Is this the most regretful sports tweet of 2012?
Ohio State backup QB Cardale Jones is a freshman from Cleveland Glenville High School. According to his Ohio State profile, he was the #12 ranked prep school player and enrolled at Ohio State in January of this year. He wants the Twitter world to know that he's taking his commitment to being a student athlete very, very seriously... or not. After all, it's not like anyone has ever really learned anything in college. Those millions and millions of non-football playing college students are just throwing their lives away with their pointless pursuit of higher learning at an exorbitant cost. College and learning: totally not worth it.
Jones has since deleted the tweet and his account is protected. If Cardale was this much against taking classes... why didn't he just enroll at North Carolina?
(H/T thefishnation)
Did anyone watch the ESPN 30 for 30 film "Broke?" If these college football players would devote as much to education as they do to football, they might be in much better shape when their 4 year careers in the NFL end. Even if they blew all their money, they would have an education and a worthwhile degree to fall back on.
No one disputes that any student athlete would be best served, academically, by devoting as much time to their studies as they commit to their team, their sport, and their coach (upon whose good will and grace, their athletic scholarship is ENTIRELY dependent.)
But so what:
There are only so many hours in the day, and big-time college sports programs now demand of their participants such a massive commitment of time and activity that the expectation that these same student-athletes can somehow equally apply themselves to their books is naive. When many of these (often academically-struggling) young men commit themselves to these big-time programs, the conditions of their scholarship are not unreasonably comparable to an unfair lop-sided indenture. The scholarships are mostly 1 year offerings contingent singularly upon on-field success: mediocrity, injury or just bad-luck could easily boot an athlete off the field, and thus, out of class and off the campus. It hardly takes an Einstein to guess where these athletes are going to reasonably commit most of their energies.
Poignant PS. Aside from the obvious fact that the overwhelming majority of all student-athletes (including the big-time programs) NEVER get to the professional level (and thus NEVER get compensated,) 60-80% of all NFL players will become divorced, unemployed, or bankrupt.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/09/sports/football/09marriage.html?_r=0
(Thanks for the response.)
OK, sure. Who wouldn't like to see ALL students be more prepared to enter the working adult world unsaddled by mountains of student loan debt and with enough financial discipline and savvy to avoid what burdens millions of working adult throughout the U.S.?
But the comparison with single mothers misses the mark.The failure of many student athletes (particularly at schools with large and profitable sports franchises) to benefit from the opportunity to receive a university education is still regrettable. And that failure is due, in large part, to the system as it is now constituted. That the athletes are not worse off than single mothers, or orphaned children, or starving Ethiopians doesn't mean that they are NOT still being taken advantage of by the coaches, the athletic programs, the NCAA and all its constituent member schools and universities.
@nicodemusboffin Yes, I know they are being taken advantage of and that is another thing that needs to be addressed with regard to college athletes.
While I agree partially with your response, I think you are missing the point. These student athletes aren't any worse off than single mothers (such as mine) who have to work their asses off to make things work the right way, while parenting children and trying to stay afloat. Mothers spend a $hitload of time raising their children and often have no help and little money to go on. Many of them still manage to productive children. As to your second point, I never said ALL athletes will make it to the pros, but I would like to see the ones who do get more financial education before they start getting quarter-million dollar paychecks.
Poignant indeed.
There is a bitter truth to the young man's words.
For scores of student-athletes enrolled in universities with big-time sports franchises, classes are an under-utilized opportunity with little guidance offered from staff and teachers.
For the schools and coaches that employ/hire/indenture these kids (while reaping ALL of the reward resulting from the labors in the field,) the classes offered are pointless, a canard to the idea of an amateur student-athlete
An excellent essay from the Atlantic Monthly (which serves as a richly-deserved excoriation of the NCAA:)
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2011/10/the-shame-of-college-sports/308643/
@BurnsOrtiz pretty incredible. Most college kids hate class (and it’s ok to tweet that) - but that was over the top.
As one who reviewed the graduate student enrollment application essays of those possessing BA and BS degrees from some of the East coast's finest public and private institutions I actually appreciate his comments. Based upon the sampling of about 120 of those essays I would say his estimation of higher education was not off by much. The graduates I speak of were seeking admissions into a Masters program that was in a communications field and each of the applicants were honors graduates from their respective schools. Of the 120 essays over 70 of them would have flunked Freshman composition as it was taught in the 1960's. Their essays demonstrated not only a woeful understanding of the basics of grammar, but also the inability to express an idea and develop it. There were comma splices, sentence fragments, run-on sentences, and no discernible understanding of paragraph development. These applicants were not athletes. I repeat, they were the brightest and best of their undergraduate classes.
Since that initial shock of what passes for education these days, I have come to find the same lack of grasp or mastery of the subject matter in history, math, science, and even business sciences. I don't know what has happened in the past five decades, but the results across the board are appalling and distressful. I fear for the future of our way of life if this continues and we give it our blessings by calling it honors work.
@JRsec This is a rather impressively long "bunch of malarkey" as Biden might say. As someone who is a college senior who just completed a 42 page honors thesis I can assure anyone who might be worried about the authenticity of this author's comment that there is no cause for concern -- standards at our top public universities, and even at our more average ones, are fine, at least for non-athletes.
@Badger2012 Congratulations Bucky, you took an ACT and, or, SAT that has been downgraded at least 4 times since I took mine. You are part of a generation of Americans that has been conditioned to respond emotionally in defense of the hand that gives you your daily ego biscuit, rather than to think critically. Enjoy your diminished dream, your social harness, and your economic governor. Surely your reward shall be servitude.
I'm glad you have faith in Biden, one of the minions that served Congress gleefully while depleting the coffers of your future. If, or when, you get to one day review entrance essays and enrollment applications I hope you don't shockingly realize how much of a bill of goods you've been sold in your education.
And if you are having a holier than thou Big 10 moment my school was rated higher than any of your's save Northwestern.
Oh, and as usual you offer no experience for your opinion, and no argument against my experience except to apply a personal attack. I have come to expect as much from your generation. You've not studied Western Civilization because it was culturally biased to believe in the byproducts of the age of reason. You've had no logic because it is Euro-centric in origin. You've had no inner journey because "Spiritual Enlightenment" is somehow either bigoted, or reflective of ignorance. Therefore your generation practices few of the world's most common mores. And as a result of the above you have no ability to reason. Have a great life in the illiterate, drug ridden, electronically isolated world you are creating. I hope they still give you trophies and awards for trying.
I must admit I fear that one day you and your classmates will be in charge of the nursing facility I'll be forced into. I won't get to provide my own care because my savings and benefits will have been ameliorated by the Health Care committee assigned to oversee my care so that they can make sure I shuffle of this planet before I've spent my own retirement. That way my money that I earned and paid taxes on (multiple times) can be used to indoctrinate more fine young drones like you. I'm sure with the people you will put in office I will enjoy my palatable care program. Peace!
@Badger2012 We'll see what you still believe is true when you have 5 more decades behind you. Much of what you perceive as reality changes with the perspective of experience and age. It is a good thing to feel optimistic, but informed optimism is optimal.
By the way I've finished graduate school, and yes with honors, third in my class of about 300. I hardly need to audit a class, although I might enjoy some from different disciplines. I did have some sport, but am not trolling.
As for reality, we live in a very diverse and malleable world and in it are many realities. I would urge you to do some social work. gratis. Get to know the real problems that people face every day. I left the professional world which was an education in itself and before I retired got involved at the grass roots level. I'm glad I did. I rediscovered some of my soul before it was too late.
Out there beyond the campus the uniform world view that today's higher ed presents does not exist. The sooner you learn that the more successful in every way you will become. Be careful when you and your buddies walk lockstep on issues and eschew the views of those whom you hold to be inferior. For the moment you find yourself in that position you will have become a cog in a predatory machine.
You may find that one day you long, as I do, for more colors on the political map than just the corporate red and blue. Your civil rights are disappearing at an alarming rate, and not by act of congress, but by regulation. My challenge to you is to never stop questioning why things are taught the way they are and to search the oldest stacks in your campus library to see how and why views have changed over the decades and centuries. Some have changed for the better, some for the worse. Good luck and build a better world for your children or you will have lived in vain.
@JRsec If you're trolling, I have to give you a lot of credit, as your comments are pretty funny. If you're not trolling I'd recommend auditing a college class of some kind as well as perhaps seeing a therapist, as you have a very distorted view of reality.
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@CoryEckberg Thanks, and as they would say to us, "Like, my dad is somebody your not and um my opinions are like really liked by my bf and my family gives money to my school who you like work for. So duh! " And as Connery said in The Untouchables, "There goes the next chief of police!" Only my fear is that the job title will be congressperson.
@awfulannouncing Where's Emmert? His ears must be twitching. But I thought the NCAA's ruling on Penn State eliminated football culture?
@awfulannouncing @SarahSpain thats why he went to ohio state...they dont pay their players to lurn! I mean....um...they dont get paid
@gweenawch @davandy72 @jasonmrandall @weedner Exhibit A Reasons ex-NFLers are broke per @GabeBridwell posts yesterday.
@chrissyteigen @awfulannouncing I-O! OSU football players are gems: too cool for school and too cool to pay for tattoos and cars. GO BUCKS!
Buckeyes L. RT @awfulannouncing: Ohio State backup QB Cardale Jones sent the biggest #facepalm tweet of the year. http://t.co/i71zRWmw
@awfulannouncing hope someone reminds him of this while he's shoveling driveways for a living.
@awfulannouncing @ShaunPisani That's got to be the funniest thing I've ever seen. "HE GONE"!!!
