Sociology professor Joseph Kotarba is asking the University to issue a survey to student athletes that would compare their college experiences to those of other students.
The survey, which Kotarba proposed at a Faculty Senate meeting on Aug. 27, is comprised of 20 questions divided into eight sections.
"The document I discussed was a draft of a survey proposed by the Coalition for Intercollegiate Athletics," Kotarba said. "The 57 faculty senates who are members of COIA are reviewing and editing the draft."
COIA is an alliance of faculty senates of 56 National Collegiate Athletic Association Football Bowl Subdivision (formerly Division 1-A) universities whose goals are "to engage faculty with the issues of intercollegiate athletics reform, and share ideas on how reforms can be implemented at their institutions," the draft of the survey said.
COIA, in conjunction with The John Curley Center for Sports Journalism at Penn State University, developed a rating system that will "assess and compare the integration of athletics into academic goals and mission of NCAA FBS schools," the draft said.
The purpose of the system is to highlight schools doing a good job of integrating athletics and offer a means of self-study for institutions wishing to examine the role of athletics at their school.
Schools will be rated based on publicly available data and responses, and analyzed by The John Curley Center for Sports Journalism at Princeton University.
"The questions refer to activities that serve to integrate student athletes into the general student body," Kotarba said.
The Admission and Recruiting section of the survey asks if general admissions policies are the same for athletes and non-athletes, whether the average high school grade-point averages and SAT scores of athletes are comparable to those of general freshmen and if special admissions of freshmen and transfer-student athletes reflect the same philosophy and processes as that for non-athletes.
The Student-Athlete Integration section asks if athletic competitions and travel are routinely scheduled to minimize lost class time, whether the institution has explicit written policies designed to minimize lost class time and if these are publicly available and athletically-related activities.
The survey includes five other sections meant to measure the student athletes’ experiences at a university. The survey has not yet been approved for distribution.
