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Show FACULTY CONTROL OF ATHLETES Yale Professor Advocates College Col-lege Athletics in Control of Faculty Says Athletics Are Menace. New Haven, Conn., Jan. 15. Prof. Robert N. Corwln of Yale University has come out as a strong advocate of Faculty control of college athletics. He writes: "There should, I think, be little dispute dis-pute as to the proper definition of the function of the Amerloan university. We all agree In a general way that the university exists primarily for tho purpose of preparing young men for service, that Its chief aim is to train young men In habits of thought and a mode of life which will fit them to live better and longer and more effectively. ef-fectively. As to the best ways and means of attaining this high aim thore Is great want of unanimity among uvuiutj iwiu v. ilium uui;ii x(ii;uiL. it Is, therefore, rather anomalous to find such agreement in educational bodies is to the value of a prominent and growing factor in university life. Most of our Faculties are pretty well aqreed in the belief that athletics are a real menace to tho attainment of that high purpose for which our institutions insti-tutions of higher learning were founded found-ed and are maintained. They have be come an Insidious malady which threatens tho well-being of the body scholastic. Constant restrictive regulations regu-lations and repressive measures are required to keep athletic sports from intrusion into that temple of learning. We are constantly adding to the already al-ready large body of rules which so frequently reiterate the prohibition. 'No student shall engage in athletic sports unless, or until, or except, &c.' "Do athletics deserve their low educational edu-cational rating? The attitude of the Fnculty, which ranges -from serene Indifference In-difference to active hostility is based upon the belief that thev unduly con-sumo con-sumo the time and divert the interest of the student. This attitude Is of course amply justified if the assumption assump-tion is correct, that athletic sports serve no good purpose. If athletics are not an aid to the accomplishment of the high aim which is set before every institution of learning, they should be hewn out root and branch and cast Into the flre. If athletics cannot can-not be taught and practiced in such a way as to aid in the attainment of some educational purpose, the sooner they are eliminated from college life, I I IM-WIM I the better. For we must be careful, in our haste, not to throw out the baby with the bath. "For many believe, and I am one of their number, that the athletic field offers a laboratory in the art of living for which no other feature of the university can be a substitute. "Inasmuch as athletic sports have been considered the most extra of extra-curriculum activities, their man-ogement man-ogement has been left very largely In the hands of undergraduates. We at "Vale have been especially conservative conserva-tive in this respect. We have felt that the assumption of control by the Faculty might dampen tbe enthusiasm and leseon the spontaneity of undergraduate under-graduate sports. It Is evident, however, how-ever, that one may exceed the minimum mini-mum limit even in non-intervention. Loyalty In tho student body must bo built upon respect and confidence. "Faculty control has meant In most cases unsympathetic and not Infrequently Infre-quently unintelligent repression We need more of tho big-brother movement move-ment in our Faculties. The average undergraduate as I have found him, is desirous of doing what Is right as he sees it, but he needs and wants the belp of the best minds, more encouragement encour-agement and less reproof, more sympathy sym-pathy and less legislation, but inasmuch inas-much as the faculty has not made Itself It-self tho natural and logical adviser in athletics, the undergraduate has been forced to turn for help to the athletic lobby. This has usurped the place which belongs by right to the Faculty, Facul-ty, and Is largely responsible for the code and traditions of sport. If then there has developed In the undergraduate under-graduate theory of conduct a- dual code of honor, which finds its most frequent expression in athletic practices, prac-tices, the result lies In large measure with Faculty indifference." |
