argue that athletics have “ruined” academics at top Div III schools.
Has an over-emphasis on athletics, in the admissions process and on the expected norm of day-to-day life, diluted the academic focus? That’s the question. The Williams faculty report on Athletics suggests that it has, although it is clear to differentiate among various sports.
The impact on the NESCAC schools is much greater than on any Div I school. It’s simply a numbers game. From the IPEDS data regarding numbers of athlete-students on an active roster for the first game in 2004/05.
Williams:
Total Undergrads: 1931
Total team members: 825 (43%)
Unduplicated varsity athletes: 601 (31%)
Amherst:
Total Undergrads: 1638
Total team members: 605 (37%)
Unduplicated varsity athletes: 489 (30%)
University of Miami:
Total Undergrads: 9202
Total team members: 452 (5%)
Unduplicated varsity athletes: 287 (3%)
University of Southern California:
Total Undergrads: 15776
Total team members: 624 (4%)
Unduplicated varsity athletes: 608 (4%)
It is certainly true that powerhouse Div I programs will “dig deeper into the admissions pool” (euphemistically speaking) in order to enroll a recruited athlete than will the NESCAC schools. However, the impact of the recruited athletes is negligible at these schools because their numbers relative to the undergrad population is so small. These schools could literally enroll a box of rocks to fill every athletic slot and it would barely impact academics.
The argument that “each sport is different” is certainly true. The Williams report was clear in citing women athletes and members of many mens teams as outstanding students. Nevertheless, athletics plays a bigger role in admissions than any other combination of extracurricular activities. In this year’s freshman class at Williams, more enrolled students had “gold stars” from the athetics department (projected as a four-year varsity athlete) on their admissions folders than had “gold stars” for music, theater, dance, art, and writing combined.
The problem with the much bally-hoo’d NESCAC conference “tip policy” is that the number essentially becomes a floor that all schools in the conference feel they must meet. The “tip” regulations are trotted out as an example of good intentions when the admissions offices know that the number of recruited athletes is actually two or three times higher. The 66 tips are simply the worst of the recruits — those who would have literally zero chance of getting into a Williams or an Amherst otherwise. The additional 100 or so recruited athletes in each class bring decent to good to even excellent academic qualifications to the party. Get rid of the 66 tips and — voila — the whole issue goes away.
Why should we applaud the NESCAC for saying, “hey guys, let’s agree to enroll 10% to 15% of our freshman class each year who don’t even meet our academic standards just so we can raise the bar for being competitive in conference competition.” They could get rid of tips entirely, across the board, and the relative competitiveness in conference play wouldn’t change one iota. Keep in mind that this 10% to 15% of each freshman class (being, on average, whiter and wealthier than the student body as a whole) undermines several other institutional admissions priorities.
April 28th, 2006 at 2:22 pm
HWC –
How do you know what Williams’ “academic standards” are independent of tips to athletes, kids of alums, talented musicians and the like? What are these standards that are being violated? What are the magic numbers? And why does that matter? Your assertions only are legitimate if one buys the implication of your argument: that the skills an athlete brings to campus are not valuable ones. And that we should only consider “academic” models when looking at admissions. But Williams has never done that. Ever. At no point in the history of Williams College has the only concern of the admissions office been these as yet undefined “academic standards.”
Furthermore, do we know that every tipped athlete might not have gotten in anyway? Do we know that these kids did not bring other extracurriculars to the table? Do we know that among those tips were not class presidents and musicians and artists? And if so, let’s see the evidence. I want to see the evidence that these “tips” brought nothing else to the table. I imagine you cannot do it. If so, show the data. If not, stop the unsubstantiated nonsense aboput a tip process that brings in unqualified people.
In any case, your initial case was against NESCAC. Now it is the conference’s fault that the “much bally-hoo’d NESCAC conference “tip policy” is that the number essentially becomes a floor that all schools in the conference feel they must meet,” an assertion for which, again, I am sure you have the evidence? How so?
And do we know that tipped athletes are whiter than the student body as a whole? Again, how about a citation or two. I am unimpressed by ipse dixit assertions of “facts” that I suspect may have been cooked just a wee bit.
And funny, I see no response to the fact that a number of us dumbass athletes seem to have done fairly well for ourselves. I suppose that would be because to do so would be to acknowledge that the admissions system might actually work, handwringing to the contrary.
dcat
April 28th, 2006 at 3:23 pm
Another strawman argument.
My “implication” is that athletic skills should be viewed exactly the same as any other skill brought to campus by any other student: no less valuable, no more valuable. Exactly the same.
This also means that athletic admits should be treated no differently than any other admit. Just as there is no separate admissions mechanism for 66 artists or 66 musicians or 66 computer geeks, there should be no separate admissions track for athletes. There is absolutely no reason the admissions office couldn’t properly weight the value of athletics as an extracurricular activity, just as they do for rest of the class. There is no reason that the Athletic Department should be given what is essentially sole discretion to select 10% to 15% of every freshman class. If the Art History department were given similar autonomy in the admissions process, I would object just as strenuously.
Furthermore, there is no need for the tip system. The preference mechanism for the additional 80 to 120 “non-tipped” athletes enrolled in each freshman class by the admissions office works just fine, just as the preference given to accomplished artists or musicians or debaters.
———
BTW, the data on varsity athletes at Williams comes from Charts 10 and 23 of the Diversity Report, using data from the Spring 2003 Enrolled Student Survey (ESS). I think the data supports my assertion that, by enrolling 30% of each freshman class with students tagged as likely 4-year varsity athletes, the ability of the College to meet its other diversity goals is undermined. There are only “x” number of slots in the freshman class.
Whites are 70% of the total enrollment, 86% of the varsity athletes. 49% of white students participate on a varsity sports team.
African Americans are 8.6% of the total enrollment, 5.2% of the varsity athletes. 33% of Af Am students participate on a varsity sports team.
Latinos are 7.7% of the total enrollment, 3.4% of the varsity athletes. 36% of Latino students participate on a varsity sports team.
Asian Americans are 8.6% of the total enrollment, 3.2% of the varsity athletes. 33% of Asian American students participate on a varsity sports team.
Low socio-economic students are 13.9% of the total enrollment, 7.6% of the varsity athletes.
April 28th, 2006 at 3:27 pm
the only sentiment I’m seeing in this thread is Derek consistently trying to find someone to make the patently absurd claim that all athletes at Williams are dumb.
Of course they aren’t. The question is not are athletes stupid, but rather, of the people who are at Williams who one does not believe improves the school but rather hurts the school, how many of thsoe people are athletes? How many tipped athletes? Is there a way to have athletics without having the bad apples?
What I’ve noticed everytime athletics (and many other things, but it is especially clear with athletics) is brought up, people run into extremist camps defending either all athletics as good, or all athletic tips as bad. I don’t think either camp is particularly good. I would rather look for a creative solution to the problem of the (many but certainly nowhere near most, IMO) bad apples that get into williams thanks to athletic tipping and the effect of having such a sports heavy culture (i don’t think it’s much of a positive or negative effect, but it is an effect). To wit, I propose a recruiting demerit system for teams: for each infraction of certain Williams rules (too rowdy parties, vandalism, low grades, etc.) from members of a team (shoot, if you really want, we can make it true across all extracurricular programs with any form of “tips”), that team will receive one fewer tip the next season. So, when team X lacks a player at a position, they have no one to blame but their own unregistered party and vandalism.
and now, back to a timed take home (why do they still give those to grad students??? grr…)
April 28th, 2006 at 3:40 pm
There is no other extracurricular activity at Williams that has a “tip” mechanism in the same way that the 66 “tipped” athletes are admitted. The preferences given to other EC interests operate much like the next tier of 30+ recruited athletes (in which the admissions office considers a recommended list provided by the athletic department, but the athletic department does not have sole discretion choose) or the top tier of 40 to 70 athletes (in which the admissions office may or may not consider athletics noted on the application, but receives no names from the athletics department).
If the mechanism for weighting athletics in the admissions process were the same as the mechanism for any other EC interest, there would be no complaint (at least from me).
April 28th, 2006 at 4:18 pm
the truth is, hwc, that athletics are not any other extracurricular activity. and that’s fine - the chamber singers don’t bring in money or promote school spirit the way a winning lacrosse team does. frankly, if we wanted a school without the possibility of going to a sporting game and seeing our friends there and cheering and just feeling good about going to school where we do, we would have gone to uchicago or nyu, also great schools that simply put a different emphasis on athletics.
looking at the relative “impact” of sports on NESCAC schools as compared to Div. I schools is useless - look at the TYPE of impact. sports here are for the most part inclusive, fun, and relaxed - people go to watch their friends pitch or score a goal, and that’s really unique to what we have.
And derek made an excellent point, that the question isn’t whether athletes are dumber or contribute less off the field than a violinist, say, does off the stage. the question is what percentage, among the “bad apples” at our schools, are athletes, and then what percentage of those might not have gotten in otherwise. some of the smartest kids i know play sports here, and many of them were absolutely good enough to play Div I, but chose Tufts because of the academics.
THAT’s the real safeguard here. Bad apples sneak by admissions all the time, and maybe a few more at NESCAC schools get helped my a coach, but I know for a fact that coaches get told no way more often than they get told yes. The “tip” system is an interesting way to think about it, but honestly, all of us were “tipped in” somehow. the academics just gets you an audience, and we all have something that pushed us in the door over all the other (academically qualified) people who didn’t get in. You can whine all you want, but the truth is that I think athletics add something unique to NESCAC experiences - look at the fact itself that these institutions, even when talking about their academics, are referred to all over the country as “NESCAC” schools. You say that NESCAC schools have a higher percentage of people involved in sports, but that’s expected, since these were all involved, engaged kids in high school.
and the perceived level of competition does to some extent force schools to bend the rules, but if you’ll look back, every time its gotten out of hand, the presidents and ADs and faculties of these schools have stood up and taken a step back.
April 28th, 2006 at 4:20 pm
Also, you said that Williams had more athletes with “gold stars” indicating expected four-year participation. But that’s not surprising - more people quit the orchestra or the paper than quit athletics. Most athletes are life-long athletes and don’t want to walk away. Let’s pick our battles, and not rip on athletes for being more committed than the average student.
April 28th, 2006 at 4:58 pm
OK, if that’s the question you wish to pose, let’s turn to the data. This time from the recent Williams College Alcohol Task Force report, a study that attempted to shed some light on what is perceived to be Williams’ most pressing “bad apple” behavior issue:
Thus, it would appear that the extremely high percentage of varsity athletes in the student population at Williams (the highest percentage in the nation) not only tends to undermine the diversity priorities of the College, but also correlates with the College’s most serious campus life problem (above average levels of heavy drinking and resulting disruption).
Again, this is not the “strawman” argument that Williams should have no college athletics. Rather, it is a question of whether the disproportionate emphasis on athletics in the admissions process (relative to peer institutions around the country) serves Williams overall priorities. It is a question of degree.
April 28th, 2006 at 5:56 pm
I understand the point you’re making, and you hardly have to pull out data to convince me that athletes drink more than the average student body. But that shouldn’t suprise anyone - because of the nature of college social dynamics, athletes tend to know more people, and have more people know them, and the teams tend to be close with each other. Team “houses” often serve as pseudo-frats, as team members tend to live with each other and have parties that attract a lot of athletes (since many of them tend to know each other) and their friends.
Second of all, a lot of people at college drink, and frankly, that has very little correlation, I think, to “bad apples.” What I’m referring to are people that you look at and say “Why are you here?” The ones that tend to be uninvolved across the board and uninterested in anything having to do with the school. If college is about getting involved and giving back to the community, then I can think of a huge number of people who do that less than athletes.
April 28th, 2006 at 6:20 pm
Call me old fashioned. But, as I follow campus life in the Record, the students that most make me ask, “why are you here?” are those who get arrested for battery, those who smear feces in college buildings or deficate out of third story dorm windows, those who build bonfires and burn other students’ property, those who host high school prospects ending up in the emergency room with alcohol poisoning, and those who shout “nigger” at other students in the science quad. In comparison, I don’t think a quiet, studious type detracts much from campus life.
Note that I am not attributing any of those behaviors to athletes. In only two of the incidents listed above was participation by athletes confirmed.
April 28th, 2006 at 6:26 pm
“Team “houses” often serve as pseudo-frats, as team members tend to live with each other and have parties that attract a lot of athletes (since many of them tend to know each other) and their friends.”
And therein lies the crux of the problem. IMO athletes at Williams self-segregate from the rest of the community. This is precisely the reason why Williams abolished frats. Please, don’t tell me that Williams golf team represents a campus-wide cross-section of college population by rate and soc-ec status.
April 28th, 2006 at 6:29 pm
the end should say “by RACE and sco-ec status.”
April 28th, 2006 at 6:32 pm
I simply don’t understand why HWC always feels the need to tell Williams and now the NESCAC are wrong in the way they choose to to do things. There is nothing inherently wrong with emphasizing sports and choosing to give athletes a leg up in admissions. Williams and the NESCAC have decided that this is part of the culture they want to have and students are free to choose whether to join it or not (and even if they are non-athletes who want to go to Williams they are saying that they approve of the culture Williams has chosen to foster). I agree completely with the previous poster who said that if people want a different, more academic culture they are free to go to UChicago or NYU or Swarthmore.
Williams gives preferences to athletes because it chooses to do so (even in the NESCAC other school don’t place a heavy emphasis on athletics–look at Conn College and Hamilton prime examples). The school has chosen its niche and it is very successful at recruiting the type of people it wants. If it were to change its mission, it would be a fundementally different school and experience. It would have the same name and location, but a completely different character and lifeblood. If all you care about is the outer shell of the school, then fine, but making the student body and emphasis of the school into the HWC model completely changes everything else that truly represents Williams.
April 28th, 2006 at 8:45 pm
an eph: In the 50s at end of the hey-day of the fraternity system, there were 15 fraternities “on campus”, with membership totals (after the commencement in 1953 of deferred rushing applicable to freshmen) running from about 20 to 75 per fraternity in a College enrollment of approximately 1000. Without or almost without exception every fraternity had in its membership at least a few athletes, at least a few intellectuals, at least a few social butterflies, at least a few musicians, at least a few artsy-craftsy types, at least a few hard workers, at least a few slackers, etc. - heaven forfend, most fraternities had at least a few intellectual athletes. It appears that compared to today there was a relative lack of self-segregation by athletes and other interest groups from fraternity to fraternity and within fraternities. If the reason for the College’s abolition of fraternities was to facilitate the reduction or elimination of self-segregation within the College (and I don’t believe that it was a primary reason), then clearly that reasoning was faulty.
April 28th, 2006 at 9:31 pm
I agree with that. I’ve suggested here on numerous occasions that the admissions department gets the students it is told to get and that the emphasis on athletics is an intentional decision by Schapiro and the college. Furthermore, I agree that it has been a successful formula and that the college would be well-served to build its mission statement and brand marketing around that identity.
April 28th, 2006 at 9:37 pm
Frank,
While I agree that a return to the fraternity system would solve the problems Morty most seems to be concerned about, I don’t think the issues of self-segregation are the same in 2006 as they were back in the late 1950s. After all, there wasn’t really anyone to “segregate” from at Williams in that era. Elite colleges were one big self-segregation. No women. No African Americans. No Latinos. No Asians. No openly gay students. A strict quota on Jews.
April 28th, 2006 at 9:39 pm
“the truth is, hwc, that athletics are not any other extracurricular activity. and that’s fine - the chamber singers don’t bring in money or promote school spirit the way a winning lacrosse team does”
Are you seriously suggesting that any successful sports team at Williams “brings in money”?! It’s urban myth that alums care about the result of the Wms/Amherst football game when giving to the college, and the lax team is certainly not influencing this. Are you thinking gate receipts?! This makes me laugh out loud.
April 29th, 2006 at 3:58 am
hwc: I have never stated or intimated that a return to the fraternity system (which of course will not take place in any reasonably foreseeable circumstances) would be a panacea for Morty’s perceived problems or otherwise; it merely effectively and often easily negotiated a host of current housing and other social bumps which from time to time are described here and over which not insignificant stumbling appears to be confoundingly occurring.
April 29th, 2006 at 4:26 am
P.S. to hwc: You do understand that with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight and at every opportunity I enjoy impugning, explicitly and implicitly, the collective bad judgment of the long departed maestros who with great hubris in the 50s and 60s mistakenly orchestrated the silencing of the fraternity system, by which silencing, in my opinion, much more cacophony was created than resolved.
April 29th, 2006 at 10:49 am
Frank:
Yes, I understand your pleasure. Heck, I think we all enjoy a curmudgeonly look at Williams’ chasing the latest fashions in housing systems as if they were trying to keep up with the haute couture hemlines. Nobody misses the irony of moving from frats to faux-frat houses to houses without food to free agency to free agency with restrictions and now nearing the completion of a full circle with the move back to faux-frat houses. Seems to me that fraternities must surely be the next great innovation.
I enjoy poking fun at the unwillingness of Schapiro to come right out and say what disease he is hoping to cure by ramrodding the anchor house system into existence. The published rationale beats around the bush to such a degree that we are left with the impression that all he cares about is “better parties” and a more lively social scene. If that is the goal, then I can think of no easier solution than converting all those lovely frat houses back to their intended purpose.
I suspect that the real motivation is to reduce perceived balkanization on campus. To the extent that balkanization is a real problem, no amount of trying to pound a square housing peg into a round hole will address the issue. If reducing balkanization in the campus culture is the issue, then fiddling and diddling with the housing system is, at best, a band-aid.
May 1st, 2006 at 3:04 pm
It appears that this conversation is waning. I was away for the weekend, and want to add just a few points to comments that have been made.
First off, I think hwc conveniently merges two arguments, one that he claims not to be making, and one that he does make. he argues that he does not oppose athletics and that he simply opposes “tips.” And yet many of his arguments, and the data he presents, is inclusive of all athletes. Indeed, almost all of it is. So which is it — are you anti-athlete, which it very much appears that you are, or are you merely anti-tip? And if you are anti-tip, you need to provide data for tipped athletes, and not merely for all athletes as a sort of catch-all.
And here is my question about tips — do tips only go to athglete-applicants who otherwise wqould not have gotten in? Tis seems unlikely. It seems more likely that coaches pick the athletes they want, some of whom might need the boost, in order to make sure that their preferred kids have a better chance. But at the end of the day, Williams accepts something like 20% of all applicants, and so as a consequence, it seems to me that tips likely may go to very good candidates who are otherwise borderline.
Furthermore, your dats indicates that while as a percentage of athletes, minorities make up a smaller percentage, that a large % of minorities are athletes — in otherw ords, by your own figures, sports open up opportunities for black and latino athletes. On top of all of this, this data is a prime example of evidence you cite that is not merely focused on tips. If Williams is going to have a hockey team, or a squash, ski, swimming and several other tams, yes, it is going to draw white athletes disproportionately. But if those athletes are not tipped (and the vast majority are not) the idea that athletics somehow hurts diversity is a red herring.
The data on athletes drinking is similarly flawed, and also falls into the red herring category. There is nothjing wromng with drinking. Drinking may lead to bad behaviors, and athletes MAY (this seems like polling data, so let’s not get into the methodological issues involved) drink more, but so what? What does this prove? What percentage of all violations on campus are the result of alcohol, how many are there in toto, and how many are attributable to athletes? And once again, I ask the question — why are we providfing their identity as athletes? Are we similarly breaking these people down as econ majors, as artists, as musicians? Do any of these people both play sports and sing a cappella? In other words, this all seems significant, until one looks at it and realizes that it tells us very little. It implies bad things about athletes, but does not actually have much probitive value.
Later, “an eph” writes: “And therein lies the crux of the problem. IMO athletes at Williams self-segregate from the rest of the community. This is precisely the reason why Williams abolished frats. Please, don’t tell me that Williams golf team represents a campus-wide cross-section of college population by rate and soc-ec status.”
Please. I want someone to tell me about the rampant self-degregated golf parties on campus. This is an absurd argument, and one that i am not certain is even based on anything reflective of reality. Why choose the golf team? Because it fits an argument about socioeconomics, not because there is actually a problem on campus of the golf team having parties where no one else is welcome. My experience as an athlete at Williams was that my teams did in fact have a lot of parties, and that we invited as many epople as wanted to come. But we also shared an interest and an experience of being ona team, and in a sport that was a co-ed program, and so yes, we often times had parties that were centered around the team, but with a whole lot of guests from elsewhere. Is this really an epidemic/ or is this just another vauely couched slur against athletes that, upon scrutiny, does not hold up?
Rory writes: “the only sentiment I’m seeing in this thread is Derek consistently trying to find someone to make the patently absurd claim that all athletes at Williams are dumb.” I make and made no such claim, nor can any reasonable person who read the original post say that is the “only sentiment” I am expressing. But I did point out a whole host of successes that came from students at Williams who were also athletes. And no one is willing to address that — I know a lot of athletes, many of whom may or may not have been tipped, who did exceptionally well at Williams and/or who have excelled after Wiliams. So no, I am not making a “patentl;y dumb” argument in any way, shapew or form — I am offering anyone the chance to play intellectual hardball with me and tell me that Williams has been diminished by my presence there, because I feel reasonably confident in saying that while I had a lot going for me coming out of high school, I almost assuredly would not have gotten into Williams or several other schools had sports not helped. helped. We do not know how much. We do not know if the tip that came my way really was the deciding factor or not. We never will — my understanding is that the system simply does not work that way. No, Rory, I am not asking anyone to say that all athletes are dumb, as any fair reading of my post and subsequent comments would indicate clearly. But I’m damned well challenging hwc, you, and any number of others to tell me that I don’t belong at the table.
dc
May 1st, 2006 at 3:29 pm
HWC is correct about virtually every factual claim he has made in this debate.
Yes. The term “tip” in a Williams context means those 66 (?) applicants who coaches specifically identify (with different sized quotas for different sports) and who, almost certainly, would not have gotten in if they were not “tipped.”
The process is more complex than you seem to realize. See our many previous discussions. The category you are thinking of here are called “protects.” These are applicants, 32 or so, with Williams caliber qualifications (AR ranks 1 and 2, I think) who might or might not get in if they were not specifically identified by coaches.
In other words, lots of women who were captains of their, say, varsity soccer teams in high school and who spent many, many hours practicing their skills (and who are highly accomplished academically, AR 2s) are rejected by Williams. They are not rejected if the women’s soccer coach “protects” them.
Other than tips and protects it does not matter how good you are at sports or how many hours you practice it. Or at least your skill and hours count no more than those of Oboe players or newspaper editors.
Really? Men’s track does not get much support from the admissions office at all. That is, only a handful (2? 5?) applicants per year are effected by high school track ability. This was probably even less true when you applied in 1989. Did you know the Williams coach? Did he know your times/scores? Were you one of the top 2 or 3 male track athletes in your class? If not, than sports probably did not play or part in your admission (beyond the extent that we all agree it should play, a measure of commitment on par with excellent oboe playing or drama acting).
Incorrect, although the system was much less formal back in the day. But, now at least, there is a list. There are rules. There are different numbers of spots for different sports. Coaches argue about whether someone is a tip or a protect.
There are 66 or so members of the class of 2010 who are tips. You could replace those 66 with AR rank 1 students who would, on average, do much better in the classroom. Just because you could does not mean you should, of course, but there are real trade-offs involved.
May 1st, 2006 at 3:49 pm
Dave –
First off, read more closely. I never questioned hwc’s facts. I questioned his interpretations of those facts. And I stand by that — he interprets the facts in ways that bolster his arguments, but I do not think he does so rightly. In other words, please address the arguments I have made and not the ones (i.e. that hwc has been factually wrong) that I do not.
I do know that I was given preferential treatment, whether in the form of a tip or protect, I am not certain. I won three high school state championships in track, was heavily recruited in what we might call the Williams range, and in fact was also a tip at at least two Ivies where the coaches were explicit about my status. Had I gone to the other Little Three school to which I applied, or, interestingly enough, to Swarthmore, I would have also played football.
If coaches argue about whether or not someone was a tip or a protect, how can I be incorrect when I assert that, er, we do not know if someone was a tip or a protect?
The admissions director at Harvard recently said that is Harvard were to replace its entering class with the next however many hundred/thousand, they would still have an incredibly talented pool. This is also surely the case with Williams. Admissions is, at best, an inexact art. Given this, I’m not certain why so many people are determined to undermine the performance of those who have gone to Williams and done well.
dc
May 1st, 2006 at 4:13 pm
1) You questioned whether or not tip athletes would be admitted if they were not athletes. They would not be. This fact may be important. It may be unimportant. But HWC claimed it and you questioned it.
2) Coaches argue about whether a given applicant should be termed a tip or protect by the admissions office. “Come on!”, they say. “His overall SAT is low but his verbal is high.” There is a back and forth discussion. But, after the discussion is over, you are either a tip or you are not.
3) HWC and I and others are not “determined to undermine the performance of those who have gone to Williams and done well.” Your performance, like that of all Ephs, speaks for itself. But it is a fact that tipped athletes do much worse on average at Williams than other students. Given their academic qualifications, this is hardly surprising.
What HWC (and others) are “determined” to do is to ensure that the Williams community is aware of the facts in this debate. Williams might be able to take the next 500 applicants in the pool, but then it would not be as good a college as it is capable of being.
By the way, to the extent that you want to be angry with someone, be angry with Morty. Athletes get significantly less of a boost now than they did in 2000. This is Morty’s doing.
HWC would like to see more of a movement in that direction. To make that argument, he needs to describe and highlight the facts of the dispute. I realize that an unfortunate side effect of this process is that some athletes currently at Williams or already graduated may feel that they are being attacked. This is not, I am sure, HWC’s intent.
But the truth often makes people feel bad. There is nothing to be done about that except be sensitive and press on.
May 1st, 2006 at 4:27 pm
Dave –
Once again, I think you are being disingenuous about what I have written and what I am criticizing hwc for. I specifically criticized his use of alcohol stats and his use of the idea that sports take away from minority representation at Williams. You have not addressed either of those issues. I’m glad you find his arguments to be compelling, but I’m not certain why you are taking issue with me about my questioning hwc’s interpretations, none of which you have addressed. When iasked him to cite evidencve, and he finally did, he cited evidence that did not prove what he thought it proved. It is as simple as that.
I assume by “do worse on average” at Williams, you mean “have lower grade point averages.” I’m assuming that you then believe that the totality of one’s performance in college is the gpa, and not other, less measurable factors. By that reckoning, someone who finishes with a gpa of 3.3 and participates in no extracurriculars “did better” at Williams than someone with a 3.2 but who scored a touchdown against Amherst. Most professors think grades are important; most of us hardly find them to be the be all and end all of someone’s academic career. Apparently you and hwc disagree. I think my definition of doing well or doing poorly is going to bring a lot more interesting people to the table. But in your mind they might not “do as well,” because for you “doing well” equals grade point average. Sad.
Your Morty argument is a red herring. I am annoyed (angry is rather strong) at people who purport to oppose tips but who then use statistics that reflect all athletes to make their case, and then are not intellectually honest enough to admit that they are anti-athlete, and not just anti-tip. I am annoyed at people who equate alcohol use with character flaws. I am annoyed at people who create mythical and exclusive golf parties as an argument about athlete exclusiveness. I am annoyed at people who think a person’s value as a Williams student is measurable in the almighty gpa. I happen to think that the liberal arts ideal takes more into account when it comes to “doing well” than simply an agglomeration of classroom performances, however important that might be. I also happen to think that my viewpoijnt is closer to the liberal arts ideal, an ideal that always has involved athletics.
dc
May 1st, 2006 at 4:56 pm
If you insist on setting up stupid strawpersonish opponents as in:
then you will find that people don’t enjoy discussing things with you.
Question: For the class of 2010, Williams gave an advantage of size X to athletes (via tips/protects and the like). In your view, would there be anything wrong with giving athletes and advantage of size 10X? This would lead to starting varsity athletes having combined SAT scores of around, say, 1100. It would also cause Williams to win 90% of its games and many championships of all sorts. (Admittedly, this is a hypothetical since NESCAC rules would prevent it, I think.)
Whatever arguments you give against this proposal are the arguments that HWC would give against the current X. In his mind, 0.5*X would be better. Why is that so hard to understand?
May 1st, 2006 at 6:47 pm
Derek,
I appreciate your passion for the subject. What I was noting is that you’ve been making extremely bold statements about how some of the others on the board view jocks by your description of athletes as “dumb jocks” “dumbass athletes” etc. and noting well before I can find any evidence of it in this thread an “anti-athlete sentiment,” except maybe by Aidan, ironically, I might add as the only party I remember seeing Aidan at in my suites was a track team party (at which he barged into my room to change the room while I was writing a rather personal email to a friend…anyway…).
So I wanted to point out your defensive argumentative style in which you asserted that you were in some way asserting the intellect of athletes as though someone had defamed it earlier in the post. That was laughable–I challenge you to expose said defamation of the average intellect of an athlete BEFORE you accused the board of a “hint of an anti-athletic sentiment”.
Finally, Derek, I’m absolutely stunned by your recent defense of athletics: hwc and David have used statistics that show that athletes, tipped and not-tipped, seem to be more likely to participate in negative behaviors on campus (such as heavy drinking. also, such a trend does not mean they do not also add wonderful things as well, but that we know they tend to add the negatives that have been studied). Now, using common sense, there is absolutely no reason to believe that this data can not be used to assert something about tipped athletes because we have reason to believe they in some way act differently from non tipped athletes. If anything, common sense would argue that tipped athletes, because they should be expected to experience a somewhat more difficult academic transition, will participate in a higher number of negative behaviors than untipped athletes.
So, if anything, hwc and david’s lack of tipped vs. non-tipped pooled statistics is lessening any case against tips!
Finally, as for your response to me, I suggest you re-read my statement. I did not say athletes were dumb, in fact, I was very careful to make clear I do not believe such things and that anyone who would say things has disqualified themselves from participating because that argument is an absurd argument to make. I know many a brilliant athlete. I know many a non-brilliant athlete. I know many brilliant non-athletes, I know many non-brilliant non-athletes. I do not doubt the individual–but neither do I doubt statistics and their abilities to tell us about trends and groups.
But, your responses have, understandably, been very personalized, effectively asking “but tell me why I don’t deserve to be at Williams.” I don’t know anything about your file–you very possibly deserved to be at Williams significantly more than I did. Who knows? The question was originally about NESCAC and its effect on athletics at Williams. I think the turning point in what had been some relatively inane comments was you accusing the board of an “anti-athlete sentiment”. My comment was about how anytime athletics comes up in discussion (and this thread seems to prove this, I think…), we retreat into our camps of “pro-athlete” or “anti-athlete” (neither of which is a very good description of the camps) and scream at each other. It becomes the intellectual equivalent, IMO, of two teams of monkeys hurling feces at each other (ok, so the comments are much better than monkeys hurling feces, but it is a funny image…score one for the chimps! And down goes a rhesus! heehee). Kinda fun to watch, but not so productive.
also, I believe golf was chosen for humor value.
May 1st, 2006 at 6:53 pm
Dave –
What is the strawpersonish argument that I make? I quoted you, who said that “But it is a fact that tipped athletes do much worse on average at Williams than other students. ” You then called my response a stupid argument. While that is powerful and compelling stuff, you do not say what is so stupid about my response. What measureables do you have for your assertion other than GPA? Please name one. If you have tghose measureables, which you claim are so demonstrable, let me have them. otherwise, I think I can do wityhout your intellectually vacant response. I am assuming that you are not taking into account the totqality of a person, as opposed to just their gpa, because I cannot imagine what empirical measures other than gpa you could possible summon.
As for your reductio ad absurdum, I will continue to say what I have said all along, which is what YOU seem to have a hard time grasping. And that is that hwc’s arguments have not been consistently about tipping. That the empirical evidence that he has cited has not been just about tipped athletes, but rather about all athletes. His bad argumentation is not my fault. I have never once posed that there ought to be infinite tipping for athletes. I have also never said that I was opposed to there being more stringent caps than we have now — I am involved in academia, David, and would daresay that across the board I have as much or more interest in intellectual excellence at the college level as/than you do — but that the arguments that we have had so far have not been ones focused on those athletes who have been admitted as the result of caps, but rather of all athletes.
So the problem we are having is yours, Dave, and whether it is a matter of your inability to read or a fundamental lack of intellectual integrity on your part that is leading you to misrepresent what I have said (and let’s not pretend that this would be the first time at Ephblog that you have been accused of intentionally misrepresenting people), I don’t have the energy to parse the difference. In any case, you criticizing someone’s argumentation style is a rich bit of irony, or at least is indicative of an utter lack of self awareness.
I will let the record note that you turned this into an ad hominem matchup. There was nothing stupid about my assertion. In fact, I look forward to the evidence you have about factors other than gpa that indicate success or failure at Williams. Please show those facts. Otherwise do shut up, and acknowledge that in using words like “strawpersonish,” you were simply grasping at, well, straws.
dc
May 1st, 2006 at 8:04 pm
“Now, using common sense, there is absolutely no reason to believe that this data can not be used to assert something about tipped athletes because we have reason to believe they in some way act differently from non tipped athletes. If anything, common sense would argue that tipped athletes, because they should be expected to experience a somewhat more difficult academic transition, will participate in a higher number of negative behaviors than untipped athletes.”
Rory - I don’t think its fair to assume that there is a link between “difficult academic transition” and an increase in negative behaviors. I am also not sure that a tipped athlete from a very competitive prep school will experience a more difficult transition than an academic 1 or 2 student who performed very well at a much less competitive high school.
May 1st, 2006 at 9:07 pm
nMo-Your example is likely correct. However, when looking at statistics, we’re comparing groups. unless tipped athletes are expected to be overwhelmingly from prep schools (possible) then that particular example is just proving the randomness that is at the basis of statistical inference.
Now, as a group, tipped athletes may be different from non-tipped athletes (other than getting tips), but without knowing that, we can do two things: acknowledge that our data is potentially biased, or dismissing it entirely. I prefer using what data we have as a guide. I’m not convinced there’s any reason to believe that tips are substantially different from non-tip in a way to negate the data as a sign of warning.
i will say, however, that in general, academic difficult and social negative behaviors are correlated. in other words, as groups, those with a gpa of 3.5 will do less socially negative things than those with a 3.0. so, logically, if tipped athletes have lower gpas than non-tips, they should be expected to do more socially negative behaviors. it might be a very marginal thing, it might not. but it certainly doesn’t make derek’s argument that because we don’t have his ideal numbers to run about tipped vs. non-tipped (though I’m sure williams has them…wonder why they aren’t public…) we cannot use any statistics about athletes any more valid.
May 1st, 2006 at 9:15 pm
Derek writes:
It is clear from the tens of thousands of words that I have written on this topic (as well as the last two sentences of my previous post in this thread) that the phrase “worse on average” refers to their academic achievements and choices. It is strawpersonish of you to pretend — for surely you know this to be false — that I (or any Eph!) would think that GPA is the key measure of a person’s accomplishments in college. Just for fun, let me quote you again:
Why would you make this assumption about me or anyone? Perhaps you are lucky (?) enough to find people who enjoy it when you make these sorts of statements about them. I am not one of them. I don’t think any other EphBlog participant is either. If you purposely mischaracterize the positions of other Ephs, you will find, I predict, that they are unwilling to continue the conversation.
Intellectually vacant? It is hard to know where to begin. The main argument against that admission standards for athletes that prevailed in the 1990s is that those athletes took their Williams education much less seriously than other students (that Williams rejected) would have. Have you read The Report on Varsity Athletics? It is damning. Athletes (especially tipped male athletes in certain sports) have lower GPA, take fewer tutorials, are less likely to double major, less likely to get department honors, less likely to write theses, less likely to graduate with latin honors, more likely to take gut courses and on and on. It is more than GPA we are talking about here.
Certain drinking and disciplinary problems are more common in male athletes in certain sports than among other students.
Now, none of this says that tipped athletes are worse people. Indeed, many argue that tipped athletes would not have these problems if they were at colleges for which they were better matched academically. But your refusal to see HWC’s basic point — tipped male athletes from certain sports are much more likely to have issue X (drinking, disciplinary, academic) than other male students — is annoying.
HWC might be guilty of not explaining himself thoroughly to you, of assuming that you have read the materials that we have covered over and over again. Perhaps he should be more patient. But, having seen you mischaracterized my position, I can hardly recommend patience to him.
You claim that I am guilty of having “misrepresent[ed] what I have said.” This is a serious claim, which you should not make lightly. Please quote where I have misrepresented you. I promise that I did not do so intentionally. If I have misrepresented you, I will apologize. But I think that this is more overreach on your part.
I did not say that your assertion, any of your assertions, were “stupid.” I claimed that instead of confronting the actual arguments made my HWC, me and others, you insist on avoiding those arguments and, instead, arguing with strawmen of your own construction.
Derek, if you are too cheap to buy a clue, then I will give you one for free. I quote the Report.
But, who knows? Maybe Professor Michael MacDonald, Soccer Coach Mike Russo and the other members of the committee were “anti-athlete.”
Also, note that your main “argument” (I use the term loosely) against HWC — that he uses data on all athletes to impugn tips — falls apart at this point. Any Williams insider will tell you that the “two teams” mentioned above are football and hockey and that these two team have a much greater percentage of tips than any other team on campus. Indeed, 80% or more of varsity football players are tips.
If the two teams with the most problems are the two teams with the most tips, then it does not require a vicious bias against athletes to conclude that tips might be an issue.
May 1st, 2006 at 9:17 pm
I can only give you the data that the college provides. To its credit, Williams provides a lot of data. But, alas, they don’t always provide it in exactly the perfect form for every discussion!
There is a strong inference in the Williams College Report on Varsity Athletics that the range of issues I cite, and others, apply most strongly to the group of “tipped” athletes. The report mentions that the largest number of “tips” goes to three high profile mens’ sports teams and goes on to cite stronger correlations between these sports and several issues detailed in the report.
In addition to these issues, the report talks at length about the concentration of athletes from these sports in a limited number of majors and about the relative academic disengagement prevalent among these teams and the negative impact on the academic community that results. Read it for yourself.
The report is very complimentary of certain groups of athletic teams. For example, the report quotes professors to the effect that the female athletes they teach are among the most academically engaged students on campus. So, the report is hardly painting with a broad brush.
Just so we are clear: these are issues that have reached the level of being signature characteristics of Williams. I was thumbing through the new edition of Fiske Guide to Colleges today. The emphasis on athletics and the “hard partying”/alcohol problems on campus are both cited as defining qualities of Williams College circa 2005. Like it or not, the two page blurbs in books like the highly respected Fiske Guide determine “conventional widsom” about colleges. These are the soundbytes that high school juniors and their parents toss around in discussing colleges. As an alum, it concerns me a bit that Williams is increasingly known as a “party school”, but, as others have pointed out, nobody doing even a modicum of research should enroll in Williams and be surprised. If a bright student doesn’t want a party school, there are plenty of other options.
——
On the issue of adjusting to college. I don’t think lower academic qualifications lead to insurmountable adjustment problems. There’s plenty of support for motivated students at Williams and, frankly, it’s not that hard to maintain a 3.0+ GPA for a student making a good faith effort to do the assigned reading, show up for class, and turn in papers. I do think getting drunk three or four nights a week leads to a degree of academic disengagement, whether the student is on a sports team or not.
May 2nd, 2006 at 12:34 am
Davbe –
Let’s nip your latest little affectation in the bud, and that is asserting that others will be unwilling to engage with me because I think YOU are a gasbag. So far they haven’t shown that disinclination, and I do. The two are unrelated. Let’s not confuse your delicate sensibilities with others willingness to engage.
But if you insist on asserting that I am somehow an untouchable, look at the numbers. We are dealing with my post here. And we are dealing with a discussion in which I have been an active participant. Look at the number of comments. Now compare them to the average number of comments that posts here at Ephblog get.
Are you doing the math?
OK — now please do piss off about your assertions of people’s willingness to engage with me. It seems that unlike some of your interminably dull posts about student housing elections, mine has actually engendered both interest and conversation. If you are going to make a personal attack, and I see that you are lining them up now, how about making them reflect reality?
Now, to your post — I am amazed by the fact that I criticize you for not showing evidence that would seem necessary to your argument, then you continue to post without showing that evidence, then some 50 comments in you finally show the evidence for which I have asked, then you feign outrage over the fact that I criticize you for not having shown that evidence. It’s a cunning little strategem for covering your ass, but it does not change the fact that only after being called out several times do you present the evidence for which I have called for several days.
Now as for that evidence — the report itself, the very excerpt you quoted, makes the case I have been making all along — the number of cases of discipline are small. And I would maintain that by the very fact of how small they are, they do not tell us much. I certainly do not believe that the small numbers, from which one can divine an even smaller number that involves athletes, from which one can divine an even smaller number that involves tipped athletes, represent an actual crisis at Williams. I am not even certain that those small numbers reach the level of “problem,” forget crisis. So what we are dealing with is an assertion of a problem where there is none, and a situation in which the overwhelming majority of athletes, tipped or not, have never actually been involved with any sort of violation. One would think that this would give pause to the reading of the evidence that posits tipped athletes as a problem at Willaims — but why let anything get in the way of a good harangue? After all, even noted social scientist Mike Russo points out that the comings and goings of a few athletes on a few teams makes a key difference. Hardly the sign of an epidemic, but again — why let the facts get in the way of, well, the facts? The very report that you venerate justifies my argument, not yours.
Did you really write “if you are too cheap to buy a clue, then I will give you one for free.”? Please tell me that it was not Williams that taught you how to write like a 17 year old Valley Girl from 1987.
I’ll cease repeating my point that most tipped athletes are not a problem at Williams even if some tipped athletes are. You’ll probably write back and tell me to talk to the hand ’cause the face ain’t listening. If I want crappy writing, in all honesty, I’ll read my sophomores’ papers.
I’d ask you which professors’ courses you are impugning when you refer to “gut courses,” I’d ask what percentage of the entire Williams community double majors and receives Latin honors, and I’d also ask you many Phi Beta Kappas have earned All America status, captained a varsity college team, and so forth. But of course that would give you another opportunity to misuse the term strawman (or the tortured “strawperson”) and frankly, enough of your infelicitious use of the language is too much.
dc
May 2nd, 2006 at 8:26 am
Aidan Finley is, telepathically, urging me to show some mercy at this point, but cruelty has its pleasures too.
1) Derek wrote before:
Derek writes now:
Valley Girls don’t do the Pepsi Challenge?
2) Derek does some math:
Average daily readers at dcat: 48.
Average daily daily readers at EphBlog: 817.
(That isn’t a fair comparison, of course, and Derek is correct that, by responding to him at such length I disprove my own prediction.)
3) Derek writes:
Well, you can call out for stuff all day long, but my first comment in this thread was 18 hours ago. And, again, like HWC, I (mistakenly!) assumed that you had done the background reading on the topic. I won’t make that mistake again.
3) Derek now claims: “The very report that you venerate justifies my argument, not yours.” The barrel is so full of fish that my shotgun runneth over.
May 2nd, 2006 at 9:42 am
Dave –
What is funny is that you really do think that you are some sort of force of nature winning this debate. What is equally funny is that one of your standards of measurement is that your much older weblog to which I am a contributor has more readers than my weblog, which is a diversion. Now for the moment we shall forget that these numbers are temporal — when several hundred or even thousand people check in when I have been linked by instapundit, or the Wall Street Journal, my numbers dwarf yours. But let’s skip that — we can look at other measures if you’d like, Dave — op-eds in newspapers? Journal articles? Books? What shall our guage be? What shall we use for a guage that pits your productivity and readership in the larger world against mine? Because that average daily readership at Ephblog includes a good 200 days when I have posted, and thus that readership includes my readers. Furthermore, I never asked you to write at dcat. You did approach me to write at Ephblog. So invoke blog numbers if you think that means a damned thing. But keep in mind that Ephblog’s numbers are in some small part my numbers. You reveal your sense of proprietorship over Ephblog in a rather unseemly way. But as you allude, you continue to add eyes to a post that has had a hell of a lot more impact than any of your recent offerings. (And then you admit that the comparison is not fair to begin with, thus proving that you are a cheap shot artist. In any case, in the next week or so, another of my pieces is set to appear in a reasonably major newspaper. We can chat about our relative place in the cosmology then. In any case, I write this after returning from an appearance for my book. My second book is under contract. My third book is soon to be. I am starting the writing of my next one. Is this really a competition you want to have, Dave?)
I find it funny that you invoke Aidan, who probably had the first truly anti-athlete comment here, and who we found out later may not be the best broker here.
You say that my “barrel is so full of fish”: Then respond, rather than thrust out hackneyed metaphors. Show me that we are dealing with a statistically saignificant enough number of violations that it goes to the heart of the case that tipped athletes are somehow destrpoying the fabric of the college, a college that by any standard is at its absolute peak now in terms of BOTH national reputation academically and athletic accomplishment. If I offer fish in a barrel, Dave, take a shot: Show that athlete violations rise to the level that it impugns a significant number of athletes at Williams, a majority, or even a plurality, even though the very evidence you cite indicates that the numbers of violations may not be all that significant. My case all along has been that those numbers are not significant and that athletes add a lot more than they detract to Williams. And you have not yet disproven that argument. And you can keep invoking hwc as if you and he are partners in some sort of noble endeavor. But the fact remains that the burden of proof lies with the accuser. In this case, you are the accuser. Let us keep in mind what this whole strand of conversation started with, and that is my assertion that:
“NESCAC is a unique manifestation of places that, The Game of Life be damned, still try to do it right and succeed a lot more often than they fail.”
Your gutless little insults, powerful though you think they are, notwithstanding, I maintain that assertion. And I’d bet that thousands of former NESCAC athletes agree with me.
I think we are spinning our wheels now. Let your 850 readers a day move on. I have real writing to worry about.
dc
May 2nd, 2006 at 12:22 pm
I have a couple comments.
a) how is it anti-athlete to call athlete’s jocks? A rose by any other name…?
b) I’m not sure how Rory’s comment, which didn’t make any sense, supposedly lessened my credibility. I don’t make any secret of the fact I drank in college. I think most people do.
c) Derek and Dave should play nice. Whatever ills (and I’m enjoying HWC and Frank’s agreement on the fraternity issue) Williams has by being a largely rich white jock/prep school in the middle of nowhere are certainly offset by the real rigor of the education (in many cases) and the real appeal of the people. Sure, there are some asshole cretins who happen to be jocks, but there are effete nerds in secret frats, and mediocres of every stripe. In any case, admissions can always be second-guessed, but these things are what they are, and I don’t think blame is ever assigned fairly in these arguments.
in any case.
May 2nd, 2006 at 2:05 pm
I will follow Aidan’s advice and play nice. I appreciate Derek’s posts at EphBlog and enjoy reading his entries at dcat. In retrospect, it was jeffy of me to do “the math.” I should have resisted that temptation.
Fortunately, I believe that we have iterated to agreement! Many tips are credits to Williams, perform superbly on the field and in the classroom. They are everything an Eph should be. Some (a smaller number) tips have significant academic, disciplinary and other problems while at Williams. The rate of such problems is higher among tips than among non-tips.
I will leave it to others to discuss whether the advantages that athletes receive in admissions today is appropriate. Some might argue that a perfect balance has been struck. (Morty argued just this at the Boston Alumni Society meeting last week.) Others believe that Williams should emphasize athletic excellence more (as it did in the 1990s). Others think that less emphasis would be better.
There is plenty of room for all three views on EphBlog.
May 2nd, 2006 at 2:28 pm
I apologize for where I was intemperate. This was one of those escalations in which I could see it getting out of hand three steps ahead of time, and did nothing to stop it.
I think Rory is on to something when he says that I got a bit defensive. I maintain that aspects of this conversation had an anti-athlete bent, and I continue to wonder how big a problem we are dealing with.
But let me be clear: I have absolutely no problem with Williams having the highest possible standards, academic, athletic, and behavioral. I would never, ever countenance defacing campus, violence, and any other crime against people or property. My view, however, is that if you have the rules in place, anyone who violated those rules, athlete or not, should face full punishment. I guess I just do not see how it is useful to break students down into categories when those categories are inherently fungible. Most of the athletes at Williams are a lot more than just athletes.
I am also not certain what the role of “tipped” admittees ought to be, as opposed to other forms of preference. I see sports affirmative action as being akin to other forms of aa — you use it for specific purposes to bring in people who can still do well, and who when placed against other candidates who do not bring an exceptional skill to campus may get the edge even if SAT and gpa are not the same.
I look at my own record coming out of high school, with tons of accomplishments in extra curriculars, some pretty clear signs of intelligence, but also some signs that I did not, as my teachers always said, “apply myself.” And I came from a school in a poor town that had not sent someone to Williams in more than two decades — including the guy who was class president, valedictorian, and three sport star from the year before had been rejected. So if sports put me over the edge, I have no issue with that.
The football and hockey situations are, to say the least, the sticky ones we are dealing with here. It sounds as if Dave does not have much issue with pulling in an extra kid for track, golf and squash, but rather 30 extra kids for hockey or football. But I’d still like to know more in terms of the pure numbers of crimes and honor code and other violations to see just how rampant the problem is. I just cannot help but wonder if there is not an element of Chicken Little, akin to the stories about shark attacks or kidnappings a few years back, in which the actual data indicated neither a spike in events nor trends that indicated that people were in serious danger of being attacked by a shark or abducted (or abducted by a shark). Stories of smeared feces are obviously ones that we will all remember. And one smeared feces incident is one too many. But I wonder if cutting off the head to get at the pimple may not be just a bit of an overreaction, especially if we find that the pimple was not actually on the head to begin with.
So there we have it. I don;t hold grudges and I tend to say my piece and once it’s done it’s done.
I still dig NESCAC and like that new blog.
dc
May 2nd, 2006 at 2:42 pm
I need to stop writing comments while watching TV. Messes up my sentence structure…
I meant to say that I found it funny that the “anti-athlete” moment that sparked this whole back and forth came in a post from a student who, when we were at Williams for years together, I rarely saw. The one time I do distinctly remember seeing him at any of my suites I lived in over my four years at college was at a track party. I found that humorous, but in being unclear because I forgot things such as “periods” and “basic grammar rules”, such humor was lost.
Further, I propose that ephblog have its first streaming pay-per-view (or youtube.com post if we don’t want to stream it) of Derek and David screaming about how to infer things from small statistical samples while simultaneously hurling feces at each other from across the room with David dressed as a nerd and Derek as the stereotypical jock. I’d pay to watch that!
May 2nd, 2006 at 2:53 pm
You pull it together and start talking percentages, and I’ll have my people get together with Dave’s people.