Football Favoritism at F.S.U.: The Price One Teacher Paid
Article Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/01/sports/ncaafootball/florida-state-football.html?mcubz=3Discussion Question(s):
- What may cause issues of academic integrity to go unreported at big time sports schools?
-What can be done to deter issues like this from occurring?
- Ms. Suggs, the teacher in question, was a graduate student at the time of these events. If you were in her position, what would you have done?
-Does this damage FSU's reputation? To what degree?
If I was in the position that Ms. Suggs was in, I would likely have done the same thing. As a student as FSU, there is a certain regard to which you should be held and even though the school is mainly known for football, the students must act in the proper manner. Especially as a graduate student, you would want what is best for the student. There is a lot of uncertainty when it comes to sports, injuries can happen and that could ruin your career after you have dedicated your life to the sport. These uncertainties are what should lead student athletes to also focusing on education, and not just sports. In addition to focusing only on sports, student athletes have a higher role in a school society, and should set the right example for the rest of the students in the school. I believe that the teacher was in the right for following the rules and punishing the football player for what he did.
ReplyDelete- What may cause issues of academic integrity to go unreported at big time sports schools?
ReplyDeleteBig time sport schools like FSU may not report issues of academic integrity because fantastic athletic programs like these, containing great athletes, help contribute to providing the student body with a college experience which students dream only of. Reporting people like these star athletes of academic integrity may take away these players opportunities to play for the team. Having a negative effect on the performance of the team as a whole. The less athletes you have, the worse the team is, the less people that watch the games. This ultimately takes away from a students college experience, preventing people from wanting to go to that school. Which often causes these schools to have a decrease in annual income, making it harder to pay more teachers, leading to lost jobs. Which is something that schools do not want to have to worry about.
-What can be done to deter issues like this from occurring?
Maybe there should representative from an organization which regulates school systems in America that are sent to each college in the country to make sure they are treating their students fairly. As well as making sure schools intervene when students aren't performing as well academically as expected.
- Ms. Suggs, the teacher in question, was a graduate student at the time of these events. If you were in her position, what would you have done?
If I knew this situation would effect my reputation, and career, I would want to keep myself as far away from being a part of the situation as possible.
-Does this damage FSU's reputation? To what degree?
It does in a way damage FSU's reputation. This is because it demonstrates that FSU values athletics over academics. And other students are treated differently based on this value (of athletics over academics). Causing more students to attend schools who seem to care about their whole student body equally, as well as value everyone the same. Instead going to a school like FSU where some students aren't valued as highly as others.
Big time sports schools, not unlike F.S.U., want to keep their sports program as stout and prestigious as possible, and when problems like academic integrity are called into question, the schools will try everything in its power to deny or fix the problem. However, if the answer to the problem includes suspending or even expelling top rated players, these high profile schools might sweep the problem under the rug as to keep its reputation intact.
ReplyDeleteOne thing that could be done is to require student athletes to pass academic standards before qualifying to play or participate in athletics. An example of this would for students to take a test both after and before a season starts to evaluate the progress or recession of their academic prowess.
If I were Ms. Suggs I would have went to the N.C.A.A. with this information and then transfer to a different school.
This really doesn't effect FSU’s reputation as much as it should because the only person who could have revealed the evidence and truly damaged their reputation is now gone. Also FSU is already a top tier school for sports and scandals disappear from big time schools quite effectively
FSU's reputation is damaged by this because it shows that athletes are almost prioritized over regularly attending students. People will not be able to play football into their later years which means that by passing these athletes almost sets them up to fail after their football career is over. Ms. Suggs did the right thing because it is better to have a proper education then to be not very educated and think you are doing as good as some of the other, more determined students
ReplyDeleteBig time sports schools like FSU are prone to ignore issues of academic integrity regarding athletes, because of the revenue these players produce for the school. College sports are watched by a multitude of people. If a school has a great team, more people will be inclined to watch the game. Which in turn makes more money for the college. From the business prospective it makes no sense for the player to sit out for games sue to academic issues, because that is losing the school money. If the NCAA wishes to preserve the academic integrity of the athletes, they must issue a heavy fine to the schools that are giving their athletes special treatment. This will take away the motivation for schools to provide this special treatment, and will give these players the grades they deserve for their assignments.
ReplyDeleteDoes this damage FSU's reputation? To what degree?
ReplyDeleteI think this does slightly damage FSU's reputation because they are known as one of the best college football teams in the country. The only reason they are doing this is too keep their reputation and keep on winning championships.
What may cause issues of academic integrity to go unreported at big time sports schools?
It is unreported because they care more about their sports than academics. and it gives the team bad publicity and less of a chance to win championships.
Sports players being treated better at large schools has always been an issue that the United States faces. And sadly, most of the time this goes unnoticed. The only reason it was seen this time around was because Ms. Suggs decided to stand up and say something about it. Ms. Suggs was not willing to give anyone special treatment, and luckily that included athletes. The main reason why issues with athletes keep occurring is because these athletes believe they are better than everyone else. As a child, they are bombarded with complements of their skill, and getting special treatment because of it. Over time, they learn that they can get away with small things, which turns into larger things. In order to stop this cheating and all the problems with star athletes, they must learn at an early age that they are not the center of the universe.
ReplyDeleteAcademic integrity might not be reported for a variety of different reasons. Academic integrity violations are big issues involving the academic community and can drastically affect a student. Many of these academic integrity violations may not be reported because the teachers feel obligated at a big football school to allow these famous and important football players to do what they want as long as they are playing football. The teacher does this to help the university and the football team as a whole. To deter from issues like this is to allow football players more time for school work outside of football and to promote teachers to keep athletes to the same standards as normal students. I am a big football fan and I understand that it is very tough to work that hard on football and to do that well in school, so I would of held the athletes to the same standards but maybe made exceptions for homework after a game and even offer an adjusted deadline if need be. I do think this damages FSU's reputation as an academic establishment because academic integrity violations are are very big deal in the academic community.
ReplyDelete-What can be done to deter issues like this from occurring?
ReplyDeleteI really feel bad for Ms. Suggs because she was placed in a position between her job and loyalty. She was at FSU and she could have conformed with the professor when she knew that her job was in jeopardy. However, for student athletes at every college or university, I believe that they have to be given certain standards that are different from non-athlete students. They are being unpaid basically to work a full time job as an athlete in Division 1 and on top of that they have to manage being a full time student. This is a lot for young adults who haven't experienced life outside of school yet. What can be done to prevent such scenarios like this are giving the athletes not only different standards than non-athletes, but putting them in classes that are useful for them and classes that they want/need to be taught. This would give students a better learning experience while giving them more freedom and equality compared to regular students to complete their courses and be more successful.
I think that the issue with academic integrity can be traced to a larger societal love of sports events. For schools like FSU and Penn State, a significant amount of the money donated comes around alumni who enjoyed going to football games. Alumni and students want to win, and I can’t blame them. When the school wins, they give more money. Students get happy. No one wants to be the person who has to repeat the cheater, because you’ll feel like a buzzkill. I think that this may hurt FSU for the people who don’t really care about FSU and wouldn’t go in the first place. I think that this issue, while bad, won’t result in much change unless people inside of the school also want it. I don’t think that I’d have the courage to step up like Ms. Suggs when she was so close to her doctorate. I think that providing a support network to help student athletes learn the content, rather than just giving it to them, would take more time but would help the players and the faculty in the long run. I think that a proper investment into these athletes education by the school would make sure that they enter a level playing field with other students. In the end, I don’t think that much will change as a result of this New York Times article.
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ReplyDelete- What may cause issues of academic integrity to go unreported at big time sports schools?
ReplyDeleteI think the number one and maybe the only reason these academic integrity issues go unreported is to keep payers eligible according to NCAA regulations. Often players fall behind in academics because of the vigorous workload of football and other sports. I think a large part of the unreportedness comes from the economics of college football. In the case of FSU, football games rake in millions of dollars, mostly because of the great success the school’s football team has had. So, if the schools team starts to lose, say to academic ineligibility, not as many people will attend games, buy merchandise, etc. If this is the case the school will see significant declines in revenue.
Big time sports schools such as FSU are in a tough spot with situations like this. If your student athletes are the ones bringing in the money for the school, as a teacher, you'd feel pressured to keep those students eligible to play. However, this does not mean it is acceptable to give said students a break or bend the rules in their favor. Ms. Suggs was caught in a difficult situation here. She could fail the student and directly affect the teams success. Or she could let it go and possibly lose her job. If I were in her place I would have reported the problem to the head of the school as it is something to be taken seriously. In my opinion, the success of a college football team is not worth losing your job over.
ReplyDelete- What may cause issues of academic integrity to go unreported at big time sports schools?
ReplyDeleteAt big time college schools like FSU in this circumstance the priorities of learning for athletes are really backwards. In these sport heavy colleges, the success of the sports teams and the players is held to be the priority. This is because when the sports teams succeed it brings more funding into the school. So having the pressure of keeping these amazing athletes who lack the skills in the classroom are really high for the teachers in these schools. The teachers have the standard to make sure that all students are treated equally and fairly, but the presence of the athletes succeeding puts a huge pressure on the teachers. These teachers are proud of the teams that represent them, so they do not want to be the ones who fail a star athlete and make them ineligible to play in the game and potentially lose the school the game because of that. If I was in the position of the teacher I would probably feel like my job was on the line in order to make sure that these athletes succeed in the class room, so it is almost an unwritten rule to let some of the bad grades or slip ups go unreported. The fact that these schools are so popular because of their sports and the athletes they bring in because of the name they have made almost makes it a responsibility for these teachers to do whatever it takes for them to make sure that these athletes are eligible to play. This has been a big factor in these schools for a long time now and I cannot see much changing because of this article.
Because higher up members of schools that are in charge of academic integrity understand that maintaining a high representation of their sports is imperative due to the fact that it brings in a lot of nationally wide recognition and revenue for the school. If their school is known to be harsh on athletes that tend to go professional, there could be less athletes who choose to go to their school. It’s easier to let the lack of academic integrity to be swept under the rug instead of addressing it and making stricter policies on star athletes. I’m sure it has had an impact on FSU’s reputation but maybe it also changed others view on the school in a positive light. Those who aren’t athletes perhaps support Ms. Suggs because they do not believe athletes should be treated differently. But, on contrary, it could have hurt their reputation by less fans coming to games and impacting the money FSU would make from games.
ReplyDelete1) What can cause issues of academic integrity to go unreported at big time sports schools is coaches telling teachers how important their sport is and they need to have less work or better grades to stay on the team. Also when it is a huge sports school they get favoritism as athletes.
ReplyDelete2) To keep these issues from happening, universities should be keeping a closer eye on the big time athletes, by talking to professors and coaches. Professors can and should make sure that athletes are doing their own work and being treated equally as other students.
3) I can't really know what I would do if I were in the situation but I would like to say I'd report it but who knows what I would do if I was being convinced by one of the best college coaches of all time.
4) It could damage their reputation, but honestly this is probably a normal thing at big time football school. It will certainly damage their reputation to parents thinking about sending their kids to FSU.
In my opinion, I think that what causes issues of academic integrity at big-time football schools such as FSU, Alabama, and many others, is that professers and TA's at these schools do not have any power over the head coaches of these teams, and if they resist, they risk losing their job. Also, the professers and TA's of these schools more than likely support their football teams, and giving these star athletes poor grades could only hurt their schools chances of competing come Saturday. I think that it is very hard for the NCAA to fix this problem, because most of the remedies they have have significant drawbacks. However, I think that unbiased representatives from the NCAA should be allowed to observe classes with athletes in them and even randomly check athletes projects/papers against a solid rubric provided by the professer to confirm that the athletes are indeed getting C's and B's. This could be done very easily, but it will take a lot of time away from the NCAA's business and make them hire even more employees, lowering their profits.
ReplyDeleteI personally believe that this does not hurt FSU's reputation very much. It is widely known that this happens at schools all over the country, so while it is disappointing, it should not make FSU less respected in any way. I think this problem would be hard to stop because of the size and strengths of the athletic programs at important division 1 schools. I think that the cause of this is that the NCAA and the school wants to improve the players skills more than their intelligence, which would make the games more interesting and make money. I think this is also the reason why anybody including Ms. Suggs would have a tough time making a change in the student athlete lifestyle. Even though Ms. Suggs' story is becoming very popular, it would be hard for her to deal with the NCAA and schools to enforce student athlete rules. I would love to say that if I was Ms. Suggs, I would have told the truth. The reality is that as a student of the school, I still have to be liked by my classmates, and ruining one of the biggest aspects of social life would not work well, so I probably would not have done anything about it. This was a very tough decision for Ms. Suggs, but I think that it occurs at all Division 1 schools in some way, shape or form, and it is hard to change.
ReplyDeleteThe article and scandal absolutely damage FSU's reputation for many reasons. The athletes are given special privileges at school such as getting second chances on their work. This is bad because non-athletes are not getting the same opportunity. Secondly because FSU has had a history of getting in trouble with the NCAA and law enforcements, Ms. Suggs point seems to be true. When FSU let Ms. Suggs go most likely because she wouldn’t let student athletes cheat this showed very poorly of the school. All of the information from Ms. Suggs provided in the article damage FSU’s reputation in a very serious way.
ReplyDeleteAs a student, in any school, we are all held to a form of academic integrity. This can range from cheating on a test or to lying to a teacher. At the college level, students should still stick to these regulations that they have been taught repeatedly. In recent years, the stigma of being a 'sports star' or immediately getting committed to a college simply for your skill has been a largely increasing one. There is a distinct inequality between those who play on the field and those who do not. I believe that all students are held to the same regulations and all have an equal right to a quality, fair, education. At a college that is as well known as FSU, it is difficult to go under the radar with these excuses that were made for people because they were a key player on the team.
ReplyDelete- What may cause issues of academic integrity to go unreported at big time sports schools?
ReplyDeleteI believe that issues of academic integrity occur at big time sports schools because sports (especially football) bring in lots of revenue for the universities and they would like to keep that up. If a star football player is ineligible to play that could hurt the team drastically and thus, hurt the overall program and the revenue that it is bringing in. For example, if a star quarterback were to be ineligible for a couple of games that could so much as destroy an entire season for a team such as Florida State and then have an effect on all other fields related to the football team.
-Does this damage FSU's reputation? To what degree?
I think that this does damage FSU's reputation. However, this is a common occurrence at most large sports schools so it should not make FSU's reputation that much less respected. It does show where Florida State priorities are set and it shows that they value the sports over school which is like I said a common theme among large schools that belong to competitive football conferences.
What may cause issues of academic integrity to go unreported at big time sports schools?
ReplyDeleteI think that big time sports schools are way more concerned with the revenue that their sports teams bring in through their games and events. In the case of Florida State, they've been a solid football team basically ever since Bobby Bowden was there, so if they experienced a huge drop off in wins after doing so well for so long the boosters and fans may question the coach staff and school officials. School's like FSU choose to overlook their athlete's poor schoolwork in order to get them out onto the field. Timmy Jerragin was an integral part to the FSU national championship team and eventually became a second round pick in the NFL; FSU knew that if he was suspended due to inadequate school work they would be much worse on defense.
What can be done to deter issues like this from occurring?
In my opinion it all comes down the how the coaches on the team are willing to deal with these situations. Coaches who are morally stout and won't compromise the rules for their players are ultimately the ones who don't have to deal with NCAA investigations and stress upon graduate students. In 2012, Les Miles dismissed Tyrann Mathieu, quite possibly one of the best defensive players in college football in the last 10 years, for violating team rules. It was a huge loss to take on as Mathieu was a game changer on all fronts, but it needed to be done. LSU has had no NCAA investigations under Miles because of his justified rules. It goes to show that if coaches are willing to play by the rules, the players will as well.
What may cause issues of academic integrity to go unreported at big time sports schools?
ReplyDeleteIn my opinion, tons of news outlets responsible for covering certain fields in media often leave out the reality of the situation. If all of the content they put out was not all that positive, it wouldn't spark as much attention since people don't really have the interest to read about it. Also, it could potentially discourage student athletes that have ambitions of playing a sport in that college. At the end of the day, colleges are trying to flood the student body with as many high class athletes as they can, and can't afford to take a loss on any type of revenue generated from any type of sporting events.