(03-13-2017 04:34 PM)georgewebb Wrote: (03-13-2017 04:18 PM)illiniowl Wrote: The criteria for a Rice Trustee's Scholarship are eminently discretionary and wide enough to drive a truck through: "distinguishing personal talents." A school -- especially a rich, private one -- can define merit however it chooses to and award scholarships on that basis to whomever it chooses. I assume most of our baseball recruits are not one-dimensional and in their high school careers demonstrated talents in areas such as leadership, entrepreneurship, music, or any of a thousand other fields.
Our non-baseball applicants are not one-dimensional either. Yes, Rice can define "merit" broadly, but even so, the definition cannot be a masquerade for athletic talent. For example, if a merit scholarship is based on "entrepreneurship", I understand that Rice would have to be able to demonstrate that it is given roughly proportionately to athletes and non-athletes alike who demonstrate similar levels of entrepreneurship.
Given that, what basis do you suggest Rice use?
For example, what basis do those other schools use?
What we cannot and should not do is say, "It's a 'merit scholarship' -- wink, wink -- but really it goes to baseball players."
Let's start with the premise, which no one has thus far disputed and in fact has been cited multiple times as an excuse for an evident competitive advantage vis-Ã -vis Rice baseball over the last several years, that Vanderbilt has supplemented some partial baseball scholarships with merit scholarships. Fair enough?
Assuming that is true, then one of two things is also true: Either Vanderbilt is cheating or it is acting within the rules. No one seems to think the former (if you do, please turn them in to the NCAA at once), so evidently it is the latter.
Therefore, if Vanderbilt can do it, there is no rational reason that Rice cannot do it also. Vanderbilt's admitted student profile is every bit as competitive as Rice's. Yeah, they have an education school (Peabody). It is not, however, some secret, easier backdoor into Vanderbilt. And in any event, a quick perusal of
Vandy's website reveals that there are no special merit scholarships for the Peabody School, just the music school.
How are they and other private schools doing it? Well, my guess is that they have categories of merit scholarships with criteria so broadly and fuzzily defined that anyone admitted to the school could plausibly qualify. Vandy's own website says (any emphases are mine):
Quote:Each year, Vanderbilt awards about 300 merit-based scholarships to incoming freshmen who demonstrate exceptional accomplishment and high promise in intellectual endeavors. These awards range from partial to full tuition and are renewable through four years of undergraduate study as long as the student maintains satisfactory academic performance. Financial need, unless otherwise specified, is not a factor.
Vanderbilt awards a number of scholarships to students choosing to enroll in any of the four undergraduate schools, including our three signature, full-tuition awards: The Ingram Scholarship, the Chancellor’s Scholarship, and the Cornelius Vanderbilt Scholarship. Detailed descriptions of these awards can be found on the Scholarships website.
Additional awards include: the Carell Family Scholarship for students who have held part-time employment during their high school years; the John Siegenthaler Scholarship for outstanding minority students interested in a career in journalism and/or public policy; the Fred Russell-Grantland Rice Scholarship for students interested in pursuing a career in sports journalism; and the Curb Leadership Scholarship for students who place creativity and innovation at the center of their lives and use their talents and leadership to create new possibilities. Vanderbilt also awards specific scholarships to qualified students residing in Houston, Texas, and selected counties in Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, and Tennessee.
All those criteria could conceivably apply to just about anyone. And again, we are stipulating that there is no evidence they are cheating, i.e., evidence that there is some category of scholarships that is going disproportionately to athletes, or evidence that the Houston and "selected counties" scholarships are just pretexts for paying athletes merit money.
But here's the thing. While we amateur sleuths are out here fumbling around for explanations,
how Vandy is doing it is surely
not a mystery to Rice's coaches (including Wayne Graham) and the AD, whose jobs it is to keep abreast of the competition. Certainly, if they don't know how Vandy is doing it, they are utterly derelict in their duties.
So,
if we are not doing what Vandy (and others) are doing, then again there are only two possible explanations. One, alluded to above, is ignorance/incompetence on the part of our coaches and AD. Let's not assume that. The other explanation, which is unfortunately far more plausible, is that our coaches/AD have asked the academic/financial aid side of the University for the same tools our competitors are using to keep up with the state of the art in playing within but to the full extent of what the rules allow, and have been told no. Not because it would be impossible/illegal (which clearly it wouldn't be, else why would Vandy be doing it), but because we simply choose not to. (One other note:
our endowment is $5.5B and Vandy's is $4B.) Which once again points toward the conclusion that this university, at bottom, does not want or see the need for anything other than a window-dressing level athletic program.
