Cal isn't some crappy school...........it is probably the #1 Rated Public College and I bet it is even Top 25 out of all Colleges......is it ND.....no......but don't kid yourself.....a degree from Cal is quite an accomplishment itself.....
Don't kid yourself that a football athlete who gets the same on paper degree as a non-football student at Cal gets the same education.
People often rave about how good of a reputation a school has for academics. But the school's reputation as an academic insitution is completely irrelevant to the question of whether a school actually educates it's student athletes, specifically its football and basketball athletes. Graduation rates and the major those athletes are enrolled in are the two greatest factors for determining whether a school's degree obtained by an athlete is worth anything.
Even if a football or basketball player obtains a coveted big-name degree, the education they obtained and retained may not be worth the paper it is written on. A degree in sub-Saharan cultural studies with a minor in parks and recreation won't help the athlete much who can't make the pros and must later get a job.
Just listen to the professional football and basketball players who supposedly graduated with a degree from an acclaimed academic institution like USC, Florida, Michigan, etc. (It is pretty clear they majored in [butchering the] english language [speaking with rocks in their mouth].) Each of those schools are excellent academic schools, and a student who goes there would get a great education under average circumstances. But football players aren't there under average circumstances; the goal of the school and the goal of many of the football athletes are completely different than the regular student.
There are only 30 schools on average (out of 119, D-1) that graduate more than 70% of their student athletes. 70% is a passing grade; anything less is failing. Most of the big-schools like USC, Texas, Florida, Alabama, are around 50%. In general, that means football athletes have a 50% chance of graduating. The numbers for African-American males (per the NCAA) is often 5-15% points lower than the schools' average.
While there are some student athletes that the 50/50 proposition doesn't apply to (take Myron Rolle for example), all that means is that for every guy who is higher than 50% likley to graduate, you have a guy who is much lower than 50% likely to graduate. How would you like to be recruited knowing you stand much less than a 50% chance of graduating and be used as a warm body to profit the school?
The issue is not the reputation of the name on the degree, but the quality of education one received along the way. I've worked with many people who have big name degrees who are very uneducated. And I've worked with people who went to no name schools who are head and shoulders above the big name graduates.
Cal is certainly not among the worst offenders. But Cal's latest reported rates (2009) are 64% for football athletes, 62% for African-American football athletes, and both of those are using the inflated GSR rates that are designed to make the schools look better. 2008's reported rates are much lower: 53% GSR, 45% Fed Rate.
In 2007, a Stanford Scout site analyzed GSR rates for all the Pac-10 and Cal was near the bottom.
Scout.com: The Bootleg's Graduation Rate Analysis They also analyze each year going back to 2002. In 2007, Cal had the biggest percentage difference (-44%) between all student grad rate and African-American football grad rate.
So while the majority of people would do well to get a degree from UC Berkley, the fact remains that on average there is a 50/50 chance those that strap on the pads for Cal will actually get a degree, and who knows what percentage chance that those that do get one that actually helps them down the road.
PS - so you don't think I am beating up on Cal: you were wrong about it being ranked somewhere in the top 25 public Universities in the US; it is ranked #1 for public Universities by US News as of 2010, and #21 of all National Universities (one spot behind Notre Dame). You are very much right about it being a great educational institution. My point is it is not the same institution for student athletes, even though it is the same physical campus.
