‘Playing volleyball here was a nightmare’: Inside the Dartmouth women’s volleyball team’s culture
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Anonymous
DP. The bolded part cuts into your argument. Just because the modern university started one way, it doesn't mean it cannot evolve into something different. Without evolution, the universities would still be doing theological and clerical training for men. Nowadays, the theological and clerical training for men is a minuscule part of the university (and programs are getting cut). I agree with the PP who wrote that universities offer choices: some of these choices may be great for some students and not that great for others. That's part of how they attract students - they will come if they have the choice they want. |
Anonymous
PP. My point was just that the university is an ancient intellectual format with roots in religious education. And attaching serious, high-level sports to it is quite a graft. America has grafted more sports onto our higher education than anywhere else in the world and it doesn't fit very well. Drama, mentioned by a PP, actually is also ancient and evolved in part for religious purposes. There seem to be a lot fewer drama club "scandals" at colleges...but perhaps that's just because drama is mainly a cost center. My point about mentioning that the ancient university educated men was just to point out that it's a long way from educating male priests to preparing top quality female volleyball setters. I'm very tired of pastimes that attract scandalous leaders who claim noble purposes (such as leadership training) and then exploit and degrade people. And leave them with permanent sports injuries. It also seems that at many schools the athletes have lower measurable academic qualifications (this may not be true at Dartmouth). I have a friend whose daughter is dropping out of D3 softball this year. The 20 hours a week of practice interferes with her schooling and has left her with a shoulder injury that's new since starting college. She is going to transfer colleges now. From my perspective, it seems time to throw the baby out with the bathwater. Colleges do not seem to be producing the noble educational effects they claim by offering these sports. College football and basketball should go first, but are money machines that are too entrenched to get rid of. |
Anonymous
And you have the right to have your own perspective. But you didn't address the evolution of universities to keep up with the times and to produce revenue. I would agree that a lot of athletes would not make it to good university based on their academic skills alone. Should there be a law baring universities to give degrees to students who are good at sports, but don't have a strong academic background? A lot of the college sport teams would be decimated. Even though athletes may not be among the best academic thinkers, they are contributing to the society in their own way, so they deserve some sort of recognition / degree. And this is where universities step in and give them a chance to pursue this recognition. |
Anonymous
This is a bit hyperbolic. The vast majority of high school students stop playing the sport they love after high school. They manage to move on. It’s hard to feel sorry for volleyball players who choose to give up their sport 2 or 3 years later and still end up with a Dartmouth degree. |
Anonymous
They got into Dartmouth because they can play volleyball. Now the system isn’t working for them and we are supposed to feel for the “brutal “ situation they are in? |
Anonymous
Agree with this. College age students playing, especially those playing small, non revenue sports like volleyball, should be dropped back to club level. Get a dorm floor team together if you want to play in college. |
Anonymous
Then they have a choice: sport or education. So sad for them. |
Anonymous
PP. I regret that universities use sports to produce revenue. That is a side effect/unintentional outgrowth of our unusual American system. Originally sports like college football were used to build school spirit and then that took off as a way to ensure the interest and loyalty of local politicians. In many states with D1 state flagships, the football coaches are the highest paid state employees. More than the university presidents and more than the governors. I think college athletics has gotten out of control. That's all. I feel bad for the volleyball players in this particular situation. I would never want to submit my college experience to one person's close inspection and control like that. |
Anonymous
NP. What a gross belief that these student athletes would not have been admitted without their sport. I do not know these women, but I do know other Ivy League athletes. They are impressive, top tier students by any measure. Your beliefs are incredibly antiquated and biased. |
Anonymous
I also agree that CEOs should not be paid 100x the compensation of a regular employee. A university president should not be paid more than 10x the salary of a university professor. And definitely a coach should not be paid more than the university president. But that's the results of the "community" we are building and the values we have as a nation. Taking competitive sports out of universities will not change that. The money will simply go somewhere else and universities will simply lose their athletic identities. And athletes would lose the option of getting a degree from a good institution, where most of them would not make it based on academic criteria alone. |
Anonymous
But why should athletes who can't make it based on academic criteria alone, go to a school where they are at the bottom of the academic ability distribution? This isn't true of the drama kids, the instrument players, the real or fake non-profit creators. Athletics is one of the areas where kids with lower credentials get onboarded essentially for business reasons. I am not saying this is a Dartmouth issue. I'm just speaking generally. I rarely hear about admirable scholar athletes like the Indiana quarterback who actually had the drive and academic talent to complete his undergrad degree before moving on to what seems like a potentially sketchier grad school arrangement at Indiana. I am associated with a school well known and much loved for sports success. And I find the compromise in standards to be offputting and the occasional sports scandals to be enraging. They seem to be part and parcel of big money sports. |
Anonymous
| Didn't Dartmouth also have an abusive track coach until recently? What is going on there?? |
Anonymous
The “long way from training male priests to female volleyball setters” line is not the profound point you think it is. It just restates that universities evolved. They also moved from excluding women entirely to educating them, from theology to modern science, from classical languages to engineering and public policy. For some reason, all of that evolution is acceptable, but women competing at a high level in sports is where you draw the line. That reads less like a historical argument and more like selective discomfort. The “I’m tired of pastimes that attract scandalous leaders” point also falls apart once you apply it beyond athletics. Those same dynamics show up anywhere there is hierarchy and pressure. Theater programs have had recent repeated harassment and misconduct cases at places like University of Oklahoma, Indiana University, University of Michigan, University of Central Oklahoma, Central Connecticut State University, Salve Regina University, Mesa Community College, and Columbus State University. Research labs and graduate studies programs have long-standing issues with abusive advisors. Music and dance programs produce real, sometimes permanent injuries. ROTC does as well. Universities do not respond by eliminating these areas. They impose oversight and hold people accountable. Then there is the suggestion to “start with football and basketball.” At many schools, those programs help fund large parts of the broader university ecosystem, including non-revenue academics and arts. So the proposed fix for problems in one volleyball program is to remove revenue streams that support everything from niche departments to student services. That is not a targeted solution. What you’re really arguing is not about structure, it’s about personal preference. You don’t value athletics, so you’re comfortable treating it as disposable. But once you apply your own logic consistently across campus, it takes down far more than sports. That’s why no serious institution operates the way you’re suggesting. |
Anonymous
Incompetent control freak is my conclusion as well. |
Anonymous
“Get a dorm floor team together” is the kind of throwaway take that sounds neat until you think about it for five seconds. Universities are full of non-revenue activities that exist because students want to pursue them at a serious level, not as a casual dorm hobby. Nobody is suggesting orchestra becomes a jam session in the dorm’s common area, theater becomes skits after dinner, or research gets downgraded to weekend tinkering because it doesn’t turn a profit. Athletics sits in that same category. Treating it as uniquely disposable just shows you don’t understand how any of this works. |