[CTcard]

True about Booker--great politician, but over his career at LSJU he caught 20 passes for 199 yards.  Hardly football HOF material.....

The issue isn't whether they are Voldemort candidates or practice fodder.  The issue is-- if on the squad and meeting all the demands of being on the squad-- do they have the time/scheduling constraints that all football players have taking the more structured, demanding majors?  I have no idea whether it was harder or easier back when Booker played.

The issue also isn't whether there is an individual who has been on the team and done excellent academic work. Most teams have at least one of those somewhere to point to - the individual writing the blog cited in the OP for example.

It also takes no particular statistical evaluation to note that at all Division 1 football programs football players get into the schools with academic profiles lower than the average student body. It also doesn't take much to see there is some clustering of majors on most every football team. There's likely some herd-effect here, and I have no doubt some of the underlying motivation is looking for an easier major - in logistics and content.


What I would worry about is whether broadly speaking the money sport athletes are in real majors or those that exist primarily to keep them eligible.

There's no simple way to know for sure from the outside, but some combination of the following might be warning signs. 
1. Is the clustering of majors so extreme that it crowds out a reasonable variety of majors on the team?
2. Are more than half the folks in that major from the money-sports?
3. Does the major seem to have a coherent core or mostly have advisor-approved electives?
4. Do folks graduate in that major and go on to something productive?

As far as I can tell, Stanford and STS seem okay on those criteria.
Not so sure about Public Administration at Auburn.
Even less so about General Studies at all sorts of places.

[CTcard]

True about Booker--great politician, but over his career at LSJU he caught 20 passes for 199 yards.  Hardly football HOF material.....

The issue isn't whether they are Voldemort candidates or practice fodder.  The issue is-- if on the squad and meeting all the demands of being on the squad-- do they have the time/scheduling constraints that all football players have taking the more structured, demanding majors?  I have no idea whether it was harder or easier back when Booker played.

The issue also isn't whether there is an individual who has been on the team and done excellent academic work. Most teams have at least one of those somewhere to point to - the individual writing the blog cited in the OP for example.

It also takes no particular statistical evaluation to note that at all Division 1 football programs football players get into the schools with academic profiles lower than the average student body. It also doesn't take much to see there is some clustering of majors on most every football team. There's likely some herd-effect here, and I have no doubt some of the underlying motivation is looking for an easier major - in logistics and content.


What I would worry about is whether broadly speaking the money sport athletes are in real majors or those that exist primarily to keep them eligible.

There's no simple way to know for sure from the outside, but some combination of the following might be warning signs. 
1. Is the clustering of majors so extreme that it crowds out a reasonable variety of majors on the team?
2. Are more than half the folks in that major from the money-sports?
3. Does the major seem to have a coherent core or mostly have advisor-approved electives?
4. Do folks graduate in that major and go on to something productive?

As far as I can tell, Stanford and STS seem okay on those criteria.
Not so sure about Public Administration at Auburn.
Even less so about General Studies at all sorts of places.