NCAA regulations limit football players to 20 hours of mandatory practices, meetings, film sessions, and the like, but anyone who believes that's where student-athlete's effort ends is a very naive and silly person who should play poker against me: Division I-A football players reported spending an average of 44.8 hours per week on their sport. That doesn't include the hours involved in taking care of their academic responsibilities.The general recommendation for time spent on academics is class hours * 3 and usually kids take around 15 credits. The same study found that football players spent around 40 hours a week on class. Since sleeping is usually encouraged, that takes up another 56 hours a week, leaving a football player taking a normal class load 26 hours a week to shower, eat, and do, like, anything else at all.
Football players spend 85 hours a week on work-ish obligatioons. By comparison, other professions:
- Union guy: 40 hours
- French guy: 36 hours
- Software coder on a deadline: 80 hours
- New York medical interns, as limited by law: 80 hours
- Sports columnist: 45 minutes spent on Blackberry.
This is also why graduation rates at many institutions are pretty sketchy and what kids do graduate usually do so in the easiest major available. Keep it in mind the next time you rip on collegiate athletes for being dumb: they are so obviously working harder than you did in college.
As you might expect, the heavy workload reported by football players has spurred concerned quotes:
"It's an early warning signal that we've got a problem," said University of Hartford President Walt Harrison, chairman of the NCAA's committee on academic performance. "I think we need more safeguards."The NCAA will no doubt politic on this issue and either do nothing or impose easily avoided regulations that do nothing to stem the problem but are cheap."Once you get past 40 hours, you're really pushing things," NCAA President Myles Brand said.
How about something else? Revenues (and, not coincidentally, coaching salaries) continue to skyrocket, but the men largely responsible for the skyrocketing revenues have seen not a dime's worth of it because of NCAA amateurism restrictions. Without getting into the "they should be paid" argument, -- a nasty one -- wouldn't it be possible for the NCAA to offer collegiate athletes an extra year of scholarship after their eligibility has expired? No 45 hours a week spent on other tasks, an eased workload when you are eligible, and a path to a degree for everyone even if their pro dreams don't work out.
Expensive? Maybe, but in the face of millionaire coaches across the country "expensive" doesn't fly.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
1-15-2008 @ 11:32PM
nunya said...
Well, just because they spend more time on school than the average student doesn't mean they aren't dumb. Obviously, some aren't. But the average student not only spends more time on school work in real classes, but earns his/her way into the school academically more often than athletes do. All athletic programs could agree to spend less time on athletics, so as to make the academic experience real for athletes while keeping the playing field level for the games...but we know that won't happen...plus, some conferences are already still more academic than other ones, which is, eh-hem, probably why the SEC is the best in football. I've attended a SEC school and a Big Ten school...the SEC school is the one where athletes can take real classes and should still have an easy time, which might be why jocks at OSU take Golf and the History of Rock & Roll instead.
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1-16-2008 @ 1:03AM
Feruw said...
History of Rock and Roll and Golf? I'm impressed you were able to find Andy Katzenmoyer's schedule
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1-16-2008 @ 2:20AM
Matt said...
@ nunya (the idiotic SEC homer):
The stigma around athletes not being as qualified to attend any institution as your average academic is so full of logical holes that it's disgusting. There are many different kinds of intelligences and talent, and I'm willing to bet my bank account that the kid who gets in on an academic scholarship to study math or biology couldn't read defensive coverages if his mother's life depended on it, the abilities have far too many differences to count, and they're both worthy of investment at the college level. Whether or not the athlete continues to compete, his or her intellectual development still takes place; he or she learns values of hard work and discipline, and more importantly, the demands on them in competition teach them how to think under pressure. The idea that either academics or athletes are 'more worthy' of an institution's attention or investment is laughable at best.
As far as your silly conclusion about SEC athletes being able to take "real" classes and still have "an easy time" is disproven by your own admission to some conferences (and thereby the schools within) being more academic than others. You can't have it both ways, chief.
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1-16-2008 @ 2:21AM
anreed said...
He took AIDS Awareness, too.
An excellent idea, Brian. Like an academic redshirt (though not have them actually practice with the team, of course). Call it a mortarboard year. I see very little moral gray area here. The only argument against it would be that the athletes wouldn't have gotten into the classes if it weren't for their athletic ability, and therefore shouldn't be worried about class so much. That would be quite a position to take.
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1-16-2008 @ 3:19AM
Scott said...
@Matt
I think you completely misunderstood nunya's second point. You might want to read his last sentence again.
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1-16-2008 @ 3:30AM
Grer The Sarcastic Bastard said...
I have always been of the belief that student athletes of a schools' major revenue generated sports (football & basketball, Baseball to a somewhat lesser degree) shouls be allowed to stack their classwork schedules in their off-seasons, thus devoting full time to their trade during the season. For one thing, you csn use it as a chip to keep them on the field (you don't pass, you don't play), and second, especially for football, you would eliminate the convienent excuse of finals being one of the reasons you can't have a playoff in Div I.
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1-16-2008 @ 9:25AM
urbanisagod said...
Ok, 40+ hours a week is way too much? At most academic institutions if you plan on getting an A in the class, you should plan on studying at least 3 hours outside of class for each hour you spend in class. What that means is that for a 12 hour workload, you should spend an additional 36 hours outside of class to get your A. Do you take a golf class to ease some of the workload? Yes you do. Let's be honest, most of us weren't taking Calculus 3 as an elective.
That being said, their workload is no different that the kid that has to work 40 hours a week to pay thier bills. In some cases, with the additional benefit of having tutors and the resources available, some might argue that they have it easier.
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1-16-2008 @ 12:05PM
Clark Ruper said...
I don't buy this argument at all. I was on the rowing team at UM and I do not have any sympathy for football players. On the Crew team we practiced between 20-30 hours a week in the off season. During the season we were well over 40 hours.
Because no one at UM cares about men's rowing we were a varsity club team that competed on the varsity level but only received token funding from the university. None of us were on scholarship and on top of all the time commitments we still paid around $3000 a year each to compete.
Football players also get tons of perks. They get special free meals, personal trainers, early scheduling, and 24 hour tutoring, not to mention a free ride. The UM Crew members paid full tuition without any perks.
I'm not bitching, I loved my time on the rowing team. Best experience of my life. All I'm saying is that athletics is not excuse to take blow off classes. I still managed to keep a 3.5 gpa. Less noticed athletes across the country work just as hard as football players, but no one ever writes stories about how hard their lives are.
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1-16-2008 @ 3:55PM
sour said...
I attended a school that made the Final Four a few years ago and one of the players was 'enrolled' in a history class of mine. He showed up probably 5 times all semester, and when he did - strolled in half way through with a giant sack of McDonalds. Even if he did put in way more extra time outside of class (judging by his constant presence in the gym, I'd venture to say he didn't), he was allowed to play by different rules than everyone else in the class. I refuse to refer to someone like that as a 'student athlete'.
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