SLCBengal
Active member
Here's a good (and encouraging) column written by Gary Olson, Provost and Vice-President of Academic Affairs...
Similarly, having an active athletics program, especially if it includes football, is often important to alumni. Even if the team is experiencing a poor year, the games themselves can evoke memories of when alumni were students, perhaps when the team was more successful. Having a team can help keep alumni engaged with the university, and, of course, a winning team can energize them. Those may seem like intangible benefits, but alumni are among an institution's greatest supporters, financially and otherwise. Keeping them engaged, even with a mediocre team, can have substantial payoffs.
The truth is, athletics events, especially football, are often key ways of attracting potential donors to contribute—and not just to the athletics program. When I served as a dean at another institution, I worked closely with donors who had allegiances both to athletics teams and to an academic program. Frequently those donors wanted to support both. I am certain that in many of those cases, we might not have been successful in interesting the donors to give to academic programs were they not first interested in athletics.
Sports teams can foster a deep sense of community and social solidarity, even when those teams lose more often than they win. One alumna told me that she would "never give up" on her team.
The point is that athletics and academic programs can—and should—work together for the greater benefit of students. Far from a drain on the academic endeavor, athletics can be the perfect complement, both through increasing community and alumni support and through adding disciplined, hard-working students to the institution's overall population.
Read the entire column at: The Chronicle of Higher Education: Should We Ditch Football?
Similarly, having an active athletics program, especially if it includes football, is often important to alumni. Even if the team is experiencing a poor year, the games themselves can evoke memories of when alumni were students, perhaps when the team was more successful. Having a team can help keep alumni engaged with the university, and, of course, a winning team can energize them. Those may seem like intangible benefits, but alumni are among an institution's greatest supporters, financially and otherwise. Keeping them engaged, even with a mediocre team, can have substantial payoffs.
The truth is, athletics events, especially football, are often key ways of attracting potential donors to contribute—and not just to the athletics program. When I served as a dean at another institution, I worked closely with donors who had allegiances both to athletics teams and to an academic program. Frequently those donors wanted to support both. I am certain that in many of those cases, we might not have been successful in interesting the donors to give to academic programs were they not first interested in athletics.
Sports teams can foster a deep sense of community and social solidarity, even when those teams lose more often than they win. One alumna told me that she would "never give up" on her team.
The point is that athletics and academic programs can—and should—work together for the greater benefit of students. Far from a drain on the academic endeavor, athletics can be the perfect complement, both through increasing community and alumni support and through adding disciplined, hard-working students to the institution's overall population.
Read the entire column at: The Chronicle of Higher Education: Should We Ditch Football?
