Bravo to columnist George Will for questioning the place of high-stakes football in higher education (“NCAA’s tax-free lifestyle raising questions,” Oct. 26).

Unfortunately, Will doesn’t go far enough by just questioning the tax-exempt status of some college sports programs.

I question our tradition of mixing organized sports with education in public schools.

Don’t get me wrong: I’m all for physical fitness in schools, but fitness should be for every student, not just those belonging to a sports team.

Far too many public school districts have dropped physical education classes from their curricula in recent years. Meanwhile, the media constantly remind us that American teenagers are suffering an unparalleled obesity epidemic that could make them the first American generation ever with a shorter life expectancy than their parents.

What I advocate is ditching organized sports completely in public schools and focusing instead on physical education and intramural sports.

But that’s for a later discussion. My topic today is simply whether we should have sports teams in public schools.

Confession – I love the “Friday Night Lights” and watching rival teams clash on an athletic field or court. I can’t wait for the next Penn State football game or the next basketball match of my alma mater, the University of Kentucky. But I still say ditch the sports teams in public schools.

Before you recommend a mental examination, consider some recent comments by Microsoft Corp.’s founder Bill Gates. I view school sports teams as part of a larger problem with our education system, one that Gates has addressed very eloquently.

Speaking at the National Education Summit on High Schools in February 2005, Gates called today’s American high schools “obsolete.”

He went on to explain that even when our schools work exactly as designed, they do not equip the majority of students to become part of tomorrow’s work force. Only one-third of the students graduate ready to move on to college. The remaining two-thirds, consisting of mainly low-income and minority students, are tracked into courses that don’t prepare them for the future.

Statistics show that the youngest American students can compete with their peers in other developed nations, but are lagging far behind by the time they reach high school.

Were we to take the time and resources devoted to school sports and focus them instead on educating our overlooked student population, we might be able to solve the problem. Instead of sports practice after school, imagine tutoring students in subjects where they are experiencing difficulty. Instead of a booster club raising money for sports, how about a booster club for academics?

Shifting the discussion to colleges, why should public universities, i.e. our tax dollars, fund “farm teams” for Major League Baseball, the National Football League and the National Basketball Association?

Why should a football coach at a major public university, which also just happens to be a national football powerhouse, be the school’s highest-paid employee?

In Europe, sports clubs provide players for professional teams, not high schools and universities as is done in the United States.

Professional European sports teams sponsor club systems that provide competitive leagues from peewee up through semi-professional.

Kids having the greatest potential to play in the pros are groomed for the future in a system that is funded by the very professional teams they might end up playing for.

Education is an entirely separate facet of their lives.

Granted, implementing such a system in the United States would take a generation, but that is no reason not to do so as we seek ways to fix our public education system.

Imagine professional sports teams in the United States providing scholarships for the best athletes to attend college. Better yet, imagine professional sports teams funding NCAA division one teams for public universities.

Even better, imagine no organized sports teams in public universities. Imagine universities that educate kids instead of entertaining them.

Call me crazy if you like, but I’ve seen firsthand where we’re headed. My youngest daughter, who is enrolled in a Ph.D. program studying cell and molecular biology, just received a minority scholarship for being a Caucasian-American female at the university she attends in Maryland. Reading the list of students in her program is like listening to a roll call at the old South East Asia Treaty Organization.

America is falling behind, folks, and we’d better fix this problem before we become a second-rate power.



Zachary P. Hubbard of Upper Yoder Township is general manager of the Johnstown division of MTS Technologies, an Arlington, Va.-based consulting firm founded in Johnstown in 1991. His 24-year Army career included service across the United States, Britain, Germany, Italy, the Balkans, Africa and the Middle East.