Atlantic Article on a Crisis in Elite College Sports

[apl68]

Meaning the sports played by the elite in order to get into the Ivy League, not the big-revenue sports.  Apparently there were so many affluent parents pushing their children into lacrosse and the like in an effort to find a side door into the Ivy League that these sports had reached saturation point even before the pandemic hit and disrupted college sports in general.

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/11/squash-lacrosse-niche-sports-ivy-league-admissions/616474/

The competition in some of these sports is said to be so extreme that it is leading to student players who are overstressed, burned out, and turning to drugs to cope.  And now many colleges are starting to close down their "rich kid" sports programs.

[dismalist]

Because the number of slots reserved for such students will hardly increase, the parents are engaging in an arms race -- spending a lot to stay in the same place.

[financeguy]

This varies substantially to the information presented in Daniel Golden's The Price of Admission which deals with legacy admissions in general, one section including the "rich kids" sports as a back door. At the time of publication many of these sports were not particularly competitive since so few played. Apparently this has changed...

[Hibush]

The laxbro is certainly a thing. A friend at a college with a good lacrosse team, high admission selectivity and very high tuition knew quite a few of the team members. Their first names corresponded closely with the Urban Dictionary list (Shawn, Chad, Todd, Brian, and Brett) also Albie, Westie and Rock, confirming the accuracy of the stereotype.

If you have any doubt, check the lax team roster at any such school and zero in on the given names and their high school. I doubt any are getting financial aid.

[writingprof]

The laxbro is certainly a thing. A friend at a college with a good lacrosse team, high admission selectivity and very high tuition knew quite a few of the team members. Their first names corresponded closely with the Urban Dictionary list (Shawn, Chad, Todd, Brian, and Brett) also Albie, Westie and Rock, confirming the accuracy of the stereotype.

If you have any doubt, check the lax team roster at any such school and zero in on the given names and their high school. I doubt any are getting financial aid.

Thank you.  I love making assumptions about people based on their names!  Does the same experiment work in reverse for inner-city basketball teams? 

[Hibush]

The laxbro is certainly a thing. A friend at a college with a good lacrosse team, high admission selectivity and very high tuition knew quite a few of the team members. Their first names corresponded closely with the Urban Dictionary list (Shawn, Chad, Todd, Brian, and Brett) also Albie, Westie and Rock, confirming the accuracy of the stereotype.

If you have any doubt, check the lax team roster at any such school and zero in on the given names and their high school. I doubt any are getting financial aid.

In this case, the conclusions can be validated.

Thank you.  I love making assumptions about people based on their names!  Does the same experiment work in reverse for inner-city basketball teams?

[Aster]

Oh my God. I knew people on the lacrosse team when I was an undergraduate. They lived near me in the same dormitory. They had first names that matched the ones on the laxbro weblink.

And yes, most of these dudes sat around in the lawn chairs all day drinking beer and perfecting their humble-brag slang around a flotilla of pretty girls.

I think only one of those guys actually graduated.

[apl68]

Lacrosse just wasn't a thing where I come from.  I'm not sure anybody in the whole state played it.  I think there was a lacrosse team at the university where I went to grad school, but even there none of the undergrads I knew played it.  For people of my socioeconomic background lacrosse is even more remote from actual experience than snow skiing.

Getting back to the article--it's bizarre that competition in certain sports should become so extreme as a byproduct of trying to get into certain selective institutions.  It's disturbing to think about the kinds of students that such unbalanced activities and emphasis must produce.

[fourhats]

I read the article a few days ago, and was appalled by the parents. They pushed their kids hard, and in multiple sports: lacrosse, fencing (one poor girl was stabbed in the neck),rowing, etc. When the high schools went remote, the parents set up private training areas in their neighborhoods. One chilled for a while, but then her pushiness came roaring back. The kids are being overstretched, often having to train in more than one sport. It all has to do with the parents' sense that their kids have to get into elite colleges at any cost. It was very depressing.

[Stockmann]

I read the article a few days ago, and was appalled by the parents.

This. So a lot of the kids have serious physical injuries by the time they are 18, and the article notes difficulties navigating life and a lack of initiative (both presumably because their parents have always micromanaged their lives). How is a lack of initiative and having serious physical injuries a good start in life? These are rich families so it's not like the Ivy League is their ticket out of Dickensian poverty. Given the costs involved - just for the financial ones, take the cost of coaches, facilities, trips, etc, the cost of full-freight Ivy League, the (present and future) medical costs of injuries - add in opportunity costs, as the time and effort could've gone to becoming fluent in Mandarin, getting involved in running the family business if applicable, etc - is it in any way a sensible investment, even if the student actually does get into, and graduate from, an Ivy? Even purely financially? What if the financial cost had been used to buy stocks instead?  It seems very dubious as a financial investment, and also doesn't seem to be done for the sake of the kids in some non-financial sense (again, injuries and a lack of initiative seem like a poor reward for that kind of time and effort) - is it just a status symbol?
Maybe as a professor of sorts I shouldn't say this, but what college education is worth potentially ruining your health at the age of 18, and this kind of expense and stress without developing independence, etc in the process?

Oh my God. I knew people on the lacrosse team when I was an undergraduate. They lived near me in the same dormitory. They had first names that matched the ones on the laxbro weblink.

And yes, most of these dudes sat around in the lawn chairs all day drinking beer and perfecting their humble-brag slang around a flotilla of pretty girls.

I think only one of those guys actually graduated.

Ah, the irony... Stocks would definitely have been a better financial investment, then... I'm sure they're OK financially now, but they would also have been OK financially without getting into an Ivy.

[marshwiggle]

It all has to do with the parents' sense that their kids have to get into elite colleges at any cost. It was very depressing.

Maybe as a professor of sorts I shouldn't say this, but what college education is worth potentially ruining your health at the age of 18, and this kind of expense and stress without developing independence, etc in the process?

So is it time for people in academia to start calling it an urban myth that getting into a "good" institution is vital for life success?

[dismalist]

So is it time for people in academia to start calling it an urban myth that getting into a "good" institution is vital for life success?

A few years ago a really clever study was done of the effect of "elite" college graduation on earnings. The multi-year earnings of those who graduated from elite colleges was compared to those who had been accepted to elite colleges but attended a non-elite college. The difference in earnings was ... zero!

Financial success comes form the person, not the college.

[spork]

For this group of parents, a child attending an Ivy League university is a Veblen good.

[Ruralguy]

Since our rich kid sports teams are (I mean were) actually winning, I doubt we'll get rid of them any time soon.

[Stockmann]

It all has to do with the parents' sense that their kids have to get into elite colleges at any cost. It was very depressing.

Maybe as a professor of sorts I shouldn't say this, but what college education is worth potentially ruining your health at the age of 18, and this kind of expense and stress without developing independence, etc in the process?

So is it time for people in academia to start calling it an urban myth that getting into a "good" institution is vital for life success?

Aside from the research dismalist mentions, it's clear that it is not absolutely necessary for success. Financially, not all rich people went to super-elite colleges (and not all of those who went graduated), and many of those who did were born into wealth. But going back to my point, what I'm saying is that the students described seemed to have had deficiencies in their education (in the broades sense, as distinct from their formal schooling) - lack of initiative and independence seem pretty serious deficiencies. Paying that kind of costs (including to their health) to get a deficient education (even if they get superb formal schooling at an Ivy) does not seem like a wise choice.
I'm not saying an Ivy education isn't a hugely valuable thing. I'm just saying it's probably not worth this kind of price, esp. not for kids born into wealth who are going to be perfectly fine if they don't get into an Ivy. I'm reminded of one point in Tin Drum when a character says that hygiene is more important than life - hygiene is important, but not more so than staying alive. Or, given the uncertainties surrounding elite sports - not always a ticket to an Ivy, etc, and that it seems a particularly unfortunate bet right now with the pandemic - perhaps a quote from No Country For Old Men fits better: What's the most you've ever lost on a coin toss?