Most athletes have gotten into degree programs to keep them eligible for sports, but it doesn’t help prepare them for post-sport careers. Education specialists say clustering raises various potential problems, including academic fraud; certain majors and classes have specific academic requirements. Coaches and athletics academic advisers inappropriately influence students’ decisions on their majors and classes.
Instead of getting paid, college athletes get a free education. College athletes like Steven Cline pursued a pre-veterinary program; it is 1 of 4 interdisciplinary majors in the College of Arts and Sciences that provide options for those who don’t have a major chosen. Cline stayed at Kansas State and spent 2007-2008 in a master’s program in college student personnel. Cline didn’t let the academic advisers choose his major for him. He knew that once football was over, he needed something to fall back on. Cline is now working construction to save money and return to school as a pre-vet student.
For athletes to be eligible to play, they need to complete 40% their 2nd year, 60% their 3rd ,and 80% their 4th year. Until recently, athletes needed to at least have an 820 on SAT or 68 ACT sum score. There is also a new NCAA rule that threatens penalties for teams with too many players who have become academically ineligible or fail to graduate. Doing things like changing your majors because you find the first one too hard will also make you ineligible. You would have to start at the beginning all over again because you decided to change majors. It will also affect Football, Basketball ,and Baseball ;if you play any of these sports, you wouldn’t have any time to focus on both your major and your sport at the same time.
The NCAA rules are in place to help control college athletes and to have them do whatever they say ,even up until they graduate from college. Those college advisers choose whatever they want you to take that’s in their program. For the freshman that are in high school, if you want to go to college for a sport, you should already be thinking about your academic eligibility. By doing this early, you can make sure that you are taking your core classes in time and that you are maintaining your GPA. That is one of the main things that colleges will start to look at if you are trying to get a scholarship for that specific sport that you are good at.
So for any high school students who are trying to go to college for a sport, make sure that you are being careful about your choices. Try to talk to anyone who might have gone to college for a sport and got wanted to have a major to fall back on. See what they went through and figure out what all you need to do to succeed. Remember that if you don’t end up going pro after college that you at least have something to fall back on so you won’t be stuck.
Your decision matters, because at the end of the day you’re going to have to be the one who has to stick with the major. Anybody who tells you any differently is wrong. Just make sure that whatever major you choose is a good decision and that you will actually stick with it. Also when you are choosing your major make sure it will fit in with whichever sport you are going to college for, because if it doesn’t fit you might have to choose something different. So for all of Myers Park athletes I hope you find this helpful and can hopefully put this to some good use.