The Field House. College Sports coverage from The Denver Post’s Kyle Fredrickson.
The relationship between major college sports and academics has long been contentious.Does the system need to change?
That topic will be addressed in Boulder this week as part of a panel discussion hosted by theColorado Athletics Sports Governance Center titled: “Are Big-Time College Athletics Compatible with Academics?” The event will be held from 7-9 p.m. Thursday at the Champions Center on campus inside thethird-floor Petry Auditorium. It is free and open to the public.
CU men’s basketball coach Tad Boyle will participate in the conversation alongside a wide-ranging panel of speakers.
• Jay Smith (University of North Carolina professor and co-author of ).
• Victoria Jackson (Former NCAA championship runner and Arizona State professor working on the book project).
• Kris Livingston (CU associate athletic director for student services).
• Joe Jupille (CU faculty athletic representative).
Roger Pielke Jr., director of CU’s Sports Governance Center, provided a synopsis of what the event hopes to accomplish .
“The goal for the evening is educational, with a wide ranging and open discussion of these challenging and important issues. You should feel free to address the question posed as the title of the panel discussion in whatever way makes the most sense to you. It is intentionally provocative and ideally we will have some debate as well as conversation. In the unlikely event that we do not solve all the problems of college athletics, I’d like the audience to go away with a deeper and perhaps more sophisticated understanding of the challenges, issues, opportunities.”
Academic integrity for college sports in Colorado has entered the spotlight on several occasions in recent memory.
• Colorado men’s basketball freshman Evan Battey last season because he did not complete high school within the four years required for immediate eligibility.
• The Northern Colorado men’s basketball team received three years of NCAA probationafter it discovered the program had completed coursework for prospects, paid for classesthat players needed to become academically eligible and arranged off-campus practice sessions with an academically ineligible player.
• The Colorado State men’s basketball program was for the entire 2017 spring semester.
