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This report presents 13 commentaries on issues related to intercollegiate athletics that were delivered to institutional chief executive officers every 2 weeks during the first half of 2002. The commentaries address: "Division I Academic Reform"; "The Gambling Threat"; "Amateurism: Re-Examination"; "Student-Athlete Issues"; "Continuing Education"; "The Diversity Hiring Failure"; "The Governance Process: Does Form Follow Function?"; "Is College Basketball in Prime Health or Just Prime Time?"; "College Football and Ma Bell"; "The Funding Dilemma"; "Reputation and Clean Restrooms"; and "The Will of the Membership." (SM)

This study sought to determine the perceptions held by high school principals and head football coaches in regard to efforts by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) to improve academic integrity in intercollegiate sports. A total of 112 principals and 79 coaches were asked to rate and rank each of the NCAA's current efforts, including satisfactory academic progress (SAP), core curriculum, initial eligibility index, and disclosure of admission and graduation rates of student athletes. The results indicated that SAP generated the majority of support from principals and coaches as the primary means to improve the status of academic integrity in college athletics. Both groups were found to display an identical sequential order of their mean ranking scores for all four reform measures. (Contains 20 references.) (MDM)

This paper estimates the effects of freshman athletic participation on reading comprehension, mathematics, and critical thinking controlling for pre-college aptitude and other influences. A group of 3,331 students from 18 four-year and 5 two-year colleges and universities participated in initial testing during fall of their freshman year. Testing involved pre-college surveys and the Collegiate Assessment of Academic Proficiency (CAAP). Subjects (n=2,416) were given followup testing the following spring. Women and non-white students were over-represented, and nearly twice as many women participated as men. Intercollegiate athletic participation was found to have significant adverse consequences for the general cognitive development of both men and women during the first year of college. The analyses for women showed somewhat less pronounced and extensive general effects than those for men. In particular, males participating in football and basketball experienced net declines in reading comprehension and math skills during their freshman year while students in other sports and non-athletes showed net gains. The study raises questions as to the educational wisdom of allowing freshmen to participate in varsity level intercollegiate football and basketball. (Contains 40 references.) (GLR)

Data from the National Longitudinal Study of the High School Class of 1972 were used to evaluate the contention that big-time college sports exploit athletes, denying them an education that will help them succeed after college. The sample (N=8,101) consisted of six comparison groups of students who attended four year colleges: varsity football and basketball players; varsity athletes in other sports; intramural sports participants; performing arts students; nonathletes; and a residual group who claimed to be active in athletics, identified by transcript entries for "varsity" or "intercollegiate" sports, whether the entries carried credits or not. Major findings of the study include the following: (1) varsity athletes, including football and basketball players complete the bachelor's degree at a reasonable rate, but it takes them longer to do so than other groups, their grades are lower, and their curricula are less demanding; (2) ex-varsity football and basketball players do very well economically in the first decade of their worklives, whether or not they earned college degrees; and (3) at age 32, they had the highest rate of home ownership, the lowest rate of unemployment, but were the most likely to have lower status occupations than other groups. Results suggest that colleges do not exploit athletes but that the near term educational promises colleges make to students are not being kept. Includes 19 references and 17 tables. (LPT)

This is the 12th issue of the "Racial and Gender Report Card," which assesses hiring practices of women and people of color in U.S. professional and amateur sports and sporting organizations. It considers the composition of players, coaches, and front office/athletic department employees in the leading sports organizations. Each organization is assigned a grade for race, another for gender, then finally an overall grade combining the two. The 2003 report covers perhaps the worst overall 2-year period of declines for women and, in some cases people of color, in the report's history, which is a reversal from 2001, when historically best hiring records were noted for race and gender. Each professional sport covered for 2003 had lower averages for gender, and only three improved for race. College sport improved overall for race and gender. Though there were significant losses for African American men playing college and professional sports, the Black Entertainment Television's CEO became the first African American majority owner of an NBA franchise. Latinos had all-time highs in baseball and soccer. There was also an all-time high of head coaches/managers of color in the three biggest professional leagues. Title IX has been the single most powerful tool to create opportunities for women in sports. (SM)

The nine appendixes of the feasibility study include: (1) current litigation involving intercollegiate athletics: analysis and implications (Carlos Alvarez); (2) financial problems of intercollegiate athletics (Robert H. Atwell); (3) the state politics (Jerry Beasley); (4) report of the task force on the black athlete (Roscoe C. Brown, Jr.); (5) sports and the postsecondary sector (Joseph Froomkin); (6) new and changing circumstances influencing the conduct of intercollegiate athletic programs since 1930 (Bernard P. Ireland); (7) campus, society, and the place of amateur sport (Theodore J. Lowi); (8) women in intercollegiate athletics (Mary McKeown); and (9) the experience of senior colleges that have discontinued football (Felix Springer). (Author/MSE)

A popular belief among leading sport psychologists has been that optimal performance of specific tasks in athletics is associated with different optimal emotional arousal levels of performers. This study was undertaken to test this generalization by examining possible differences in precompetition emotional arousal level of football players who were assigned to different playing positions and whose subsequent game performance was rated optimal. The subjects of the study were three junior and seven senior high school football teams. The precompetition emotional arousal of all subjects was measured by the Spielberger State Anxiety Inventory (STAI), which asks subjects to indicate how they feel at a particular moment. The test was usually administered within minutes of actual competition. After the game, the performance of each subject was evaluated subjectively by the respective coaches on a three-point scale. No significant differences were found between elevations in pregame emotional arousal in subjects playing different positions in high school football competition. (Author/JS)

Changes in pre-competition state anxiety of junior and senior high school football and basketball players were studied as a function of trait anxiety of these athletes and three experimental athletic environments characterized by stressful and non-stressful conditions. In response to the psychological stress associated with athletic competition, state anxiety significantly increased in all subjects. These rises in state anxiety were occurring between practice and regular season and playoffs. High Trait subjects exhibited significantly higher elevations in state anxiety than Low Trait subjects which was in agreement with Spielberger's Trait-State Anxiety Theory. Stressful athletic environments (regular season and playoffs) did not, as has generally been believed, differentially affect the state anxiety of both groups of subjects. Spielberger's State Anxiety Inventory successfully discriminated between practice and competitive athletic environments and was successfully used in assessing the presence and strength of state anxiety levels of athletes in these environments. (Author)

Following World War I, many Americans plunged into sport, and found the Sabbath a convenient and popular day for engaging in sporting events, especially since Sunday activities had become commonplace during the War and acceptable in many areas. However, when Pennsylvanians turned to sport on the Sabbath, they were confronted by the state's archaic blue law of 1794 which prohibited all sports and diversions on Sundays. In 1926, the Philadelphia Athletics baseball team tested the statute by scheduling a Sunday contest with the Chicago White Sox. The game was played without incident, but Sabbatarians protested and brought this issue before the courts. In 1927 the Pennsylvania Supreme Court concurring with Sabbatarian charges, ordered the Athletics not to schedule any more Sunday games under penalty of forfeiting its charter of incorporation. It was not until 1933, after several battles in the Pennsylvania legislature, that the Sunday lobby generated enough votes to modify the 1794 statute. The new law permitted baseball and football on Sunday afternoons between 2:00 and 5:30 p.m., if the voters of any locality approved. The electorate in Pennsylvania's metropolitan areas voted heavily in favor of Sunday sports at the November 1933 elections. Immediately after the elections, professional football teams began playing on Sundays in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia, inaugurating the first legal Sunday sports in Pennsylvania's history. (Author/JS)

This study focuses on the body composition and anthropometric measurements of 65 college football players. Body composition was determined by underwater weighing with an accurate assessment of residual volume. The anthropometric measurements included height, weight, seven skinfolds, waist circumference, and wrist diameter. A step-wise multiple regression analysis of the data indicated that body density and body fat could be predicted from anthropometric measurements. A multiple correlation of .96 was found between body density and the following three independent variables: (a) waist circumference, (b) triceps skinfold, and (c) height.) The team data were divided into five categories by position. When subjected to analysis of variance, significant differences at the .01 level suggested that at least two separate groups, backs and linemen, be used in future body composition studies of football teams. The estimated optimal playing weights of each player were determined by densitometry, and each player and the coach estimated their optimal weights through personal experience. It was found that the players and the coach estimated the players optimal mean weight to be six and nine pounds heavier, respectively, than the densitometric analysis indicated as optimal. (Author/JS)