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Fri 16 Apr 2004
Random Musings About Tips
When I saw Morty speak in New Haven, he said that the question he is asked about most by alumni is the emphasis on athletics at Williams. Sure enough, Morty was asked a few questions about athletics despite his preemptory oratory. Seemingly, alumni are ambivalent about winning 7 of 8 Sears Cups: while they are proud of the accomplishment, they are worried about the effect athletics has on the campus culture. I think a couple of common arguments need to be addressed:
#1: Tipped athletes are less academically able. I don't think this is really a matter of debate. If a coach has a limited number of tips, why spend it on an athlete whose academics are strong enough to ensure admission? Why not use the tip on an athlete whose academic credentials are significantly weaker? Coaches aren't stupid and put their tips to best use.
#2: Tipped athletes change the culture of the campus. Again, I'm not sure there can be much serious debate about this topic. While I met some extremely smart athletes at Williams, would anyone seriously argue that the hockey team is a bastion of learned discourse? If you were forced to categorize the football team as intellectual or anti-intellectual, which of the two categories would you choose? Many of the tipped athletes know they were admitted despite questionable academic credentials and adopt the identity of a dumb jock. [Note: In my entry, the football, hockey, and basketball player got into an argument as to whose SAT scores were lowest — it wasn't clear whether the winner had the high or low score.] This anti-intellectual culture spreads through the team and the athletes' social circles making the culture more pervasive. At my reunion, I was struck by the degree to which our class was bifurcated: athletes on one side of the room and non-athletes on the other.
#3: Tips are necessary to maintain the quality of the sports teams. Anyone who argues otherwise is seriously underestimating the skill of the athletes at Williams. Dartmouth is considered the jock school of the Ivies, but they routinely lose to Princeton and UPenn teams that admit better athletes (with questionable academic resumes). Trinity and Connecticut College have lower admission standards than Williams and routinely lose to the Ephs. Sure, Williams has good coaching, but good athletes are a must (unless you are Jerry Sloan — but even he missed the playoffs this year).
I think these three "facts" can be used to construct three models/archetypes for elite liberal arts colleges. I'll attach a name to each model, but the name is intended to be impressionistic. The goal is to illustrate what Williams might look like under different admission regimes, not seriously compare different schools.
Swarthmore Model: Students are admitted to the college on the basis of their academic or artistic accomplishments and little or no weight to athletics. The athletics teams are generally bad and walk-ons are common. The campus culture generally celebrates scholarship and might even be slightly anti-fitness.
Middlebury Model: Only students who meet the basic acceptance criteria are admitted. Athletic achievement will be used to break ties, but very few athletes will experience grades below a B. The athletic teams are competitive, but do not go far in NCAA tournaments. The campus culture is not bookish, but nor is it anti-intellectual.
Williams Model: There are two distinct tracts for being admitted. Most students are held to very high academic standards, but good athletes need only cross a minimum threshold. As a result, teams compete for national championships, but many athletes earn C's in courses. The campus culture is bifurcated. Most students engage in the pretensions of undergraduate pseudo-intellectual musings, while athletes (and associated friends) adopt an anti-intellectualism and define themselves in opposition to other members of the campus.
I think it is within the power of the admissions committee to mold a campus to resemble either of the three archetypes (which I suppose could be thought of as points along a continuum for elite liberal arts colleges). I don't think it is possible to say which model is preferable objectively. It is a matter of taste. The question is, which campus stakeholders get to determine the actions of the admission committee? There are many groups who should have a say in the discussion:
1) Administrators
2) Professors
3) Alumni
4) Current Students
5) Prospective students (the undergraduate market)
6) Townspeople
I suspect that Administrators would favor the accolades and press that come from the Williams model. Professors would likely favor the Swarthmore model where they have engaged and motivated students who want to learn. It isn't clear to me what the current students or the high school market would favor. Townspeople may want competitive teams to cheer for, but abhor the loutish behavior that often accompanies the victories.
One positive attribute of an anti-intellectual atmosphere on a college campus that often goes overlooked is the future earnings of its alumni. Reed College boasts the highest percentage of alumni pursuing advanced degrees in the Arts and Sciences. While I am sure that Reed professors are proud mentors, the college is always in financial trouble. Talented but anti-intellectual students will ignore graduate school and instead pursue business or law or consulting — far more profitable enterprises. A richer alumni base usually translates into a larger endowment. A college could rationally decide to foster a culture that molds "Investment bankers conversant in Shakespeare" rather than "Shakespeare scholars with few investments."
No individual has a "right" to attend Williams. Admitting academically less able athletes is not the "wrong" way to construct a college class. The admissions committee has clearly pursued a particular policy with a fair amount of success. Critics of the policy (and I am one) need to explain:
a) What is wrong with the current policy;
b) How it could be improved;
c) Why her/his stakeholder group deserves a large enough voice to trump the status quo (after first establishing that you speak for the stakeholder group in question).
Lower test scores and GPAs for athletes do not inherently condemn the institution of Tips. Why is creating a campus where everyone is familiar with Derida or electron microscopy inherently better than one where students train hard, pick up a few job skills employers might like to see, and relax by playing video games, watching TV, and drinking beer?Print • Email
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33 Responses to "Random Musings About Tips"
Aidan says:
you've generalized this argument beyond any approximation of the truth. All jocks are stupid, anti-intellectual, revenge-of-the-nerds sterotypes. Everyone else at Williams would be having tea parties and discussing post-structuralism if it wasn't for jocks pushing them down stairs.
I think it is difficult to know what a campus culture is like, say, without being at school there. I think it is even more ridiculous to make comparisons between an institution you once attended and a bunch of institutions you never attended.
It is a well known impression, for example, that Midd likes to admit attractive, stupider, students.
What this debate really hinges on is a percieved level of "intellectualism" in "campus discourse." This is just crap.
David Kane says:
You write "Tips are necessary to maintain the quality of the sports teams." Does "quality" here mean current quality (i.e., Sears Cup winning) or reasonable quality (overall 0.500 mark for Williams teams on average)? If the former, then tips are, I'll assume necessary. But I do not believe the latter. I think that without any tips, or certainly with many fewer tips, Williams teams would still be competitive.
Is there good evidence one way or the other?
Sam Crane says:
No, this is a great post. (d) hits many nails on their heads, as far as I can see. Of course ideal types (which I would use instead of "stereotypes" in this case) obscure certain complexities to elucidate essential truths. But the point here on the bifurcation of campus culture (we couldn't really say multi-furcation, could we…) is something I have heard from students throughout my time here. I have even seen intellectually curious students leave Williams for other schools where they can find more stimulating interchange, beyond beer pong and the keg line. And the desire of faculty for the "Swarthmore model" is certainly true. Hail (d)!
Loweeel says:
Talking to some students who went to swarthmore from my high school, and some of the kids who transferred from there when they cut their football and wrestling teams (who are actually QUITE intelligent), swarthmore is far from an ideal.
While many of the faculty might appreciate the swarthmore model, there isn't a single person out of the the 10 or so I know who attended Swarthmore who actually enjoyed the campus atmosphere outside of class. The extent of their negativity about Swarthmore really surprised me, because although I knew the social atmosphere was a little low-key, I had no idea that it was so actively unpleasant.
So yeah, we can be the Swarthmore model… but I think Cornell offers a cautionary tale of an isolated school with a very academic-intensive atmosphere. And really, do we want Williams to be known for student suicides?
Aidan says:
"While I met some extremely smart athletes at Williams, would anyone seriously argue that the hockey team is a bastion of learned discourse? If you were forced to categorize the football team as intellectual or anti-intellectual, which of the two categories would you choose? Many of the tipped athletes know they were admitted despite questionable academic credentials and adopt the identity of a dumb jock."
let's rewrite this paragraph, say, replacing athlete with "minority" (affirmative action also admits students that aren't up to snuff, academically) and see if anyone would still want to own it.
"While I met some extremely smart minorities at Williams, would anyone seriously argue that the BSU is a bastion of learned discourse? If you were forced to categorize VISTA as intellectual or anti-intellectual, which of the two categories would you choose? Many of the minorities know they were admitted despite questionable academic credentials and adopt the identity…"
Fact of the matter is, there are many reasons to admit kids that aren't "academic 1s" or whatever the hell that means. I'm not going to pretend I know how admissions quantifies all of this, and I don't even think it is particularly relevant. The point is, there are many reasons to admit people to Williams, and there are many compromises we make from the "ideal candidate" that we are comfortable with, or that we'd never question. Reading the recent Record piece, we find that we've got "127 African-Americans, 129 Asian-Americans, 108 Latinos, 5 Native Americans" coming in '08. How many jocks? 172 should be able to perform at the varsity level, 66 tips. Seems to me, that's pretty sensible.
As the other point, that campus discourse is hopelessly incurious? What discourse is curious? I'm a thesis student, and I don't talk about school when I'm out with my friends on Saturday night. There's a time and place for everything.
Williams Towner says:
I first read this essay by Mark Edmundson at the University of Virginia in Harper's Magazine about seven years ago. Perhaps a good quick read in light of this conversation.
Kim Daboo '88 says:
It's probably not possible to get hold of the data but I'd be interested in seeing if tips are failing to graduate at any greater rate than everyone else.
WRT Williams leaning in the direction of Swarthmore, please please please NO!!!! My first job out of Williams was at Swarthmore. Brilliant students, but what a bunch of whiners! Never have I seen students enjoy whining so much about how hard they work and how horrible their lives are. Ugh. It would be a crime for Williams to take the smallest step down that road.
I was often asked what the difference is between the two schools. I used to say that Williams students work hard and play hard. Swarthmore students work hard, complain hard, and seem to enjoy that they are having no fun.
(d)avid says:
Aidan, there is a large difference between the effect of the hockey team on campus and the BSU and VISTA. The BSU and VISTA define the type of intellectual discourse that many critics of tips seek to foster. Both BSU and VISTA actively discuss race, society, inequality, and culture. They bring in speakers and try to engage the campus as a whole. Professors want this type of exchage to take place.
The two organizations also serve as a support network for minority students on campus. The support network is the one feature that the hockey team also served. Many of the sports teams took the role that is served by fraternities and sororoties on other campuses. The discussions of SportsCenter and action movies fostered by hockey team hang outs are fine, but hardly the type of discourse critics of tips find socially valuable.
Are all jocks dumb at Williams? Certainly not. However, the 70 athletes that coaches felt the need to tip will tend to fit the stereotype better. If tips are ended will people be wearing black turtle necks and discussing post-structuralism in French? Of course not, but if you visit other schools (Bates, Wesleyan, Oberlin, Reed, Tufts, …) you'll find that each has a culture that is very different from Williams. Yes, I only went to college at one of the schools, but I have spent time on the campuses, know people who went there, and one gets the sense that it is a different — less sports focused — environment. The attitude towards class is different. The discussions that take place outside of class are different.
I did not intend my post to suggest that the Williams model is wrong. While I do know people who went to schools like Swarthmore and Oberlin and were happy, I see nothing wrong with how the admissions committee has decided to construct classes. The intent was to lay out what I feel is at stake in the arguments. I attached school names to the models to give readers a sense of what a decision might look like (e.g., David Kane's question — Middlebury averages 6th place in the Sears Cup, Swarthmore 155th, Williams can move down from 1st without becoming a bunch of pencil necks). I thought using the terms "archetype" and "model" made the hypothetical nature of the enterprise clear. I apologize for any ambiguity.
Sam Crane says:
What historical or political or sociological reason could there be for substituting the word "minority" for that of "athlete" is (d)'s analysis? It seems only a rhetorical ploy. The grounds for affirmative action – redressing historical wrongs and their modern manifestations – are wholly distinct from an obssession for winning sports teams.
Aidan says:
[d]avid, I'm sorry if I don't buy your argument that identity studies (ethnostudies) brings more to the campus than "athletes." You only need to go a little farther back on this very blog to see that ethnominority groups often just try to engage in 'borking' and other hyper-pc language games. I think the value of identity studies should be actively questioned: I find it troubling that many students come to Williams only to major in themselves, as it were. In many of these departments there's a emphasis on ideology and a paucity of facts–it is not unreasonable to say the only identity tradition that is critically studied is the western one.
To Sam Crane, I think the argument that affirmative action redresses historical wrongs holds very little water indeed. The recent article in the Times Magazine, here, is very pointed. You only have to consult my rich acquaintence from Virginia, a minority, who is very proud that his token status got him into a good law school without him doing very much work, to develop a jaundiced view of affirmative action.
Furthermore, I find this tired reification of a very boomer collegiate mindset to be grating. Just because boomer professors had the luxury of going to easier schools with more time to protest, consume canabis, and have "deep" discussions about "facist pigs" and "the man" (just watch the fine documentary Hair) doesn't mean that such pursuits are salutatory or should be emulated by my generation. There's more than one way to have intellectual discourse, and just because people here aren't pompous about it doesn't mean that people aren't thinking, talking, and learning quite a bit. You'd be surprised, I think, if you bothered to talk to people instead of catagorizing them in various exciting ways.
(d)avid says:
PS As for "jocks pushing [nerds] down stairs," this is simply a willful misreading of the post.
I posed the debate as "Investment bankers conversant in Shakespeare [verses] Shakespeare scholars with few investments." Not, should Williams recruit Lawrence Phillips to play football (sure he'll drag his girlfriend down a flight of stairs, but we'll win the title).
Noah Smith-Drelich '07 says:
I think possibly athletics' roll on campus has changed since many of the alumni who post on this board graduated.
First of all, until any of us have any numbers, claiming that Tipped athletes are "dumb jocks" is a meaningless and shallow accusation. Yes, they are, almost by definition, less academically qualified than purely academic admits. However, I'm sure everybody on this site would agree that SATs and grades are fairly poor measurements of intelligence and the arbitrary difference of 25, 50, 100, or even 150 SAT points between tipped and non-tipped students likely doesn't represent any noticable difference in intelligence. An Ivy-league dean of admissions once said something along the lines of: we could replace our entire class with our waitlist and there would be no noticable difference in the student performance…we'd just have a much less interesting class. Honestly, someone with a 1600 SAT is most likely NOT smarter than someone with a 1450 SAT.
Williams gives preference to MANY types of students, not just tipped athletes–URMs, legacies, and people with unusual talent all get fairly large amounts of preference given to them in the admissions process. Isn't a tipped athlete just an athlete with an unusual amount of talent? As a current student at Williams I feel that I can accurately state that there ISN'T a noticable difference in intelligence between tipped athletes and regular students. Yes, there are some tipped athletes that seem distinctively unqualified for Williams, but there are legacies, URMs, even students who seemed to have been given no admissions preference who seem just as unqualified. All in all, the vast majority of students DO seem qualified.
Second of all, there ARE large amounts of mingling between athletes and non-athletes, at the very least, among members of the frosh class. Athletes spend large amounts of time together with their teams and are encouraged to form communities and good relationships with their teammates, so it's not surprising to see many people become friends with their teammates. As it is, most people are closest to people not on their teams, and there is little to no divide between the athletes and non-athletes on-campus. This is one of the things that I've really enjoyed about Williams.
Third…all of the NESCAC schools follow the same regulations that we do for "tipping" students (although many give the process a different name). We tend to have better athletes at Williams, not because admissions standards are lower, but because better athletes want to come to Williams. Athletes like playing for winning teams, and we have the MOST winningest teams around. There ARE some legitimately brilliant student athletes in the country, and we get many of them.
Fourth of all, the assertion that athletes perform poorly at Williams is false. Women varsity athletes at Williams have a higher GPA as a group than the SCHOOL average. While the mens teams are slightly lower than average, they are not significantly lower than average. Varsity sports are a huge time committment at Williams, and it's surprising that teams can keep their GPAs as high as they do just for this reason. If I had to spend the 2+ hours a day in athletics that most varsity athletes do, I know my GPA would fall.
Lastly, while I posted something of this sort on another thread, I'll say it again. I don't understand why people on this message board (maybe alumni and faculty in general?) think that there's a lack of intellectual curiousity among Williams students. This is not the case at all. Williams isn't quite as "flamingly" intellectual as, say, Swarthmore, but I think that's a good thing. At Williams people discuss academics frequently out of class, but nobody flaunts their intelligence. Unlike Swarthmore, there is no status attached to "sounding smart"…students are just as intelligent, but express their opinions in much more honest and often informal contexts. At Swarthmore you'll have social planned intellectual discussions. At Williams you'll have discussion JUST as intellectual occuring more spontaneous…such as during sporting events. This doesn't make Williams any less intellectual than Swarthmore, it just makes it less obviously so.
Aidan says:
article from the Record a couple years back, very much worth a read.
The Game of Life, a book by Williams Bowen and James Shulman that sparked much of the athletic discussion at Williams and other colleges, suffers from "anti-market" and "liberal" bias and its authors have no moral vision except for "academic snobbery," according to Hal Scott, the Nomura Professor of International Financial Systems at Harvard Law School.
Prof. Scott is the father of Tory Scott '04, who was an entrymate of mine.
(d)avid says:
Aidan, "academic snobbery" is exactly what the debate about tips is about. Edmundson describes the culture the "academic snobs" aim for very well in the article that Williamstowner links to. Attaching an unflattering name to a view does not make it any less valid. Indeed, all of your contributions to this thread involve attacking positions rather than offering anything constructive. What aspect of athletics or the culture it engenders do you support? Do we fundamentally misunderstand the dynamic of the Williams culture (an argument that Noah makes), in what way? Why not take the time to genuinely illuminate us with your insights?
Noah, I certainly hope that you are right about the culture at Williams. Professor Crane's comments would suggest that some students do not share your view, but perhaps your class will have a different dynamic. As for more specific points:
a) I don't think anyone would argue that the SAT or GPA determines intelligence;
b) Athletics are unique in that they receive tips. To the best of my knowledge, the music department, theater, debate team, WCFM, do not recruit students and then provide a list to admissions. Such activities will certainly help a resume (in part because it fills in information that SAT scores miss), but such talents do not receive a "free pass" up from low 1 through 9 rankings;
c) You are right about good athletes wanting to come to Williams, but I am fairly sure that Tufts does not exercise tips in the way or the extent of Williams;
d) You are also right about the diversity within the population of varsity athletes. The Report makes it pretty clear that the locus of the problem lies with a few teams. While the specific teams are not identified, the outlines provided are "male" and "large team" sports;
e) Why the claim that Williams students are not intellectually curious? Largely because it is true. The Edmundson essay describes the problem as widespread and that certainly is true. However, Williams is a very selective institution and could certainly select a different type of student body. I've spent time at many different institutions, meeting both faculty and students. Williams students are certainly smart and hard working, but not particularly intellectually curious or politically engaged. It's not necessarily a bad thing (apparently Tory Scott's father thinks it is a good thing), just different from how professors, some students and some alumni idealized the school.
The discussion I intended to spark was about which stakeholder should have a say. But if my depiction of the status quo and relevant options are wildly off the mark, then I guess there are empirical facts to clear up first.
Sam Crane says:
Aidan, I am well aware of the cultural backlash against affirmative action by both minorities who feel slighted and whites who feel materially hurt. The fact of a backlash does not, in any way, change the equally true fact that the experience of African-Americans, for hundreds of years, in the US was abominable, nor that effects of that sorry history are still to be found today, whatever the situation of your rich acquaintance. Now, whether affirmative action is the best way to address those facts is another question – I happen to believe that there is still good reason to keep it around. And with all that said, it is still the case that the historical case for affirmative action is, or at the very least should be (unless one wants to argue, as I do not, that sports recruitment should be a primary means of redressing racial discrimination), a wholly separate issue from the question of recruiting athletes at Williams. Linking the two, which was your rhetorical move, is specious. And all of your ad hominen attacks (a sure sign of a lack real argumentation) on old boomers like me do nothing to advance your case.
Noah, I would not deny that there are, among Williams students, some extraordinary intellects. I am not speaking about all Williams students. Rather – and I base this on my own experience with some very unintellectual students (no, Aidan, not intellectual in some other form, but just straight out slackers) and from conversations with some remarkably bright and accomplished students who sit in my office and complain about "Williams culture" – I am pointing to an anti-intellectual strand of student culture that seems to loom fairly large here. Perhaps this has not been your experience. Let's chat in April of 07…
Aidan says:
constructive? I've been questioning the terms on which this debate is being framed. I think, and this is unfortunate, that Williams can become socially ossified, once defined groups of friends occur it takes a lot of effort to get outside them. Partly, this is a function of workload, partly a function of getting tracked so aggressively.
To put it another way, and this stems partly from a recent interaction from '08 potentials, everyone is so damn pre-professional in this world. Nobody's got a love for biology, for example, everyone's curious whether Williams has a good enough med school admission rate. Everyone's worried about double majors–do I look like a slacker with just one?
I feel uncomfortable with larger cultural arguments. I think the simple fact is, many students here (and read the latest, Bowdoin centered lament on the stressed-out student) are in a huge hurry to get somewhere–grad school, Putnam, Goldman, law school, Teach for America, whatever. The type of type-A that Williams gets is very focused, not likely to branch out.
Which leaves us where? There's a joy you get from athletes, a robust physical investment, a healthy focus on the present, that serves as a great counterweight to a college population too interested in 5 years from now. There are different perspectives, there are different goals.
And so, I don't think my comparison of athletics and affirmative action is "specious," as Prof. Crane suggests, but rather appositive. Both classes of student, after all, are let in for explicitly non-academic reasons, whether white guilt or the necessity of a good football team. Both classes of student can be critiqued for precisely the same reasons: contribution to culture, GPA, insular identity, failure to participate in larger campus concerns.
More than rectifying the sins of the fathers, I think the best reason for affirmative action is to achieve a diversity (oh no!) of viewpoints. International students, minority students, athletes, art students, all individuals who are "bucking the trend" of J.Crew suburban whiteness here are precisely valuable because of their different valuations.
I'm not saying that tips are bad, or affirmative action is bad, or that this college is bad, but I'm saying that before we start throwing bricks at "campus culture" or Vitz proving by resort to "I know 3-5 kids who don't do any work" that we think more carefully about what we want, and what we have.
To put it another way, Williams is a very hands-off place. There's no hand-holding here, this college is going to be what you make of it, your friends are going to be who you deserve, your interactions are going to be what you seek. In general, Williams kids like to complain. If we really didn't like campus culture, we might try making new friends or doing something different, or getting out of our rut, or (more shocking yet) actually talking to the Hockey team member we have long wished to think a moron, and maybe (even more shocking yet) discovering him to be a smart, articulate, focused individual.
Stranger things have happened. I think we all deserve to give eachother the benefit of the doubt.
ravenastro says:
Aidan, you say:
"I think the value of identity studies should be actively questioned: I find it troubling that many students come to Williams only to major in themselves, as it were. In many of these departments there's a emphasis on ideology and a paucity of facts–it is not unreasonable to say the only identity tradition that is critically studied is the western one."
Why do you think that ethnominorities go to Williams just to study themselves? I think that this is a huge logical fallacy.
Firstly, I want to know if you would you criticize an Irish American for studying the history of Ireland or the immigration narratives of Irish Americans? Or someone of French descent taking French language, literature and culture courses at Williams?
Secondly, the idea that an African American, Asian American, or American Indian student would want to come to Williams to focus on Ethnic Studies is laughable because there is a paucity of those courses. Go check out the course catalog to see what I mean – and yes, there is a difference between African Studies and African American Studies. Btw, all of these fields are critically studied – and I don't know how you can claim otherwise.
Lastly, suppose that a Chinese American student decides to go to Williams to study Asian Studies, and winds up studying the Japanese language. I am not sure how that is really studying "yourself" but surely you have some broad sweeping generalization in response. And just because this student majors in Asian Studies doesn't mean that s/he doesn't take any courses on Shakespeare or have any other interests.
Like I said, the relative paucity of courses really precludes one from studying oneself. Unless it's navel-gazing, which you also seem to do quite well.
Sam Crane says:
Aidan, I am happy to say that I have found something we can agree on: Williams is too instrumentalist (pre-professional). I suspect this is a much larger issue than sports and tips. Maybe you should start a new post on it…
Jeff Zeeman says:
Aidan's ad hominen attacks and generally unhelpful level of vitriol notwithstanding, I do think there is something to be said for linking affirmative action and athletic admissions policies in a single discussion, if only to expose the hypocrisy of those who favor affirmative action. One of the most unpleasant experiences I had at Williams was sitting on the Committee on Diversity and Community. One particular discussion was illuminating: the largely white liberal-guilt laden faculty on the committee were discussing why black and latino students on the average had lower gpa's than their peers at Williams. A variety of theories were offered: hostile culture, no institutional support, etc. Not a single person stated the obvious: that the qualifications, on the average, of certain ethnic groups admitted to Williams is lower than others all other factors being equal, so of course, their predicted gpa performance would likewise be lower. But even if folks (like I was) were thinking it (and they must have been, given the obviousness of the conclusion), they would be afraid to state it.
Yet, folks have no problem, rightly or wrongly, demonizing athletes. (By the way, I am all for Williams doing everything in its power to attract truly disadvantaged minorities from the inner city or rural Texas or whatnot; but many black and latino students at Williams, I'd venture to guess the majority, did not directly experience in any material degree the discrimination alluded to Prof. Crane, but rather game from wealthy, professional, two-parent homes. I certainly wouldn't say that I had any disadvantage because Jews who are related to me by blood, but who I never met, were killed in the Holocaust, or the Inquisition. If we get into historical grievance type appeals as Crane seems to suggest, there is just no way to draw a consistent line — if I can prove my grandfather was a slave, do I get preference? what if someone called my Italian great-uncle an ethnic slur? It borders on the ridiculous. The point is, we live today in a society of equal opportunity. For those facing socio-economic hardships, it is very easy to take that into account with blindly relying on invidious racial assumptions and classifications.)
At least athletes, unlike legacies or minorities, have earned their spots on based on talent, hard work, and merit — maybe not the sort of talent everyone would like to see, but real talent nonetheless.
This debate reminds me of one common on campus at UChicago when I was a grad student: the school was trying to change its image to attract more normal, less geeky applicants. Many of the current students were repulsed by this idea, because they had chosen Chicago exactly because it filled a niche in higher education, and why should it change to be just another Yale or UPenn or something. Similarly, Williams fills a niche: an outstanding liberal arts schools filled with well-rounded, generally down to earth, achievers who excel at athletics, academics, the arts, and other arenas, but are not necessarily purely academic superstars. The athletic / outdoorsy culture is part of what distinguishes Williams from its peers: if students don't like that, they can go to Pomona or Swarthmore. But I agree with the article put forth by Scott: I do think that having a big athletic / outdoorsy culture dampens some of the self-importance, pretention, lack of perspective on regular Americans, and overly intellectual self-perception that I thought ran rampant at UChicago and some other institutions that had deemphasized physical or artistic pursuits in favor of the pure life of the mind. That's part of what attracted me to Williams in the first place, and part of why all my closest friends went there: everyone I know is equally comfortable debating politics and literature, or obsessing over fantasy sports teams, or getting drunk, or appreciating modern art. Now, is that to say Williams should admit a superstar football player who is not a stand out in some other department, or at least is not a solid, engaged student (perhaps not top of the class, but top twenty percent with 1200's, which is the kind of kid who gets tipped)? I don't think so, and I think and hope the school generally does not. But, I think that as Mr. Scott comments, diversity of perspectives is actually enhanced by having students with a fierce athletic focus, because the student body and culture is thereby more representative of regular Americans who don't sit on their asses and think all day. If folks don't like this, if they want a more cloistered, intellectual, high-brow academic environment, they can vote with their feet. But why try to aim for the broad middle and be just like any number of other liberal arts schools when Williams can claim a unique niche: as good as any liberal arts school in the country in three arenas: academics, sports, and the arts. Plus, crucially, I won't be able to give nearly as much shit to my Amherst acquaintances after we kick their ass in football and basketball. :)
Kevin Koernig '05 says:
One question that I've been wondering about while reading this whole debate, what is wrong with our current system? Right now, Williams is number one in both academics and athletics in its respective groupings. That may be the first time that has ever happened. How could we improve upon that? We have a system in place that allows us to be a top academic institution, ahead of schools devoted strongly to academics like Swarthmore, and a top athletic institution, ahead of schools with much lower standards which are able to recruit and attract a lot more high-quality athletes than we are. I'm just wondering how we can improve on being number one.
Indeed, the question becomes why should Williams want to be like another school such as Swarthmore or Middlebury. Swarthmore, from my impressions of it, only has an academic culture. There is no passion for athletics at all, and some sports teams have even been disbanded. That's okay if your only interest is academics, but it only gives students the best of one world. Middlebury, meanwhile, seems to me to be kind of like Williams except not quite as good. They have good academics and good athletics, compared to Williams's great academics and great athletics. This may just be my personal bias, but here at Williams we have a school that has the best of both worlds, which then gives many more options to students. Why change the system and move Williams from being the top liberal arts college in both academics and athletics to being still the top academics college but only marginally successful at athletics.
The only real complaint against the influence of athletics at Williams seems to be the vague contention that they help institute an anti-intellectual culture. This contention seems to be strongest among professors, as expressed by Prof. Crane. It is very incorrect for a number of reasons.
First of all, the comparison that Prof. Crane makes is between a culture of "intellectual curiosity" and that of "beer pong and the keg line." If you are trying to avoid a culture based on beer pong and kegs, you should probably avoid college. The simple fact is that when you get a bunch of young people together in an environment with few responsibilities or consequences, you are going to get a lot of drinking. That's just the way things are, and it is not at all a component of athletics teams. Do teams play a role in the social scene at college? Of course, just like any other social organization (like fraternities and housing/entry groups). But anyone who wants to contend that athletic teams are the key to the social situation at Williams would need to explain why fraternities are a much more powerful force than athletics in the social scenes of colleges that have them, much as they were back when they existed here at Williams. I would also argue that club sports, which don't have tips or any of the other major trappings of varsity sports being discussed here, are a much more entrenched in the party/alcohol culture than varsity teams.
So it seems odd to me to blame athletics for the campus culture. Oren Cass has another strong argument on this subject (as well as many other ones on the larger issue of athletics and tips) at his blog. Oren's basic point is that it is illogical to believe that tips, which make up at most 66 out of 500+ students in a class, can control campus culture to such an extent. Indeed, tips are even the vast minority within the teams themselves. Using the 33% of students play varsity athletics number from the report (I had heard 40%, but that might include JV/club athletics), there are about 660 varsity athletes at Williams. Assuming perfect matriculation of all 66 tips each year, only 264 of them are tips. Thus tips are a minority even among athletes, and though they might have a disproportionate influence based on their playing ability, it seems quite a stretch to put 264 students in control of the culture of 2000. That is even allowing the assumption that someone who plays football will desire the same social scene as someone who runs cross country, merely because they are both athletes.
On to the broader issue of whether anti-intellectualism exists here, well, I suppose part of the problem is in how you define it. Personally, I like to consider myself an intellectual. At the same time, if the standard Williams student at all resembled what Prof. Edmundson or, by implication, Prof. Crane desire, I would be quite frightened. The idea seems to be that students should be intellectual for the sake of intellectualism, not necessarily because they get anything else of value from the learning. That's perfectly fine for college professors, for whom being intellectual is a career, but most students are planning on doing something else with their lives. They want to learn not because they desire knowledge so much, though many do, but because they need that knowledge as a foundation for becoming an I-banker, lawyer, doctor, writer, or whatever. I'm not entirely sure what is wrong with these people placing the value of reading great works of literature in their ability to "divert, entertain, and interest."
(d)avid wrote that the debate is between "Investment bankers conversant in Shakespeare [versus] Shakespeare scholars with few investments." This may largely be an accurate portrayal of the debate, at least as far as Prof. Crane seems to portray it. My question would be why this is a zero-sum game. Surely it is possible to have a school that produces both. And, at $38,100 per year, I would certainly not want to suggest to any student that there is only one appropriate course and reason for learning. Some students may want to spend that much money and four years of their life learning for the sake of learning. Others might hope that after that much investment of time and effort they come out in a competitive position to gain the job or future that they wanted. For me, Williams has always been a college that allowed students to pursue either path. It is a place full of intelligent students who don't wear their GPAs or intellectual pretensions on their sleeves. It has plenty of room for students both interested in purely learning and encountering a subject, and for those who wanted to learn about something for some more utilitarian purpose.
As for complaints about this school being too "instrumentalist," what else should it be? You do not need to pay $38,100 to learn and be intellectual. You only really need a library card. Many students decide to attend Williams with a future career in mind. They choose Williams because they believe that a Williams education will best prepare them for that career, and for life in general. Why is that an example of anti-intellectualism? Why is the "slower, more contemplative life" the only one worth living?
When I came to Williams, I had a pretty strong idea that I wanted to be a veterinarian. I chose Williams because it seemed like a good place to live and learn for four years while I got the education needed to take the next step into veterinary school. Part of this education involved taking classes that I had little real interest in, like organic chemistry. And I admit that I probably did not apply myself fully in that class, as my only real interest was in learning what I needed to learn from it and moving on. At the same time, I've taken some courses that have no bearing on my future at all. For example, I took an English course on the Poetry of Milton largely out of a desire to read Paradise Lost. I'm also planning on doing a history thesis next year, because even though the thesis will do very little to prepare me for my future I think it will be an enjoyable experience exploring a topic I am passionate about. Williams has been great for me because I have been able to do both, and even without sitting around a common room late at night discussing how Freud presents a complexly tragic view of life, I have gotten a great education here. By graduation, I will be full of information both about the subjects I need to know to be veterinarians and a whole lot of other stuff that will be essentially useless in my future life but was quite enjoyable to learn.
An important part of my Williams education has been my participation on the Swimming team. I have probably learned more about myself and the proper way to lead my life from only one year of swimming than from the two and a half years of classes I have had so far. This is not an indictment of my professors, merely an explanation of just how much an individual can learn through athletics. You really find out both who you are and who you can be when you have to wake up at 6:00am in -25 degree weather to go off to the first practice of the day, or when you are heading in to the last 50 of a 1650 with your muscles on fire, a kid from Amherst right next to you, and your teammates jumping up and down on the side of the pool deck trying to will you back to that wall. My experience with Williams would have been incomplete without the athletic component. Without swimming, I would have come out of Williams with less of an education.
That is why it is so unfortunate to me that I cannot readily wear Williams Swimming clothing around campus for fear of a professor taking one look at it and deciding that I am anti-intellectual. It is wrong that I am pushed to deny an important part of my Williams education because some professors have decided that it does not fit in with their vision of intellectualism. If you wanted my opinion, however, the real anti-intellectual trend at Williams comes from such professors, who have apparently already decided that there is only one right way and reason to learn, and that they alone hold the key to education.
Wow, that was long. The end morale is, if it's not broke, don't fix it. As Jeff just pointed out, Williams is a pretty special place and quite a lot of students choose to come here because of its unique quality. I would hate to see that quality disrupted in a way that would make Williams just another college, rather than an institution were a future I-banker, a jock, and a future art museum curator can have a high quality education at one of the finest colleges, by any metric, in the world.
(d)avid says:
While I whole heartedly agree with Aidan that diversity for diversity's sake is a good thing on a college campus, is all diversity created equally? No one would suggest that Williams should admit racists just to get that viewpoint on campus. Nor would anyone propose a quota for role game players or flugelhornists or ballroom dancers. One can make a strong argument that foreign students and the 50 state quota (a policy I benefited from) enhance the diversity of viewpoints on campus. Since we live in a racialized society, minority students can offer a viewpoint majority students may not otherwise encounter [Note #1: The argument has nothing to do with historic inequities and persecution; Note #2: The argument probably even applies to minority candidates whose parents are well to do.] Economic inequality also strongly shapes our society and proponents of diversity could make a strong argument for a diversity of economic backgrounds on the college campus. Aidan, what the compelling diversity argument on behalf of those who can throw a football accurately? Is our society so stratafied by sports that athletes have a different perspective that ought to be heard on a college campus? [Note: If so, that would run counter to the argument that athletes are just like all other students.]
But the argument is NOT strictly about athletes and athletics. I don't think the faculty are proposing disbanding the football team (though, I am sure there are a few who would favor such a move). The question is why athletics are given priority. The college has 500 slots per year to fill. Sports teams receive 32 "protects" and 66 "tips" — 98 slots assigned to athletes, almost 20% of an entering class. No other "social" group receives such preferential treatment.
And the admissions process is preferential. The admissions committee gives each applicant a rating 1 through 9 (in some mysterious way).
1's are always admitted. 65% of 2's are admitted. The average non-athlete had a rating of 2.8 in 2000. According to the Report on Varsity Athletics, 75% of admitted athletes have scores between 3 and 7. That is, three quarters of the athletes were deemed below average by the admissions committee. While the overall distribution of athletes is not available, we can take hints from Coach Barnard's very informative and well argued essay. He proposes 20 tips for applicants with a score of 7 and 40 tips for students given a 5 or 6. I assume his proposal does not differ markedly from the status quo (in fact, he implies that he is offering a compromise). Since Williams will not admit 8's and 9's, Barnard is proposing 5% of the class be composed of the least academically qualified individuals because they can play a sport well (15% if you count the 5's and 6's).
But there are already athletes on campus with higher admission grades. Where is the compelling case for diversity to admit the 7's? How about the 5's and 6's? There are many other athletes admitted in the class.
Is the diversity you are seeking that of the mediocre. The argument seems akin to Roman Hruska's support for Harrold Carswell's Supreme Court nomination, "Even if he is mediocre there are a lot of mediocre judges and people and lawyers. They are entitled to a little representation, aren't they, and a little chance? We can't have all Brandeises, Cardozos, and Frankfurters and stuff like that there."
Aidan says:
reading Barnard's essay, if the lowest we go is Ivy-league quality, how low is that, exactly?
(d)avid says:
I'm not sure I understand: "reading Barnard's essay, if the lowest we go is Ivy-league quality, how low is that, exactly?"
From reading Barnard's essay, I garnered the following facts:
a) Legacies now need at least a 1400 SAT score to be admitted;
b) The lowest athletic admits can have SATs in the range of 1150-1250. These low-banders are two standard deviations below the mean (i.e., the bottom 2.5% of class with regards to SAT) and consistute 30% of recruited football players.
I take this to mean that tipped athletes are far below the standard bar that students must cross to be admitted. He provides anecdotes about students that turned down Williams and enrolled in an Ivy or even a few that the admissions department rejected and enrolled elsewhere. I wouldn't put too much stock in these stories — isolated incidents don't add up to broader trends. Besides, if he can't get aggregate data from the admissions offices of those schools, I would be dubious of the stories about specific students (which an office could never comment upon).
What I found extremely disturbing is that Barnard certainly implies that the admission department's grading is based almost entirely upon SAT scores. If that is true, then I am extremely disappointed. SATs measure something and that something may be correlated with intellect, but there are certainly other measures of ability that should be considered.
Kevin Koernig '05 says:
First, on the (d)avid's most recent analysis of the numbers, it is important to remember that statistics are like a bikini, what they show is revealing but what they leave hidden is pretty important. For example, it is true to say that 75% of athletes were below the average academic rating for admission, and that seems pretty damning. However, at the same time 50% of non-athletes were below the average academic rating. So obviously the admissions officials are looking at more than just academic rating when they decide whom to admit. It is also disingenuous, as Barnard points out in his essay, to include protects in a count of the students admitted principally because of athletics. These students are all academically qualified for admission. The SAT range to fall into this category, according to Barnard, is 1450-1520. The average SAT score of those admitted to the class of 2008 was 1442. So these athletes, unlike 50% of the non-athletes admitted, are actually above average. The only thing that differentiates them from any other student admitted for academic reasons is that a coach has identified them as possessing good athletic ability and being able to contribute to a varsity sport. One other thing worth noting is that there are about 1000 students admitted each year (1049 this year) in the attempt to yield a class of 540 or so. So tips only make up about 6-7% of those offered admission, not 20%.
The larger issue though is that admissions to Williams, or pretty much any other college at this level, is not based on qualifications. Qualifications play a role, but if Williams were just interested in admitting to top academic students it would just take every 1, then every 2, and so on until it filled its quota. It obviously does not do this even removing athletics from the picture. That is because the admissions office is principally looking at applicants based on what they can contribute to the college. Mostly they tend to admit people who can contribute academically, which is why they admit so many ones and twos. A number of other contributions come into effect, which is why the application covers much more information than just GPA, course list, and SAT scores. Many students do not have quite the academic qualifications to get in, but are admitted because of extracurriculars, leadership ability, or artistic ability, among others.
The 66 tips make a very clear contribution to this school. They are largely the reason that our athletic teams perform at the high level that they do. Now, the excellent coaches we have here as well as the other non-tip athletes who work very hard at their sports play an important role. But the tips are crucial for moving us from having mediocre, .500 level teams that consider Wesleyan huge competition and fight for 8th place in the NESCACs to teams that can compete with any other teams in Division 3. This is the crucial difference in making the Williams athletic experience, and thus the Williams experience as a whole, so much more powerful for all athletes at this school. 66 tips seem a low price to pay to make this school a place where a student can get the highest level of both academics and athletics.
Sam Crane says:
Why is it important that we "compete with any other teams in Div III"? If athletics have any importance at Williams, it would seem to me to be a matter of what they do for individuals who compete (sound mind, sound body and all that). Whether we can beat schools from New Jersey or Wisconsin (full disclosure: I am a Badger), seems wholly immaterial to the mission of the college. We do not need to win at sports to be a great liberal arts college. (Please note: I am not anti-sports, just anti-obssession-with-sports-to-such-a-degree-that-it-undermines-the-academic-mission-of-the-college). We do not need tips to do what we do best here. Tips simiply allow us to beat other teams. And, on the downside, they keep "walk-ons" from attaining the full benefits of the athletic experience (or so some have argued here). Let's just chop them in half to start, and go from there….
Kevin Koernig '05 says:
Prof. Crane, the problem with that view is that you misunderstand where a major part of the value lies in athletics. It is not about mere physical activity, nor about just being part of a team. Those things are factors, and they provide benefits, but the true value of athletics comes from accomplishing a goal. That goal is to win whatever competition the team happens to be involved in. Being successful as an athlete and a member of a team therefore depends to a large degree on winning. Like any collaborative effort, much more value comes from the group coming together to accomplish its goals than from failure.
There is a reason why so many Williams athletes are so passionate about their experiences on teams here at Williams. There is also a reason why that passion does not exist at places like Swarthmore, where they have little qualms about simply disbanding major teams. Personally, I have seen the difference coming from a high school team that was not as successful amongst its competition as Williams is. Being on that team was a good experience, but being on the team here at Williams has simply been incredible. There is a huge difference between being on a team that does okay, but is not extraordinary and being on a team that leads the pack and is able to constantly raise its level of competition and accomplish its goals. Being at Williams, where all of our teams can be successful both within the conference and NCAA's each year is simply an amazing experience for an athlete.
In fact, the closest parallel is actually to the academic experience at Williams. You seem to want Williams to only have the most qualified students and teachers in its classrooms. Is that not because they can reach a higher level of academic accomplishment than just a mediocre class? Presumably, this high level of accomplishment is important to what we do here. The higher level of discussion, writing, and other efforts resultant from having excellent students in our classrooms leads to a higher level of education. On the same token, the higher level of performance and teamwork of having excellent athletes on our team raises the level of the athletic experience. That experience is directly about things like character, teamwork, and commitment. I had thought that the liberal arts philosophy was about educating and shaping individuals as much as it was about learning information in a classroom. And athletics is a huge tool towards educating and shaping individuals. It becomes much less of a tool when we let our teams fade into mediocrity.
Falling back on my own experience, being on the swim team here has been an important part of my Williams education. If the team were less than it is, my Williams education would be less.
(d)avid says:
Kevin, I think you are arguing against a strawman. Williams has already decided not to compete at the highest level of athletics. We do not offer athletic scholarships of any sort. Even the worst Division I teams would pound Williams in pretty much every single sport. The primary goal of Williams is to educate and athletics does play a role in that process, but it is clearly secondary (or even tertiary).
The question is why does the college admit those 20 students whose admission scores were 7's (i.e., the least qualified of the possible admittees)? Why admit a set of people who are not academically inclined or able? Just as Brian Bosworth and his uzi toting antics don't belong at Williams (though he would have made the football team a force of nature), perhaps those handful of individuals earning a GPA around 2.3 don't belong on campus (earning a C means you screwed up — averaging a C is inexcusable). Who benefits from bringing in the equivalent of "hired guns"?
The faculty and alumni like winning teams, all things being equal. However, they also worry that the college's primary mission (creating a rich academic atmosphere) is being sacrificed for the purpose winning a few extra games by admitting a handful of students indisposed and/or incapable of performing well academically.
So, what is the defense for the 20 people (4% of a class) who score a 7 on the admissions scale?
Aidan says:
David Kane says:
Kevin writes "And athletics is a huge tool towards educating and shaping individuals. It becomes much less of a tool when we let our teams fade into mediocrity."
While I agree with much of what Kevin has written in this thread, I have serious doubts about this statement. I played on a squash team that could fairly be described as mediocre. But we tried as hard as Kevin and his teammates try today. We practiced as diligently and learned as much about ourselves. My varsity athletic experience was to me, I am sure, as important a part of my time at Williams as Kevin's is to him.
Mediocre teams and mediocre players get virtually as much out of their athletic experience at Williams as good teams and good players. One difference, though, is that mediocre teams have more room for walk-ons like me.
Jeff Zeeman says:
I agree with David N. that truly egregious examples, except under unusual circumstances, of stretching for athletes should be avoided. More on one way to counter this later. However, I don't think it's true that medicore athletes get the same out of competing as stellar athletes. Those stellar athletes have likely invested more of themselves in their identity as good athletes, and almost definitely devoted more hours to practice and to the gym on average. I think if you polled the basketball team at Williams, who got to play in two final fours and against the Globetrotters and Holy Cross, versus that at Bates, a very solid team regionally, the Williams players would have gotten a lot more out of their athletic experience, both in terms of commitment and energy invested and the end results and attention received. While that is the most stark example, I'd say to a lesser extent the same holds true with the soccer players who got to play with two future MLS'ers, or the football team who got to play in some truly memorable games wiht Amherst and complete an undefeated season, or the tennis teams who won national titles, etc. I mean, by DK's logic, why not admit merely a pretty good poly sci prospect, because they'd probably get more in some cases out of a Williams experience and lectures and personal attention from professors than a true poly sci superstar, who would probably be motivated and talented enough to read and understand all the relevant texts and pursue high level research at whatever institution they attended, and would not benefit from Williams' unique advantages? Why not have just so-so artists and singers and musicians, because they get as much out of taking part in the Berkshire Symphony or Cap and Bells as someone who has spent 20 years practicing to be at an elite level? I just think there is a qualitative difference — the best athletes put the most in, both in terms of time and emotional investment, so they are likely to get the most out, particularly when they get a chance to play in highly charged NESCAC tourney and NCAA atmospheres.
The real problem as I see it is the three sports, out of 37 who, according to the study posted on the site, account for the vast bulk of academic performance differential. Especially considering that football (surely one of the three) doesn't qualify for the NCAA's (and if NESCAC teams did, outside of the 1996 Williams era they would certainly get slaughtered), and that is the team that gets about 20-25 percent of the tips total and probably most of the academic 6's and 7's, I think the NESCAC schools should in particular self-regulate their football teams. Or even just the little 3: if we could assure that we maintain competitive balance with amherst and wesleyan in football, as has basically been the case i the last five years, would anyone really notice a slight decline in the overall talent level of the football program (as opposed to the basketall program, which plays a national schedule and, in any event, is much, much smaller campus presence). If Williams were to leave hockey excellence to Midd and the Maine schools (with whom Williams can't really compete due to their lack of SAT requirement, hockey-centric culture, and proximity to Canada) and work with other NESCAC schools to prevent huge reaches for football prospects while maintaining competive balance, I think that performance of athletes and non-athletes would correspond at an acceptable member for most on campus.
(d)avid says:
Aidan, what is the diversity argument? Why does an athlete who admissions gave a 6 or 7 have a radically different perspective to offer than an athlete who was rated a 4 or 5? Is academic disinterest or inability a valuable viewpoint to have at a liberal arts college? Given that such a high percentage of students already play a varsity sport, what is the diversity argument for those athletes who distinguish themselves by low test scores, lackluster grades, and poor essays?
I can say that it is much more fun to play a sport with teammates who excel at what they do. The statement is true at every level of competition. However, forming excellent sports teams is not the point of Williams — otherwise it would form minor league sports teams or go Div I. Sports play a role in shaping the campus and college experience, but it has to be balanced by other pedagogical aims. The faculty (and all those alumni across the country asking Morty questions) are arguing that sports are currently given more weight than is healthy at a liberal arts college.
I like Zeeman's suggestion for altering the system to mollify professors and end the most worst cases (which sadly aren't exceptions — 7's constitute 20 tips a year). His analysis of the football team brings several relevant points (a: it constitutes the largest number of tips; b: the football team plays only schools facing the same balancing act of academics verses athletics.). Zeeman for President.
Sam Crane says:
I think we learn more from losing than from winning…
Kevin Koernig '05 says:
I do not think I am offering a straw man about athletics any more than everyone who comments on how we need to keep our academics high is offering a straw man in that regard. Williams can't necessarily compare with every college out there academically. By choosing to be a liberal arts college, it is offering a different academic experience, but one that will surely fail in direct comparison in some areas. For example, our science departments may be wonderful, but they cannot compete with a place like MIT in terms of size, resources, and depth. Our academic excellence is not based on being the single best academic institution on the planet. It is based on being the single best liberal arts college on the planet. That is a crucial distinction. The faculty, administration, and trustees at Williams have decided that the liberal arts style is the best way for Williams to educate students. So they have pursued certain choices, such as small size, emphasis on teaching among faculty, much more pure academics than specific job-training, diversity of study rather than depth in one area, lack of a significant graduate program, and so on, which make it impossible to compare Williams to a Harvard, or an MIT, or any similar university. So what we focus on is making Williams the best liberal arts college around, because we believe in the liberal arts focus and think that that will allow Williams to offer the best education.
Athletics are similar. We want to have the best athletics program for a small, liberal arts school. That is why we are in Division III, with its many restrictions, rather than Division I. In our liberal arts education, we focus on offering the best academics possible under specific conditions. The same is true for our athletics. We are attempting to create the best athletic program for a liberal arts college. It is therefore not correct to compare our athletic program to those of division I, although we perform much better against the lower-end division I schools than (d)avid suggests. In the division I schools, athletes are there largely to be athletes. Here, athletes are hear to be educated, and having an excellent athletic program plays a role in that education.
Another analogy is to the arts here at Williams. We cannot compete with conservatories like Juliard in terms of arts. But in those schools, students are there just to be artists. By doing what we can to offer the best artistic program of a liberal arts college, we hope to offer a different, and arguably better, path. Our art program may not compare to those of more specific art schools, but they are better than other liberal arts colleges. Thus we have an environment of artistic excellence that aids our academic excellence.
This is what our athletics program does. We maintain its level of excellence through tips, but these are not horribly out of line with our academic goals as everyone seems to suggest. The low-band, 7 rated recruits have SAT scores of 1150-1250 and from what I understand are in the top 20% of their high school classes. These are not high numbers, nor are they horribly low. They are actually pretty well above the average for the nation, and these students would be academic superstars on many successful division I teams. We let in about 10 of those a year, not 20, and apparently that number keeps shrinking for Williams while rising for every other school. And that is fine with me. If we can find a way to maintain our athletic excellence while increasing our academic standards for admission, that would be great. I just think it would be bad if we lost a vital component of our community, something that makes Williams a great and unique college rather than just part of the crowd, so that we could raise our average class SAT score by 2 to 3 points (which is what would happen by my admittedly simplistic calculations if we moved the SAT scores of the 10 low-band athletes from their 1150-1250 range up to the current incoming class average of 1400-1500).
As for why academic excellence matters, I would submit that David is wrong about the benefits of being on an excellent sports team. Here I can best fall back on my own experiences. On my more mediocre team in high school, I had a great experience. I even probably thought at the time that that was as good as an athletic experience could be. Then I came to Williams, and being on the swim team here is simply on another level. My high school experience was good, but my Williams experience has been incredible. My high school team happened to be similar to Williams in having excellent coaching, so that can't be the deciding factor. My high school team was, however, largely filled with the kids that the Williams teams would have were it not for things like tips. Because of that, we won some and we lost some, but we were never that successful of a team, and thus the whole athletic experience became much more tangential.
Meanwhile, the connection of Williams alums to their past sports teams is amazing. Every year we get letters from past swimmers telling us about how proud we should be to be part of the Williams Swimming tradition. That tradition is about being the best, about turning a collection of individuals into a team that dominates the pool and accomplishes its goals. Without that level of excellence, being on the Williams swim team would have been a good experience, but it would not have been the incredible experience so many have found it to be. I don't believe that we should lose this level of excellence for a marginal gain in academic excellence, moving from being a school with excellent athletics and academics to a school with mediocre athletics and possibly slightly more excellent academics.
Another problem is that mediocrity tends to yield mediocrity. Teams fighting to win the NESCACs every year will be very motivated. Teams that don't win all that often will not. High quality players and coaches will not come to Williams if our athletic program is mediocre. And much of the benefit to having an athletic program for the "walk-ons" that everybody likes so much and in whose ranks I number is from having these great coaches. When Coach Samuelson retired and the coaching job for the Williams swim team opened up, there were many applications from many high quality coaches, even those at other pretty good programs. They all recognized that the Williams team was a very good team and would be a great place to coach. Because of this, we ended up with the amazing coach we have today. Many other teams also have very good coaches. Would these coaches come here and stick around if they got no support from the college and were faced with mediocrity year after year?
So, in the end I agree that we need to find a good compromise here. I just think we already have that balance in place. As coach Barnard's report makes clear, Williams does a lot more with a lot less than any other school. Because of this, we have achieved excellence in every facet of our college, a very important thing for a liberal arts institution. Yet we are supposed to turn away from this excellence in an important part of our college? I just can't follow logic that will make any aspect of Williams mediocre.
Two brief final points. First, one thing that is important to remember when discussing athletics and college is that athletics are not some secondary (or tertirary) thing attached to colleges from the outside at some point in their history. Modern organized sports in large part arose from within elite colleges in America. Athletics is not, nor has it ever been, something that was just tacked on separated from the educational mission of the college.
Second, if we are going to follow the philosophy that you learn more from losing than winning, as Prof. Crane suggests, then would that not have far larger and graver consequences for our academic program than our athletic one?
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This year, send them back to school with everything they need for an eco friendly, sustainable school year!
It's time for Back to School!
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Back to School - Get to the point
1. If your kids are like mine, pencils that have lost their points are doomed to spend the rest of the year in the bottom of their school bags. Ensure that they always have a fresh point and support the future of our planet with No-click Mechanical Pencils. The writing point automatically drops down as needed! Made from recycled paper, these are definetly eco-friendly!
If classic pencils are more to your liking, have no fear! We also offer a tube of 60 pencils, each made of recycled paper and rubber.
Use Your Back to School Resources Wisely
As you read over your child's list from his/her teacher, place a check mark beside any item that you already have or can re-use from last year. Not all items have to be purchased brand new at the start of each school year. Using our resources wisely is a lesson every student should learn. Using items we already have is better for our environment and our wallets.
Challenge your kids to see who can purchase the least amount of new items and still fulfill all requests on their class lists.
Color Your World for Back To School
2. Crayons are a staple of any young student's backpack and often need to be replaced. You can feel good about using these crayons that boast vibrant colors with an eco-twist. They come in a variety of shapes – stars, sticks, worms, and transportation – to appeal to even the pickiest scholar and all are recycled.
For your preschooler, the Kitty Egg Recycled Crayons are the perfect size for smaller hands.
"Reuse" - An Eco Mantra
Do your kids pack a lunch each day? If so, there is an easy eco-change that can be made. Simply trade out your plastic baggies and paper lunch bags for reusable containers. Sandwiches will remain un-squished in a container and snack items will remain fresher. Perk up the traditional lunch bag by reusing small gift bags.
Sweet Eco-Treats for Back to School
3. Commemorate the first day of school for your little professors with an extra special treat in their lunchboxes! Gourmet cookies in the shape of a classic school bus are sure to make the first day a little sweeter. They can even be personalized! Packaged in recycled materials and created in a nut-free and certified organic facility, you can feel good about giving and enjoying these yummy snacks.
If this year marks a special year, such as the first year of Kindergarten, celebrate with the whole class by giving these delicious and super cute treats.
Plantable Love
4. Lastly, don't forget to send them off with a note from you in their lunch, written on plantable postcards. The colorful cards have wildflower seeds embedded in them. Simply write, deliver, and then plant!
All of us here at EcoPartyTime wish you a sustainable school year!

subset: commoncrawl


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Leopardi Apartment
Tuscany - Florence
Florence never ceases to amaze. As Stendhal once said, it is the town of subtle allure, where the importance of its most famous masterpieces never decreases. It has provided inspiration for poets and artists and continues to amaze for the gentle beauty of its views.
Number of beds: 4
Bedrooms: 2
ADSL Wi-Fi Internet
Air Conditioning
City Views
Daily cleaning
DVD Player
Hi-FI System
Satellite TV
Washing machine
* Please note: the included amenities may vary according to final agreement, make sure to check your contract for complete list.
Florence Airport 6,7 km San Gimignano 52,7 km Lucca 74,0 km Siena 75,6 km Arezzo 78,2 km Pisa 85,7 km
Search for your villa in Italy
Leopardi Apartment - Florence
2 Bedrooms (1 double, 1 twin)
Palazzo Lungarno is situated on the south side of the river Arno. On one side, it overlooks Via de' Bardi, and on the other it enjoys spectacular, if not unique, views over the Ponte Vecchio, the Uffizi Gallery and the Cathedral. The building's original structure dates back to the 15th century, when a myriad of little cobbled roads branched off from the Ponte Vecchio into the Oltrarno, one of the city's most charming and typical quarters.
Leopardi Apartment Description (77 sq. m. - sleeps 4)
One enters Leopardi apartment, on the 1st floor of Palazzo Lungarno, through a gracious entry hall furnished with a round wood table, a wood console, and a linen closet whose door has a wonderful painting of a vase of plants. The entry hall opens on to the living room furnished with a three-seats sofa, a comfortable armchair, a television, a console and a table. The living room connects to the master bedroom complete with private bathroom and walk-in closet. Both the living room and the master bedroom share spectacular views of the Arno river.
Features *
1 Master bedroom with bathroom en-suite (shower)
1 Twin bedroom
2 Bathrooms (1 en-suite)
Fully equipped kitchen with 4 ring gas cooker and oven, fridge and refrigerator, American coffee maker, toaster, dishwasher
Laundry area with washing machine and dryer
Hair dryer
Telephone and hi speed Internet connection
Satellite TV
Air conditioning
Doorman and elevator
On request: DVD player, CD player, microwave, answering machine, baby crib, high chair, weekly / daily cleaning
* Please note: the included amenities may vary according to final agreement, make sure to check your contract for complete list.
Please Contact us to verify your dates.


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This is a love story. It spans from the early 1970s to here. But today I will tell only the latest part of it.
It is about my passion for fountain pens. I wrote something earlier here, but today I introduce a new batch.
How they got here is a story of twists and turns.
I suppose the first salient fact is about my right wrist, which I broke in truly spectacular fashion in the early 2000s (see the X-Ray image). This forever changed the way I could hold and guide a pen. The principal difference was that I have to grip a pen higher up than I used to, and I am no longer able to make smaller loops to shape my letters. This gives my chicken scratch the appearance of being the illegible scrawling of a small child.
Tangent: I was a latecomer to online shopping because, as an IT professional, none of the payment methods offered convinced me I couldn't hack them myself. Long story short, I did like the model eBay developed in the 2010s (the earlier incarnations were so bad I wondered whether they were the work of confidence tricksters).
One day last year I tried to buy a Parker fountain pen online, and came across a range of Chinese fountain pens so cheap I thought there was some scam going on. But cheap enough to chance my arm. I ordered two. They took six weeks to get here. They were perfect!
Over the next few months I added on to other online purchases more of the fountain pens by the same Shanghai company. My latest batch, ordered in January, arrived this week.
All of the pens were selected to come with converters, meaning I draw my ink from a bottle rather than using cartridges. They arrived without any frills, in a plastic postage bag to carry the customs declaration, and containing within it only the cellophane-wrapped pen. No bubble wrap or presentation box. The cheapest pen was $3AUD, the most expensive $5AUD!
They are delightful! The ink flows well. The nibs are broad and as I like them. The craftsmanship compares very favourably with the European and American pens, selling for ten to a hundred times as much money. I suspect the Chinese stole the designs from more expensive manufacturers elsewhere in the world. And are able to make them much more cheaply. But if these pens last only a couple of years, they will have been worth the money.
I have been disappointed how badly my much more expensive pens have deteriorated, mostly because Cross, Parker, Shaeffer, and Waterman scrimped on their cheapest parts, making them perish, and undermining the entire utility of their pens within two to five years.
It remains to be seen whether my new flames will last longer and more reliably!
I was so delighted that I also bought a bottle of blue ink from Shanghai. It arrived unbroken and, so far, compares very favourably with ink twice its price here (by 'so far' I mean the test of ink is how it fades over time).
My only disappointment has been that I have not been able to find a pen with a fine enough nib to pass on to a close friend who is a draughtsman, designer, and incomprehensively small handwriter. Not yet. But I will continue to look.


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After each mega contest ends, our team verifies the final leaderboard and fantasy scorecard to announce the results. Your winnings are credited within 2 hours of the announcement of contest results. You can go to "My Winnings" section under "My Profile" tab.
In case you are on the list of winners, but did not receive credit within 2 hours, feel free to write to us at email@example.com


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Each week we tell the story of the week in review using photos from the Fairfax regional newspapers across the NSW Southern Inlands (Boorowa News, Braidwood Times, Cooma Monaro Express, Crookwell Gazette, Goulburn Post, Jindabyne Summit Sun, Southern Highland News, Town and Country Magazine, Yass Tribune and Young Witness).
In addition to the above gallery, we also have links to what those websites have been doing online with the "Rebel Mouse" collection below. What a week it was! We hope you enjoy looking back over it.


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The Prairie That Nature Built
by Marybeth Lorbiecki (Author) and Cathy Morrison (Illustrator)
Booktalk: A wild prairie is a lively place in this rhythmic romp with munchers and crunchers above and below the grasses so thick, and fires that flare, and rains that quench—and always the prairie grows green. Back matter offers information and activities for a fuller appreciation of this marvelous, disappearing habitat.
These are the roots that plunge so deep,
Long and strong, holding water to keep,
Down past the burrows where the prairie pups sleep,
Alongside the critters that worm and squirm
Alive in the dirt so dark and deep
Under the prairie that nature built.
Such long, strong roots can save the day
When rain you want still stays away.
See the book in 3-D by downloading the app.
Two in One!
This week's Poetry Friday Round-up is hosted by TeacherDance.
It's STEM Friday! (STEM is Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics)
Copyright © 2014 Anastasia Suen All Rights Reserved.


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Democratizing Energy Markets
Our main goal is to educate, activate and empower our community to transition off of fossil fuels to clean, renewable energy.
Information is power.
We have been disseminating information through events, classes, workshops and research to get as many community members and decision makers focused on solutions for pieces of the broken energy market. Our motto is 'Citizen Power' because we believe in the power that we have collectively. Check out our programs below and get engaged.
Global Warming Solutions Speaker Series
Clean Energy Action has been creating conversations around cutting edge energy solutions since 2010 through our Global Warming Solutions Speaker Series. We have brought in experts from across the country, as well as tapped into the wealth of knowledge here in the front range to keep this community informed and engaged.
Sustainability by the Numb3rs
Have you ever wondered if a figure you hear in the news or in a presentation is accurate? Like if a claim about how much energy a technology can provide is relevant in the context of the scale of our energy use? Sustainability by the Numb3rs is a free monthly class taught by our Research Director, Zane Selvans, that gives students the tools be able to analyze the facts and figures that are used to justify decision making.
Boulder Municipal Utility Effort
The effort to pull away from Xcel and form an municipal electric utility in Boulder is inspiring not only because Boulder trying to power locally with clean renewable energy, but because we are attempting to democratize our energy supply. Clean Energy Action was central to the creation of the coalitions Renewables Yes and Empower Our Future, which have been key to organizing the 2B2C campaign and the No on 310 campaign.
Unearthing Coal Economics
Not only do we know that coal is the wrong choice for the environment, but we know it's a bad economic bet too. In order to unearth the truth about the economic and environmental downfalls of fossil fuels, we have been digging in and exposing the facts. Clean Energy Action published its third coal report, "Warning: Faulty Reporting of U.S. Coal Reserves," which uses data to drive home that our economically recoverable coal reserves are running on empty.
Youth Energy Education
With a partnership of educators and community members, Clean Energy Action has developed an energy curriculum, "From Fire to Photosynthesis," aimed at teaching our youth about the basic The program features the "Energy Bike" – a bicycle hooked to a generator and wide array of bulbs and appliances to illustrate many energy principles in a fun, "feet-on" way!
Thanks to people like you who support our mission that we can continue to move the planet towards a future powered by renewable energy sources. Please consider helping us continue our programs by supporting us with a recurring donation through coloradogives.org