It would be unreasonable to expect a student with the reading, writing and computing abilities of an eighth-grader to do well in college. If such a student were admitted, his retention would require that the college create dumbed-downed or phantom courses. The University of North Carolina made this accommodation; many athletes were enrolled in phantom courses in the department of African and African-American studies. The discovery and resulting scandal are simply the tip of the iceberg and a symptom of a much larger problem.
A UNC learning specialist hired to help athletes found that during the years 2004 to 2012, 60 percent of 183 members of the football and basketball teams read between fourth- and eighth-grade levels. Eight to 10 percent read below a third-grade level. These were black high-school graduates, and their high-school diplomas were clearly fraudulent. How cruel is it for UNC to admit students who have little chance of academically competing on the same basis as its other students? Black students so ill-equipped run the risk of ridicule and reinforcing white stereotypes of black mental incompetence. If these students are to retain their athletic eligibility or minimum GPA requirements, universities must engage in academic fraud.
Academic fraud benefits the entire university community except the black students. If universities can maintain the scholar-athlete charade, they earn tens of millions of dollars in sports revenue. Other than as a pretense, academics can be ignored. The university just has to create academic slums, where weak students can "succeed." Stronger academic departments benefit because they do not have to compromise their standards and bear the burden of having to deal with weak students. Then there's that feather in the diversity hat upon which university administrators are fixated. I guarantee you that academic fraud is by no means unique to UNC. As such, it represents gross dereliction and dishonesty on the parts of university administrators and faculty members.
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So how do kids with no academic ability graduate from high school? Pressure on teachers, administrators to be politically correct. If the students who should fail based on performance actually failed, racial prejudice would be given as the reason. The reason can never be failure to do required work at a required level.
ReplyDeleteUMES has been committing academic fraud for 50 years or more. The standards are sub-par below average.
ReplyDeleteYour absolutely correct 1:42. I read some term papers written by some umes students when I was in high school in the 80s. Shocked and sad were my reactions. The professor was a friends father and when asked about the level of the work he replied " we have a different standard".
ReplyDelete