Athletics, should that be our focus? In the past 6 months, I’ve gone from fully supporting the administration here at Dakota State to wondering what organization is going to be cut next. After news of the Concert Band being arranged into a smaller pep band and Friday Night Live (FNL’s) budget being drastically cut, I can only ask - why? The phonation students called me twice in two weeks telling me about this wonderful capital campaign we have and was wondering if I would be willing to donate towards athletic scholarships or a new athletic facility. My answer is “no”. The caller couldn’t even remember me telling him what activities I was involved with.
I would like to point out that the activities that bring in the most high school students aren’t athletic games but the performing arts. How many high schools participate in Debate or Oral Interpretation contests on campus? How many bands and choruses participate in Large Group Contest? How many marching bands come to our Homecoming parade? My personal experience with Dakota State as a high school student came through those programs. My first 1, 2, 3 …..10 visits to this institution were not spent attending DSU athletic events.
When the band was disassembled, Dr. Knowlton responded with arguments engrossed with budget issues and how it didn’t “fit with the mission here at Dakota State”. Our mission has not changed in twenty years. And is our enrollment not up? Cultural events such as what FNL or the performing arts programs put together are on the decline. At the same time I believe part of the higher education experience is to be involved in campus activities. For this coming spring semester, where is the opportunity for students who want to play an instrument to perform? FNL has a small budget leading to fewer events. The pep band certainly isn’t going to perform at the baseball/softball games or the track and field events.
Music teachers are a critical need in South Dakota according to the Department of Labor. The Dakota Corp scholarship lists critical needs in K-12 music, special education, and math and science. There are no Dakota State University students currently receiving the Dakota Corps Scholarship. Dakota State’s focus is to “prepare teachers for the information age”. Teachers? If the word “teachers” is the direct object in that phrase, one would expect the largest college at DSU to be the College of Education. They pump out more teachers than anybody. Instead we focus on creating almost identical degrees in the College of Business in Information Systems. Dakota State has consolidated art programs into the Digital Arts Degree and limits technology or fails to recognize applying technology to different fields. For example, Georgia Tech has a master’s degree in Music Technology. I believe that Dr. Knowlton could have saved the band program by integrating those chorus and band electives into the existing audio specialization in the Digital Arts Degree.
The current environment at DSU is more athletic centric than any other group. It puts non-athletes at a disadvantage. The non-athletes never filled up the stands during athletic events. In addition, we spend a lot of money just on the ongoing costs of athletics through GAF. That is a quantitative measurement. What I don’t understand is that if we quantitatively spend more money on athletic facilities, students, coaches, etc., why would that qualitatively be better for Dakota State? Are our current athletes not quality athletes? Dr. Knowlton had sent an article into the Trojan Times about accountability. I think that is a great point. Last year we lost three head coaches; volleyball, football, and women’s basketball. Where is the accountability for the athletic program in terms of retention? How many of our athletes have a Computer Science, CIS, or Computer Networking major? Are athletes from Dakota State overwhelmingly returning to our Graduate Programs? Or are athletes leaving as soon as their athletic eligibility is up? Has our mission changed so that athletics is our focus? Why are current sports scores not use quantitatively when funding is talked about? According to the Athletics website, we have 13 women basketball players, 16 volleyball players, and 12 men basketball players. These numbers don’t equate to the numbers of students registered for concert and jazz band (21). The cost per student athlete is much higher than any other area just by looking at the numbers given towards each sport and dividing that number by the number of athletes in that sport.
When the governing body of this institution, the Board of Regents, first learned about SDSU and later USD’s move to Division I athletics, they put rules in place. One of the main rules was that no student fees would go to pay for that move. If increasing athletic support is great for the whole body, then why create those rules?
We are ultimately in the business of educating students. It appears that we value athletics just as much as academics. We have a capital campaign to raise $10 million for a new athletic facility. That is the same amount as the new academic information systems building. More athletic scholarships are also being called for. Support for other scholarships such as the Kingsmen scholarship in music has dropped according to three members of the alumni association. While Dakota State is unique in its technology education, it is also uniquely the only four year higher education institution in the state to not have a concert band. The continued cutting of the fine arts goes to show how much we value athletics.
Posted at: 01:32 PM | Add Comment
| 
| 
del.icio.us