have you seen these idiotic NCAA PSAs

[TheMightyFavog]

Claiming that "Our athletes will go pro in fields other than sports and shows athletes doing chemistry, engineering, etc?

Those ads are bullshit.

When see athlete's majors mentioned on TV, I never see an athlete majoring in fields such as engineering, physics, biology or chemistry. Most of them were in bullshit easy majors tailor made for dumb jocks like Sports Management, Sports Medicine, or Sports Journalism with the occasional Business major thrown into the mix.

[PVnRT]

1. Most college athletes aren't starting basketball and football players, either

In fact, perusing this year's Academic All-American list for football, I see students majoring in economics, chemical engineering, aerospace engineering, international relations, journalism, electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, history, pre-med, Arabic and civil engineering; all at Division I schools. These are football players, mind you, the guys who are expected to take leisure studies and coast through school.

Furthermore, the NCAA covers everyone with college athletics except for community and junior colleges, which leaves plenty of schools like MIT & University of Chicago with small-scale athletics and a big academic tradition.

So, no, it's not bullshit. Most college athletes never even attempt to enter the pros. Some of them don't even have pro leagues.

[Reverend_Smitty]

2. Not to mention DII and DIII schools don't offer athletic scholarships

99% of those kids have no shot at becoming professional athletes AND they have to find their own way to pay for tuition. Those ads aren't bs...I work with DIII athletes every day and most of them have fine heads on their shoulders

[PVnRT]

5. I know, I went to a DIII school

Athletics were a part of things there, but this was an engineering school; the "easiest" major was economics, of which we usually had one graduate with a degree in it per year.

Oddly enough, though, a couple of baseball players who were there when I was did manage to break into the minors for a few years

[sasquatch]

3. Actually in some ads it shows them working engineering, physics, biology and chemistry.

Which akes me laugh because at most of the SEC schools the "student"/athletes almost 90% of the time are still undeclared as Seniors.

[MnFats]

4. Remember the Onion headline? "Florida unveils plan...

...to drop academics.
story goes on to explain how athletes were irked by classes cutting into their practice tiime

[1gobluedem]

6. You're limiting it to just high profile revenue sports

Football and basketball especially. Most student athletes never go pro, graduate, and go on to other things. I knew soccer players, hockey players, gymnasts, women's b-ball players, baseball players, swimmers...all had athletic scholarships and, except for a couple of the hockey players, none went on to a pro athletic career or majored in stereotypical sports majors.

I also knew three scholarship basketball players, two of whom were starters (at a major Division One university); they all graduated in liberal arts and went on to grad school; two are lawyers and one got an MBA. And the football player I knew best graduated in four years with a degree in engineering.

Most college athletes don't end up as pros and do graduate. Don't generalize.