July 20, 1945

t/Sgt. FP. He Bell - 17064111. :
468 Ftr. Sqdn APO 959 oe
o/o Post Master mas

San Francisco, California ©

Dear Sgt. Bell:

I do not lmow what I am letting myself in on when I answer your querry of a
yecent date. : a

First, I think that it is a general conception that athletes as a whole are

dumber than a noneathlete. However, it must be onasidered that an athlete spends two oy
hours a day on intensive training which many times fatigues him and makes him less
comprehensive of intensive study. An athlete in order to be eligible for the varsity
teams must be passing in more than the average hours carried by a non-athletee

In 1930, I collaborated with a number of other educators on the text by |
Ginn & Company = Higher Education in America - My chapter being on 6rgenizeation and
Administration of Physical Education and Athletics. My I quote you from phases of
my contribution on pages 592 and 593 <= ne

. ‘We hear little of the thousands of athletes who have graduated and have taken —
their places as worthy citizens, but we hear much about the undesirable &thletes who sift inte
the institutions and bring them no credit. Many men graduate from college and become promi-
nent in the professions and in business because of their athletic inclinations. Athletics
and the urge to play kept them in high school and le@ them to college. Hven though such

a primary motive is insufficient, in many instances it helps the boy to the place of larger.
vision and truer motives. : 3 :

Of other undesirable students who matriculate and fail to live up to college
_ gtendards, however, we hear very little. A recent survey was conducted in one of our
| MideWestern universities to determine what percentage of the student body was eligible
for athletic competition under the present ruling of twenty-seven hours of passing work
the preceding semester. The findings were interesting. Out of a total enrollment of
4082 students, 2197 were found to be eligible and 1992 ineligible. But it was the
average of the student average standing in the women's classes that brought the average
of the student body a little past the 50 per cent mark, Of the men students, 1240 were
Bla&pible and 1461 were ineligible; of the women, 957 were eligible and 531 were ineligible
Perhaps it is unjust to the athlete to focus so much attention upon the undesirable re-
flection that he brings upon his school when his class grades render him ineligible for
intercollegiate competition. a :

In spite of a mass of such statistics which might be compiled there are those
who see no remedy for the evils of the system except the abolition of intercollegiate
athletics and the establishment of an extensive system of intramurals which will engage
the entire student body in a program of play in their stead. The organization of the
American college is such that a spirit of rivalry in intramurals could not be sufficidntly
aroused to take the place of intercollegiate competition. In spite of the fact that ,
nature has endowed us with wonderful powers of substitution, we should have difficulty

. { : . . .