Boy I wish this were true.

Bill Mallonee sings:

why is joy something i must steal
starving skeletons looking for a meal
out in the graveyard the church bells peal
earth has no sorrow heaven can't heal

I didn't do nothing illegal or anything like that,

So says former Auburn University tailback and alleged sociology student Carnell Williams. Last week the New York Times published a story suggesting that professor Thomas Petee provided independent study instruction to 18 football players in the 2004-2005 academic year. Collectively, these athletes earned a 3.31 GPA in Petee's classes but only a 2.14 in their other classes.

I first learned about the story from Jeremy who wrote:

the open secret that I didn't appreciate when I got into this business is that, at many (most? Virtually all?) places, sociology counts on lazy, lost, last-resort-looking and otherwise low-achieving students as an important source of revenue--which isn't to say we don't strive hard to lure bright students as well, as long as they aren't too politically conservative--and that's a kind of systematic bargain that in the aggregate makes abuse and publicized incidents like this every once in awhile inevitable.

As for Cadillac not doing "nothing" wrong... well, er, Mr. Williams, I can only presume that Petee did not grade your grammar. As for grade manipulation and football eligibility, I can only sigh. When I was at Syracuse, I remember a fellow graduate student complaining about athletic department pressure (I have no way of verifying that she was pressured; but I also have no reason to disbelieve her story). I can honestly say that I've never been pressured by an athletic department to boost an athlete's grade; and I believe I give every student the grade their work deserves.

I'm becoming convinced that big-time athletics should not commingle with academics. I say this as a football fanatic. As my wife will testify, from September until January, I spend every Saturday glued to my television watching college football. I played college football (NAIA, Division II). In fact, I wouldn't have gotten into college without football. I was admitted to college on academic probation thanks to the football team's lobbying. I was a poor student in High School with a lackluster SAT. It was in football that I first realized that I wasn't dumb. It's an incredibly complex game involving coordination of 11 people running full speed and reacting to 11 other people also moving at full speed. You can't be an idiot and play college football. In short, football has been very, very, good to me (that is, if we discount the 5 knee operations).

Yet, from where I sit now, college football seems to be a distraction. Not just for the athletes but for non-athletes too. ESPN is coming to town on Thursday September 14th for a 7:30 p.m. game vs. Maryland. I teach a Criminology class from 4:00 to 5:15 on Thursday evenings. Starting at around noon on that day the University will begin closing parking lots and preparing for the 60,000 people coming to campus. The traffic gridlock will start right around the time my class begins. At least one student will plead with me to cancel class on "gameday". I'll refuse and teach the 20 or so students (my enrollment is 100) who consider their classes more important than getting a good seat at the ball game. Last winter, a student actually criticized me on my evaluations for having class on the day of the Backyard Brawl basketball matchup between WVU and Pitt. I was criticized for doing my job!

I wish there was a way out of this cognitive dissonance. I will continue to watch college football and basketball. I will continue to hold class on the night of big nationally televised athletic contests. [Indeed, I'll probably go home after teaching the empty room and watch the game on ESPN]. But I do wish that we could figure out our priorities.