The data on graduation rates, test scores, etc. is worthless. The four-year graduation rate at Georgia Tech among non-athletes is incredibly low...but graduation rates for the basketball team come out and the school gets ripped.
The fact is that, the vast majority of the time (and, yes, even at schools with great academic reputations and big time athletics), the athletes are not taking the same courses as the average student. There are several factors involved:
1. Time - College athletes are incredibly busy, and even the ones who are academically interested would struggle to keep up in difficult majors. I saw a few who were great students, but most just were not driven enough to juggle tough academics.
2. The race to the bottom - Big time athletes are not going to go to schools that force them to major in biomedical engineering. They are generally going to choose schools that offer cakewalk liberal arts degrees, often because they believe they have a pro career ahead of them.
3. NCAA Sanctions - The school can't win by cracking the whip. You have to keep athletes eligible or else you start losing scholarships, and in order to keep athletes eligible often times standards are simply lowered.
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the yankeehater
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