Why is anyone surprised?

Teri, at 9:50 am EST on November 22, 2006

NCAA’s Poor Public Relations Faculty and Budding Scholars

I am a 2nd year doctorate student in the Higher, Adult, Lifelong Education program at Michigan State University, and have particular interest in intercollegiate athletics.

I submitted a research proposal to the NCAA for consideration for the 2007 conference that was NOT critical of the NCAA. It has policy recommendationsfor higher education based on data about “perceptions of racial diversity among college athletes in Michigan.”

The NCAA delayed the initial application process for sometime, and the individual who was in charge of developing the parameters for the submission process never returned any of my emails. Finally, the initial deadline was pushed back to July 1 — I learned that from the NCAA website on my own.

I busted my tail, and worked feverishly to prepare this for submission to meet the July 1 deadline. So, when I saw that the submission site remained up for nearly a month after the deadline, my heart sank. Why work so hardto reach a deadline when others can submit afterwards? Obviously, my first impression was that they did not receive enough responses.

Then, I received an email that the NCAA cancelled it. They never responded to my inquiry as to why.

My point is this: for a budding scholar with a particular and specific interest in intercollegiate athletics and policy, and who does NOT have an axe to grind with the NCAA, and generally has philosophical views in support of the role of athletics in academics... well, they certainly left a bad taste in my mouth.

If the latest Presidential Task Force report aims at involving scholars and faculty to take a leadership role in reforming college athletics, they certainly can do a better job at reaching out to support developing researchers who want to study this field, such as myself.

Not responding with any reason, and not following their own guidelines, certainly is not a good start.

However, not knowing what to expect out of the NCAA, on good advice from my academic advisor, I also submitted my proposal to the Association for Studies in Higher Education 2006 annual conference; it was accepted, and Ipresented it as a poster with wonderful feedback. ASHE provided the experience the NCAA should have. That doesn’t bode well if the NCAA wants to involve faculty and scholarship.

I am hopeful that the NCAA will allow for submissions next year, and that they will consider supporting future scholarship in the area. There needs to be a place for solid research from budding scholars to help providefuture benefit in athletics. Otherwise, “we” may find something else to do.

The NCAA’s pr machine to involve faculty and scholars leaves much to be desired and they have a lot of work to do.

Anyhow, I thought I would share my experiences with you.

Scott HirkoMichigan State University

Scott Hirko, Michigan State University, at 10:32 am EST on November 22, 2006

Knight Commission

I also am fortunate do some work to assist the Knight Commission on a few items, and they are looking at this disconnect between faculty and athletics.

There will be a “Faculty Summit on Intercollegiate Athletics” on May 14, 2007, in Washington, D.C.

The summit will be held at the Dorothy Betts Marvin Theatre at the Marvin Center, The George Washington University. Registration and additional information about the Faculty Summit will be made available at a later date.

Stay tuned to http://www.knightcommission.org for more details as they become available.

Scott Hirko, at 11:45 am EST on November 22, 2006

The dog ate my homework

I’ve started, stopped, and rewritten my comments about five times. Must be something I ate last night, but nothing seems to sound just right. I know I’m taking a gamble and these comments may be deemed mediocre, inferior, “ill-fated” or “...not of the quality one would expect for a scholarly conference” but here goes...

I was going to mention I was asked by the “nice people” in charge of the postponed NCAA conference to serve on the conference’s review committee, but never received a single submission (inferior or otherwise) to review.

I was going to deconstruct Dr. Brand’s comments, pointing out how he attempts to disparage the scholarship of TDG members, while not mentioning anyone by name, and actually not commenting on any specific work. Maybe all the deficient scholarship was submitted by NCAA Faculty Athletic Representatives? Of course, we can’t say any such thing, since the process is a blind-review one. (Unless Dr. Brand saw the names of the authors.) Dr. Brand’s comments are similar to those found in a non-apologetic apology that actually denigrates those who criticize the individual.

I was going to say, he must have learned that technique during his 40 years in academe, but I thought, “No, don’t go there. Such a remark would surely be “ill-informed.”

I was going to volunteer (as I have on two previous occasions) to help the NCAA in planning their next conference (I know, I know, my involvement might cause the conference to degenerate into mediocrity, but at least I could bring a laptop and a LCD projector if they need one.)

I was also going to submit a list of 20-30 scholars and experts for the NCAA to choose from in inviting it’s “‘leading academicians’ to meet at the NCAA’s annual convention in early January to plan a new conference, scheduled for January 2008,” but I thought...why not invite those people to participate in a lecture/panel series on Issues in College Sports to be held at The University of Memphis in late March and April? (Note: Dr. Brand will be receiving his invitation along with the other “top names” in college-sport scholarship”

I was going to do all of those things, but instead, I’ll just wish Dr. Brand a Happy Thanksgiving and hope that next year the dog won’t have eaten his conference-planning homework, and that the NCAA can put on a “high quality” conference.

Richard Southall, Assistant Professor at The University of Memphis, at 1:01 pm EST on November 22, 2006

quality and politics

Mr. Ridpath, You realize, of course that scholars call each others work “low quality” all the time, constrained by only political considerations. You think this is bad? Imagine how students feel when professors assert their dominance by calling it “low quality.”

Larry, at 2:10 pm EST on November 22, 2006

Case studies in bullying

I have read a number of the comments here by “B.D.", and this last one is especially fascinating. The tone and strategy of the post is a textbook example of psychological bullying. It’s a mixture of cajoling, threats, attempts to erase distinctions and to blame victims, and loud claims that the people who are challenging the bullies are no different than the bullies themselves. If you want a nearly identical example, listen to any of Saddam Hussein’s tirades during his recent trial. It’s not accidental; it’s a polished strategy of psychological abuse and manipulation.

Fascinated, at 4:00 pm EST on November 22, 2006

I don’t speak French

B.D. but you are again off base. Those papers you speak of were submitted at the Drake Group Conference and NOT for the NCAA conference. Read the article again. In fact my paper concerned factors that influence the academic performance of college athletes. Hardly a radical paper.

We have nothing to do with ESPN, nor do we care. What we care about is academic integrity and the NCAA ‘tightening” up standards is hardly worth the paper it is printed on. For more on this visit our website with links to some solid research.

Brand can criticize if he wants, but the bluk of submissions that I know of had already been published etc. Brand alone can’t criticize that—he himself admitted the conference planners were new at this. Plus two of my collegues were invited to be reviewers and they never saw paper one.

A lot of people put a ton of work in this and NCAA yet again, made a huge PR blunder. They are not making friends with academia—go figure.

BTW—we do put on our own conference. Please go to www.thedrakegroup.org. for info. We invite all submissions—positive or negative toward our mission. We will not cancel if criticized. Also Dr. Southall puts on a great speaker series at U Memphis. Brand has been invited to both for several years—he has yet to show.

Ridpath@ohio.edu, at 7:10 pm EST on November 22, 2006

A bit of context

I wanted to add a few facts and a bit of context to the comments I made for this piece. First, my assumption was that Mr. Lederman contacted me as President of the North American Society for the Sociology of Sport (I am now Past President—I think Mr. Lederman got hold of an outdated version of my vita on our university website—our fault, not his) and because he thought I might either have been asked to participate in the conference (I received two emails on the conference, but, like others, did not respond to the call for papers, having plenty on my plate already) and/or have some observations about why sociologists of sport might have chosen not to participate.

As Faculty Athletic Representative for my institution, I am a voting member of the NCAA and would not be unless I felt my voice could work to the benefit of our students, our university, our conference (of which I am also a voting member), if perhaps, in some small way, the entire enterprise. Richard Southall and David Ridpath are colleagues of mine (I attended TDG session at the NASSS Conference in Vancouver three weeks ago), and although I am not a Drake Group member, I listen to what these scholars have to say and believe more generally that the TDG perspective is an important counterpoint to the largely uncritical endorsements that are found most everywhere else. Indeed, I believe critical examination of the culture and practices of intercollegiate athletics, with particular attention to the well being of students and the scholarly mission of institutions, is a key component to academic integrity and an essential part of the job of an FAR. When I attended my third FARA (Faculty Athletics Representatives Association) meeting this past week in New Orleans I was again encouraged to find that a number of my faculty athletic representative colleagues share this perspective.

My prediction that Dr. Brand might have difficulties recruiting sociologists to take part in such a conference was based on a number of observations, not just the perception by some of my colleagues in NASSS that the NCAA is the “evil empire,” i.e., the Haliburton analogy. Anyone who knows the culture of sociologists and related academics knows that they/we tend to employ critical perspectives, approach large, bureaucratic organizations with suspicion and more generally don’t participate in scholarship that endorses the status quo—this is Sociology 101. Knowing my colleagues in NASSS, I told Mr. Lederman that I believed most sociologists would look at such a conference with some misgivings and likely be more interested in other venues for their scholarship, as Scott Kretchmar (certainly a top scholar in the field, whose text book I am using this semester) observed.

What Scott and others might also point out is that the vast majority of research on sport in the United States has been conducted on intercollegiate athletes, and that such scholarship has been going on for decades. Hence, I also suggested to Mr. Lederman, in this context, that there may be some academic “turf” and gatekeeping issues at work here. What I am referring to, in particular, is scholars or organizations that “stop by” and study sport when they happen to see it as presenting some interesting social, cultural and political questions, issue the “definitive” work on the subject, and move on to more important things. Some scholars are, I think understandably, frustrated by such practices and may have seen an institutionalized version of this coming in the proposed conference (i.e. the NCAA sponsors a carefully orchestrated conference, issues an edited book, and goes on with business as usual).

Finally, I am not in any position to comment on the management or public relations issues related to the planning of this conference, but I might suggest that sponsoring such an event and getting large-scale interest and participation would likely entail a long-term commitment that includes a vision about where such scholarship fits within the mission and structure of the NCAA as well as the careful cultivation of relationships with scholars who study college sports.

Steve Walk, Professor at Cal State Fullerton, at 7:10 am EST on November 23, 2006