Jock Privilege

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"A wrestler pushed me over one day while I was carrying my saxophone," says Daniel, a freshman at a suburban Denver high school. "He told me I should learn a man’s sport."

"They walk around like they own the place," adds Jonathan, a sophomore. Jonathan considers himself on the bright side, with a good sense of humor and lots of friends. He writes for the school paper and enjoys alternative music. Like many of his classmates, Jonathan is generally okay with being outside the "golden circle" of athletics.

"I’m lousy at pretty much anything that involves running or chasing a ball," he says with a smile. It’s not a matter that would concern him much, if others weren’t so intent on rubbing it in.

"Sometimes you’ll be walking in the hall, and one of the football guys will bump into you," he says. "Or you’ll be hanging out in the cafeteria, and they’ll make fun of your clothes real loud, because they know that they’re stronger and more popular. It really makes me feel like I’m a loser because I stink at football."

A 1999 national telephone survey by ESPN found that nearly three-quarters of high school students expressed some level of tension between athletes and non-athletes in their school. High-profile incidents of violence at suburban schools in recent years threw the perennial problem of the campus pecking order into bold relief.

In her advice to teachers, coaches and administrators seeking to reduce "jock dominance" in their schools, Carol Lieber, director for secondary programs at Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Educators for Social Responsibility (ESR), cautions against blaming sports themselves for social tensions.

"When you look at youth development, honing a discipline, refining a set of skills, and doing it in a way that makes their contribution interdependent with others," she notes, "clearly sports can be very positive for most kids. However, one of the things that becomes very important in high school is who has status, who has power. Obviously those associated with varsity sports have that status. Males who participate in activities like football and wrestling tend to dominate high school cultures, both physically and socially. These things determine who feels they have a voice that matters. In some cases, those who feel privileged abuse others."

Jay Coakley, Professor of Sociology at the University of Colorado, has been teaching courses on the sociology of sports for more than 30 years. He feels that an increase in the visibility of varsity sports in the last decade has exaggerated the traditional image of the jock as the "big man on campus."

"The stakes associated with varsity programs have become greater," Coakley observes. "Athletes are being heavily recruited and publicized; some are even jumping straight into professional sports from the high school level. In fact, three of the four top picks in the last National Basketball Association draft were high school seniors. They’re being covered in more newspapers and even getting television exposure. They’ve also seen a proliferation of Web sites and booster clubs that make them more visible in the community."

Coakley is careful to point out that most students involved in these sports aren’t contributing to the problem. "There are a few student athletes who see themselves as separated from the student body and claim extra privileges in the process. Because of the attention being paid to their sports, those student athletes sometimes feel they have permission to dominate the social organization of the school. They do that in a variety of ways, usually claiming space in hallways and in cafeteria lines, and taking opportunities in some cases to demean other students, enhancing their own status in the process."

In other words, as Jonathan says, "They push you around and act like you’re not important if you aren’t on the team."

Permian High School, in Odessa, Texas, is the epitome of sports-dominated culture. In a town of less than 100,000 people, Permian’s stadium seats more than 20,000, and games frequently sell out.

"Football is king here — it overpowers everything else," says Tyler, a junior and middle linebacker for the Permian team. "The town bleeds white and black, the school colors."

David, Permian’s quarterback, shares similar sentiments. "Football is the biggest thing in our town. It’s almost like a professional sport — everyone comes to the games, and we’re expected to win."

"Football has been a way of life in Odessa for decades," Permian head coach T. J. Mills agrees. "That gives us a special responsibility to make sure that we keep our players acting the right way and setting a good example. We have to be more diligent than a lot of other schools in making sure our players aren’t harassing other kids."

Mill’s strategy focuses on thirty-minute "Character Development" sessions with his players. The coach and his staff use these lesson times to talk to players about their lives off the field.

"Teenagers aren’t exactly people yet," Mills says, "they’re all a work in progress. If we’re not coaching them in all the things that go on beyond football, then we aren’t doing our job."

Tyler, a junior linebacker on Permian’s team, says that Character Development has changed the complexion of the team. "During Character Development time, Coach talks to us about the choices we make, how we get along with other people and what it means to do the right thing-- even when no one is looking. Sometimes coaches will give their own testimonials about their lives, things that worked for them, or things that they wish they’d have handled better. It really helps. You can tell that attitudes have changed, even outside of the locker room. They tell us that working to become better people will help us later on in life. I think everyone pays attention because it comes from the coaching staff. We trust them like we would our parents."

At Denver’s East High, math teacher and head football coach Mark Calhoun affirms the social responsibilities that come with the coach’s position. "I get concerned that football players can be bullies, so I talk to my team about it," Calhoun says. "I make it clear that if you are going to be a leader on my team, then you’re going to be a leader off the field as well. It’s great when we have success, but we’re all part of the same community here at East."

Calhoun also leaves his players free to join other activities, a practice that many coaches would shun. "I think that a lot of coaches feel that anything their kids do outside of sports takes away from their ability to focus and compete. To a certain degree, I think that can be true. But while the values that I can teach kids through football are important, there are things in those other activities that they can use for the rest of their lives. Sports can teach a lot of things, but it’s hard to hold a candle to something like speech or drama. Kids can take the skills they learn in those activities and use them later on in the business world, or just to be more rounded people."

He stresses that taking an active interest in all school programs results in an increased awareness of the variety of activities that students can choose to participate in. As an added benefit, many of the school’s athletes take up other interests and help bridge the gap between athletes and non-athletes.

"One of our best football players is on the speech team. Another of our players had the lead in a musical. That kind of crossover is common here. That’s very important because it gets our student athletes involved in other kinds of activities. Or, even if they choose not to participate, at least they know someone on their team that is. When they can see what kind of work goes into something else, they can draw parallels to their sport and develop a respect for it."

Michael, a freshman fullback, is the kind of "crossover" athlete Calhoun encourages. "At first, a lot of my friends didn’t really respect speech the way they do football," Michael says. "Most people think of football players as these big, tough guys that are cool. When they think about speech, they used to think it was kind of stupid. But then we had an assembly where the speech team got to perform, and they got to see what we do. When they realized how hard it was, a lot of my teammates thought it was so cool."

Carol Lieber of ESR feels that the importance of that kind of exposure couldn’t be overstated. "Maybe one student plays the violin with the same kind of passion that another is a goalie. It’s important to make them appreciate those respective interests. How often does a drama student go to a sporting event, or an athlete to an art function? These things don’t happen by accident — there has to be a conscious effort, and it isn’t always easy. But, by getting them to appreciate respective interests, the dynamic of the school changes in a way that is so positive."

As important as coaches are in setting character standards for their players, Jay Coakley emphasizes the role of classroom teachers in shaping a school’s culture toward one of athletic privilege or one of equity, "Teachers deal with students on the basis of how they perceive the character of each particular student," he says, "and whether they feel the student is deserving or not. Sometimes the preferential treatment that athletes receive is tied to the fact that teachers see participation in sports as being worthwhile and indicative of positive traits. So, if that student needs a break, they’re more likely to get it."

"They can come in late, and teachers will give them a pass," concurs Maria, a sophomore at Jonathan’s school. "Or, if they had a big game, teachers will say, ‘Don’t worry, turn in a paper tomorrow.’ That doesn’t happen for the rest of us."

Coakley also suggests that faculty may inadvertently favor athletes because the demands on their time are easier to recognize. "There might be other students who are just as busy — for example, one who goes home and baby sits younger brothers and sisters. Teachers may not know that, and in turn may not give that other person an extension on their work, or some other kind of concession. I don’t see it as some sort of underhanded thing, it’s just that often student athletes get the treatment that all students deserve."

The real lesson, notes Coakley, is one that’s always been at the heart of school sports — when students have the opportunity to try hard, support each other, and receive adult encouragement, they shine. "If we treated all students the way we treat student athletes," he says, "we’d have a lot fewer problems and a lot better schools."

Notes:
1ESPN Chilton telephone poll, June 1999.
800 participants with 48% identified as athletes, 50% male.

The names of high school students have been changed.