Читать книгу Alternative Models of Sports Development in America. Solutions to a Crisis in Education and Public Health онлайн

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EDUCATION

The United States is often touted as having the best education system in the world, yet the facts tell a surprisingly different story. This is especially clear when it comes to America’s rank as opposed to other countries in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) education. STEM jobs are growing at a faster rate than non-STEM jobs in America, but the US education system is not producing a sufficient number of graduates in the field (Rosen 2013). American students are far below many of their foreign counterparts in math and science performance. Losing in this important education race cannot be entirely blamed on the overemphasis of athletics and their place within the US educational model, but the athletic-centric model does have an impact, and its role in undermining education at all levels can no longer be ignored.

In their groundbreaking book The Game of Life, Shulman and Bowen (2001) found that college athletes participating in all types of sports tend to underperform academically and that this is even more pronounced in higher-profile sports like football, basketball, and ice hockey, most notably in the NCAA’s lower divisions. While the more notorious academic issues are usually at the top Division I level, this study showed that even the more participatory and allegedly less athletically competitive levels in college sports also show numerous academic deficiencies. Meanwhile, this has not changed in the top division, as the most recently reported NCAA trends show lower graduation rates in high-profile sports: consistently, high-profile academic scandals almost always involve high-profile sports.⁷