Academic Freedom and Athletics
Appalachian State University did not violate the academic freedom of a tenured professor who was placed on paid leave after students complained about disparaging remarks they said the professor had made on college athletes and about a film she had showed on pornography, the university’s chancellor has concluded. The chancellor this month rejected a faculty […]
Ridpath Provides Insider’s View of NCAA
B. David Ridpath, President Elect of the Drake Group, first contacted the Drake Group in 2004 during his ongoing battle with Marshall University over NCAA violations in the athletic department. Ridpath, in his new book titled Tainted Glory, documents his experiences as an assistant compliance director at Marshall. Former New York Times columnist, Robert Lipsyte […]
How Colleges Cope with a Perfect Storm
How Colleges Cope with a Perfect Storm Among other things, schools must confront sports related academic corruption, sexual abuse and serious drinking problems. By Frank G. Splitt, 10-03-18 Download as PDF Introduction – Though our nation’s sports-and-money driven colleges and universities are still considered to be the envy of the world, this exalted stature raises a […]
Athletic Scholarship Rules Should be Clear
Former California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed the Student-Athletes’ Right to Know Act last fall. This requires California colleges and universities to publicly disclose, among other things, their policies regarding sports-related medical expenses and the renewal or cancellation of athletic scholarships. A similar bill is before the Connecticut General Assembly. This bill is long overdue. Follow […]
Ralph Nader and “Pay for Play”
Even the consumer advocate and former presidential candidate Ralph Nader, a relative newcomer to the debate over paying college athletes, was able to use the media frenzy around March Madness to launch his own proposal to eliminate athletic scholarships altogether. The tepid to hostile reaction his proposal brought in many circles, including at the NCAA, […]
Making Peace with the NCAA
Much to my surprise the NCAA, under the leadership of President Mark Emmert, has recently enacted financial aid reforms that I have supported for many years. Critics have argued that the changes amount to little more than “window dressing,” but a strong case can be made that the revival of multi-year scholarships makes athletes students […]
Drake Group Questions NCAA Division I Governance Restructure
During the summer of 2014, the NCAA considered a proposal to give the five richest conferences (Atlantic Coast Conference, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12, and Southeastern Conference) within the Football Bowl Subdivision of Division I legislative autonomy. In response, the Drake Group, a national organization of college faculty and others released a position statement that […]
Drake Group Hero Award Presented to Investigative Journalist Dan Kane
Read full article: Drake Group Hero Award Presented to Investigative Journalist Dan Kane
Collegiate Athletics Reform: A Call for Federal Intervention
The American public’s seemingly unbounded love of college sports entertainment at any cost can be readily exploited by skilled marketing professionals to the long-term detriment of the integrity and health of higher education in America. The incremental cost of such exploitation to build an ever bigger college sports entertainment enterprise amounts to the cost of […]
Collegiate Athletics Reform: A Collection of References from the National Catholic Reporter
As suggested in “Telling the truth on campus,” the presidents of our Catholic colleges and universities could be moved to solicit advice from their faculty and others on the place of the value-distorting, sports entertainment business in their schools. They might even go so far as to provide independently verifiable evidence that their athletes are […]