Is it real, or Memorex has new meaning in the 21st century with the rise of fake news and alternate facts.
Ignoring the facts has long been a staple of political speech, and politicians routinely overstate some statistic, distort their opponents’ position, or simply tell out-and-out lies to influence voters and/or their constituents. To be sure that it sticks, politicians often put surrogates and pundits in front of the American public to spread the spin.
Then there’s fake news, made-up stuff, masterfully manipulated to look like credible journalistic reports that are easily spread online to large audience willing to believe the fictions and spread the word. The most willing enabler of fake new is President Donald Trump. First it was the size of his electoral victory. Then it was the size of the crowd at his inauguration. Most recently, it was Trump’s tweet claiming that former President Barack Obama had team Trump wiretapped. And sure enough, Trump’s surrogates and pundits have defended the claims in the face of facts that make the claims untrue.
As an industry pioneer, I thought I would share with readers how fake news has reared its ugly head in America’s new pastimes…big-time college basketball and football…where a win at all cost mentality prevails where fair play and sportsmanship once reigned. With March Madness behind us and a North Carolina crowned king, I decided to examine the graduation rate for Black athletes, whose talent is exploited to support the two main revenue generating college sports which generate combined revenue of nearly $5 billion. Is the improvement fake news?
Heading into March Madness, NCAA President Mark Emmert recently touted the “record-breaking” graduation rates of Division I athletes based on a recent study by the Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport at the University of Central Florida that placed the graduation rate for Black basketball players participating in the NCAA Tournament at 74%. NCAA spokesperson Stacy Osburn claims that the graduation rate for Black basketball players at the Division 1 level has increased from 46% to 77% over the 15-year period that the NCAA has been collecting data. Real progress, right?
Critics balk at the interpretation of those numbers, citing recent academic scandals Syracuse , SMU , Notre Dame and even lightly regarded CSUN. There’s also the lingering and persistent college graduation-rate gap between Black and White student athletes highlighted in the 2013 University of Pennsylvania study on Black Male Student-Athletes and Racial Inequities in NCAA Division I College Sports and the 2016 follow up study. Critics also cite the academic scandal of historic proportions uncovered at UNC, a scandal that head coach Roy Williams has had the unmitigated gall to consider “unfair” recruiting by competitors against the Tar Heels.
"What really is happening is that athletes are being funneled into the majors of least resistance," said Oklahoma professor Gerald Gurney, president of The Drake Group, an NCAA watchdog. "They really, based on their athletic commitment, do not have an opportunity to pursue an education at all, much less a world-class education."
Just how fake is the news of record-breaking graduation rates for Black college athletes? Perhaps a look at the high school graduation rate can help to put the NCAA’s claim in perspective.
According to recent news reports, U.S. public high schools have also reached a milestone, with 80% of students graduating. According to Robert Balfanz, a researcher with the Everyone Graduates Center at the School of Education at Johns Hopkins University, the increase in graduation rates “is actually a story of remarkable social improvement, that you could actually identify a problem, understand its importance, figure out what works and apply it and make a difference.” Based on years of steady progress, some experts predict a 90% graduation rate nationally by 2020.
Here in my backyard of Long Beach, CA, graduation rates are up for the third straight year for students in the Long Beach Unified School District, surpassing state and county averages according to data recently released by the California Department of Education. The school district’s African American graduation rate is 73.7%, surpassing California’s 68.1% for the same subgroup. LBUSD’s Latino students graduated at a rate of 78.8% compared to the state’s 76.4% for the same population.
Real or Memorex? Perhaps the progress is real. However, if you look below the surface you’ll discover that nearly ¾ of all boys of color in the District who graduate do not meet the so-called “A-G” requirements. The requirements represent a sequence of high school courses that California high school students must complete with a grade of C or better, and are designed to ensure that entering students can participate fully in the first-year program in a broad variety of fields of study; have attained the necessary preparation for courses, majors, and programs offered; have attained a body of knowledge that will provide breadth and perspective to new, more advanced studies; and have attained essential critical thinking and study skills.
In other words, while more students are graduating high school, fewer are prepared to take the next step in a trajectory of life which increasingly requires high education.
Can the same conclusions be drawn from the graduation rate of Black college athletes? Should we look beyond the rising graduation number and examine majors? Isn’t a person’s college major is a truer indicator of achievement. What exactly is interdisciplinary studies? And why do all athletes at UCLA major in history?
No matter the spin the NCAA puts on it, what’s happening in my opinion is that marginal Black athletes are being forced to commit academic dishonesty or the universities are joining them to keep them eligible and on the court or field.
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