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Home > Jeff Schultz > Archives > 2008 > December > 08 > Entry
DEL.ICIO.USUnfortunately, Jan Kemp’s impact fading
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Charles Knapp had read about the trial and had a sense of the hangover on campus. But it took an impromptu meeting with Georgia’s most famous English instructor to bring inglorious history back into focus.
“It was one of the first times I was at the university,” Knapp, the former Georgia president, said Monday. “I was giving a talk to the faculty, and a number of people came forward when it was over. I remember the line moving up and a bunch of photographers suddenly moving into position. Then a lady comes up and extends her hand and an entire bank of flashbulbs went off. I just laughed and said, ‘You must be Jan Kemp.’ “
This was in 1988, two years after Kemp sued Georgia for wrongful termination and exposed academic irregularities regarding student-athletes.
UGA wasn’t the only campus where the athletic department’s footprint mutated far beyond its ideal size. But the Kemp suit was clear and tangible. It was something people could touch and feel and debate. It became talking point on all matters related to reforming college athletics.
Jan Kemp died of complications from Alzheimer’s at the too young age of 59. She passed knowing that she helped affect change at Georgia and elsewhere.
Unfortunately, that change now looks like a small clean spot on a greasy factory floor.
An army of Jan Kemps wouldn’t make a difference today. Whistleblowers may catch the occasional corrupt academic counselor, or the football coach whose car keys somehow keep winding up in a recruit’s pocket.
But today’s problems dwarf those of two decades ago. They’re created by hypocritical college presidents who preach academics one day and yield to a booster’s whims to fire the football coach the next. They say yes to 12-game regular seasons, conference championship games and late-night bowl kickoffs and basketball tournament tipoffs — but no to a football playoff because it “sends the wrong message.”
Jan Kemp had the right idea at the right time. But the issues were simpler in the 1980s and barely applicable today. It’s like dropping an expert on eight-track technology into a digital world.
“The days of the $50 handshake and the grade-changing — there’s a thousand ways to keep an eye on those things now,” said Knapp, who came from Tulane following the resignation of president Fred Davison and an interim term by Henry King Stanford. “The battlefield has changed. The amount of money involved with everything from coaches salaries to advertising and BCS bowls — it’s really accelerated everything.
“In my days, the question was, ‘What are our minimum academic standards for athletes?’ Now I hear less and less about those standards. It’s about the trajectory of athletics in the face of so much money. It’s college presidents talking about trying to maintain some semblance of amateurism. I remember when there was no advertising at Sanford Stadium. We had a long discussion about putting up two itsy-bitsy signs on the scoreboard, one for Coke and one for Delta. We had all this hand wringing over the issue before we decided to do it. Now you go into the stadium and it looks like a video arcade.”
There is nothing wrong with making money. The problem is, making money surpassed a university’s primary’s mission long ago.
Kemp was the voice that screamed, “We’ve lost control. Priorities are out of whack.”
Georgia listened then. It implemented changes. But in the big picture, nobody listened. Or nobody cared.
We should have known what really mattered. The Bulldogs were giving football scholarships to non-qualifiers because of their size, speed and strength. This was reaffirmed when Kemp’s superior, Leroy Ervin, was secretly taped at a faculty meeting, saying recruits were “used as kind of a raw material in the production of some goods to be sold as whatever product, and they get nothing in return.”
There was the dreaded opening statement by the school’s attorney, Hale Almand, who acknowledged: “We may not make a university student out of him, but if we teach him to read and write, maybe he can work at the post office rather than as a garbage man …”
So much for the mission statement.
Kemp won her suit. She eventually returned to teaching. Some on campus saw her as a pariah, others as a savior.
“If you view it through a sports scope, there was some sense of killing the messenger,” Knapp said.
Today, unfortunately, the message has been lost.
More on Jan Kemp: Obit • Photos • Guestbook
Permalink | Comments (87) | Post your comment | Categories: UGA/SEC
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Comments
By BirdMahn
December 8, 2008 7:03 PM | Link to this
It took the Bulldogs 20 years to win another SEC Championship after Kemp’s meddling. Good riddance!
By Bryan G.
December 8, 2008 7:14 PM | Link to this
Jan Kemp was a good person who did the right thing when it was hardest to do. That’s true integrity.
I love UGA more than anyone, but maybe sometimes the people on these blogs forget what the “U” in UGA stands for.
As an alum and someone who met Jan Kemp, I am proud of what she did.
By James
December 8, 2008 7:18 PM | Link to this
BirdMahn, are you kidding? When the head of a department refers to football players as “raw material” and the defense attorney acknowledges that the guys UGA (just like so many schools) recruited might hardly work as “garbage men”, you have as serious problem. I realize many guys see college as a stepping stone to the NFL, but it’s still college. Let the ones who want an easy out take the easy classes in the easy majors, but at least force them to get an education along the way. I realize no program forces its athletes to exactly a regular student’s standards, but it’s important that they are held to as high a standard as possible. Anyone who prizes championship more than honest practices is a fool. Your comments are disrespecful and disgraceful.
By bprice22
December 8, 2008 7:20 PM | Link to this
Yeah, talk about perspective. I think Birdmahn proves your point pretty well Jeff.
By Class of '98
December 8, 2008 7:28 PM | Link to this
This human being just passed away and you say “good riddance”?
That’s just pathetic.
By GoAwayRedneckFans
December 8, 2008 7:31 PM | Link to this
I am sick and tired of all of these redneck, townie Bulldog fans making a mockery of our fine institution. When you make comments like BirdMahn makes, you demonstrate exactly what makes the entire country look at us a school full of a bunch of hicks. These are the same mindless morons who have NEVER set foot in a classroom at UGA, and bark like idiots at the opposing team on Saturdays. Do us UGA Alums a favor and just go away, you are unwanted at this university. I don’t care if your dad drove the damn bus for the Dawgs in the 80’s or your uncle took out Vince Dooley’s trash for 20 years. You will NEVER, EVER be a true Bulldog unless you have graduated from this fine institution. Jan Kemp did the right thing, when she knew people like BirdMahn would ostracize her for doing so. I am as big of a dawg football fan as anyone, but I wouldn’t trade 2 Rhode Scholarships for 10 national championships in a row. Any true Bulldog wishes to have UGA succeed academically first and athletically second.
By Dogbyte
December 8, 2008 7:42 PM | Link to this
Kemp has reached the status—in the AJC, for instance—of Sister(Now Mother) Teresa. But, I ask you: Did she do what she did to better the lot of the student athletes or to save her job? Motive is very important before nominating her for Sainthood.
By Sid
December 8, 2008 7:47 PM | Link to this
As a person who earned 3 graduate degrees from UGA,I respect Jan Kemp for what she did. As a college professor who was lied about,undermined and,at times, humiliated by other professors who were trying to get a jump on their colleagues(including me) at PRT(Promotion,Renewal and Tenure)time,I have little respect for the lady.Where was her scholarly production while blowing her whistle? My dad died of Alzheimer’s Disease and it’s a terrible way to go! For that I express my deepest sympathies to Dr. Kemp and her family.
By Raven
December 8, 2008 7:48 PM | Link to this
Townie, are you serious? Those of us who actually LIVE in Athens have to put up with drunken morons like BirdMahn at every game, win lose or draw. You want to talk about hypocrites? It’s legal to drink on campus 6 days a year and it’s sure not the “townies” trashing the place is itz? Wake up idiots.
By Tom S. Treblehorn
December 8, 2008 7:55 PM | Link to this
Jan Kemp did the right thing - God bless her for it. May she rest in peace.
There are, however, certain realities in college football. One is that everyone, from Duke to USC wants to win, win now, and win big. Some are willing to pay a bigger price than others for winning. Some (most) will make big concessions along the way to achieve athletic glory, and others like Vandy, Duke, Stanford and others will make less academic concessions, but they will make SOME - otherwise they couldn’t field a D-1 football team. The service academies are the only D-1 schools left that hold athletes to the same standards as the other admittees, and Army and Navy are about 50 years past their gridiron glory years. The Ivies ruled college football 80 years ago, but long ago found out that they couldn’t compete against schools that have easier admission standards, so now they just play each other.
Another reality - all schools, in order to win, need the inner city athlete that runs a 4.4 40-yard dash. The days of slow-footed (relatively speaking) all-white skill players is long gone, and will never return. Besides, getting a Sugar Bowl or Rose Bowl invite brings great exposure and big money to a school. So, these schools will do whatever is necessary to get the elite athletes on campus, and keep them there. Period.
By Dogbyte
December 8, 2008 8:08 PM | Link to this
Tom Treblehorn - Your “essay” is very interesting and righteous, but insulting to players like Knowshon Moreno(arguably UGA’s best player)who recruited himself to Athens following an 18 hour train trip. I don’t know what his grade-point average is, but he appears to be a fine and intelligent young man. Generalities are fine, but they can be deceptive. In short: Deal with facts and quit making sugar-coated sermons to the choir.
By Lost message
December 8, 2008 8:12 PM | Link to this
The current President of UGA hired the previous Basketball coach, his buddy from Pepperdine, Jim Harrick, who hired Jim Harrick Jr, who created the challenging college course titled Basketball 101 with the exam question: How many quarters are in a Basketball game?
By Dogbyte
December 8, 2008 8:18 PM | Link to this
I’ll wager our two Rhodes Scholars can answer that question. How many RS does YOUR school have? Oh, you don’t have a school. Sorry.
By Dennis
December 8, 2008 8:35 PM | Link to this
They fired the President and kept Dooley. Who really came out on top? This is why I will never pull for those idiots.
By Dogbyte
December 8, 2008 8:42 PM | Link to this
Idiots Pejorative term applied to persons or points of view by bloggers who otherwise would be speechless.
By Doug
December 8, 2008 9:12 PM | Link to this
What Jan Kemp did embarrassed UGA but it was the right thing to do no matter what her motives were. Today, that would never happen: remember the professor at the Univ. of Tenn. who came out and admitted that football players’ grades were changed to keep them on the team? The NCAA even investigated it and found “no wrongdoing” — do we really believe that? And the NCAA fails to do anything against USC for Reggie Bush and his family taking money — even the NCAA is all about money.
By Dawg44
December 8, 2008 9:16 PM | Link to this
It’s a GREAT DAY IN AMERICA!!!!
By SportsFan
December 8, 2008 9:35 PM | Link to this
UGA is just coming off a disappointing season. They consistently have top 10 recruiting classes and yet always seem to under achieve. Every couple of weeks a different player is getting arrested on the team for DUI or fighting. CMR gives them a slap on the wrist and suspends them for a powder puff game. UGA still recruits players for junior colleges who have troubled pasts and could never academically qualify for the university otherwise. UGA had college credit classes with test questions like how many points are in a 3 point basket.
If any thing the situation has gotten worse with college athletics and UGA is a prime example of how not to run a program. It starts at the top with the college Presidents who should make sure the academics of the institutions are their first priority unlike President Adams. Some these previous posts are just embarrassing to read.
By FormerDog
December 8, 2008 9:57 PM | Link to this
Big time college sports, especially football and basketball, are totally out of control. You can throw in baseball, too, for that matter—how can we justify paying a college BASEBALL coach 1/2-1.0 million dollars per year?!! A system that justifies paying a head football coach 100 (!) times as much as as the average kindergarten, elementary, middle, or high school teacher is an abomination!Don’t tell me “the market” supports it. That’s the same rationale that took Lehman Brothers and our entire financial system down the tubes. Consider the following approach: (like NCAA Division III schools ???): give no athletic scholarships in any sport; field intercollegiate teams from the properly enrolled student body; conduct playoffs at the end of each season to crown the true champions; and let the NFL and NBA establish and run professional minor league systems from which they can fill their rosters. If they want to “draft” college athletes, including baseball players, wait until they graduate or complete FIVE years of college work.This will allow those who should be — and want to be — enrolled in school to pursue legitimate college educations. True fans motivated by the right reasons would still attend the games. Jan Kemp did the right thing. Jeff Schults is right on target.
By FormerDog
December 8, 2008 9:57 PM | Link to this
Big time college sports, especially football and basketball, are totally out of control. You can throw in baseball, too, for that matter—how can we justify paying a college BASEBALL coach 1/2-1.0 million dollars per year?!! A system that justifies paying a head football coach 100 (!) times as much as as the average kindergarten, elementary, middle, or high school teacher is an abomination!Don’t tell me “the market” supports it. That’s the same rationale that took Lehman Brothers and our entire financial system down the tubes. Consider the following approach: (like NCAA Division III schools ???): give no athletic scholarships in any sport; field intercollegiate teams from the properly enrolled student body; conduct playoffs at the end of each season to crown the true champions; and let the NFL and NBA establish and run professional minor league systems from which they can fill their rosters. If they want to “draft” college athletes, including baseball players, wait until they graduate or complete FIVE years of college work.This will allow those who should be — and want to be — enrolled in school to pursue legitimate college educations. True fans motivated by the right reasons would still attend the games. Jan Kemp did the right thing. Jeff Schultz is right on target.
By TDone
December 8, 2008 10:14 PM | Link to this
The Jan Kemp episode is why Georgia’s 1980 National Championship shold be voided along with its SEC Championships in 1980, 1981, and 1982. And in the Cotton Bowl of 1983.
You folks cheated…
By J
December 8, 2008 10:14 PM | Link to this
Jeff, How do academic qualifications differ among sec schools? in other words, what is the minimum qulification at UGA vs. Tennessee?
By jesus christ
December 8, 2008 10:26 PM | Link to this
love the cheater hate the cheatin’
By Gators Own You
December 8, 2008 10:31 PM | Link to this
I just stumbled across this blog and I am amazed at you people. You got caught cheating and the bottom line is “You Still Cheat.” CMR cheated, lied and had no discipline for players at FSU and he is doing the same at UGA. 8 years of waste and counting. You have the talent, but where is the coaching. Learn discipline, then win Championships.
Gators Rule !!! … Dawgs Drool!!!!
By Wil Walton
December 8, 2008 11:23 PM | Link to this
Two wrongs don’t make a right. And I certainly don’t condone any cheating. But if any one says “UGA deserves it because they cheated and continues to cheat”, I suggest you take a step back and peruse the whole landscape of FBS college football. It’s all about money. And I don’t think there is a single school that hasn’t cheated or bent the rules. Glass houses and stones…
By Uga Grad
December 8, 2008 11:51 PM | Link to this
RIP Jan Kemp - she did he right thing when it was not easy. * For you STUPID EMBARRASSING SORRY NO GOODIDIOTS Dawg44 & BirdMahn*- that old wheel will roll around again….
Uga still chooses sports over academics - not too much has changed. A recent Uga all-star football player’s web site was a very sad and pathetic thing to beholden. It is the redneck old school bulldog fans that do the school in year after year. Win on Saturday and after that who cares.
By BAMA STAN
December 8, 2008 11:55 PM | Link to this
Whatever her motives - the end result is that Jan Kemp was the messenger.
UGA needed to change - and the rest of us took notice.
When Bama got caught in the DuBose scandels - we deserved every scholarship reduction we received. Yet, we have our redneck fans that want to blame Phil Fulmer and Steve Spurrier for turning us in. The blame is with Alabama.
However, it still goes on - look at the Harricks and UGA basketball. This was the Presidents hire and Vince Dooley was AD.
Where was the institutional control???
Both should have been fired or retired.
How undermining to the academic integrity for all to have this going on??
The academic admittance standards and policy in the NCAA have roots to Jan Kemp …… this is a good thing.
Life is short - may we all make a difference in a positive way!
By V8 Cat
December 8, 2008 11:56 PM | Link to this
I kept wondering why GT kept losing to the dogs and Jan Kemp exposed those reasons. Vince Dooley is treated as some kind of saint by UGA, when he was up to his elbows in this sorrid mess. I really don’t hold anything against people(fans) that attended UGA, but the fan base that never set foot in the door of that school are the most pathetic people I have ever seen IE. “Birdman”, etc.
By PNWDawg
December 9, 2008 1:32 AM | Link to this
Rest in Peace, Jan Kemp. Alzheimer’s is a terrible disease and is especially painful for the loved ones. My thoughts are with her family. I hope our university (as in academic institution) will remember the lessons learned from this saga.
By Warner Todd Huston
December 9, 2008 2:09 AM | Link to this
Sports teach NOTHING at all. Sports do not belong in an institution for education in any way whatever. Not at the grade school, the high school or the college level. It is an utter waste of money on every level.
By Warner Todd Huston
December 9, 2008 2:10 AM | Link to this
Sports teach NOTHING at all. Sports do not belong in an institution for education in any way whatever. Not at the grade school, the high school or the college level. It is an utter waste of money on every level.
By Uncle Ned
December 9, 2008 2:16 AM | Link to this
Jan Kemp,rest her soul, should be commended. The GA Athletic Department has continued to be a shameful blight on what could otherwise be recognized as a fine academic institution. Ultimately, the responsibility lies with Adams. Who is to answer for this mess? Jim Harrick?
The athlete arrests, the academic cheating are not only a black eye to the school but to the entire State of Georgia. UGA, Clean up your act,once and for all.
By HH
December 9, 2008 7:26 AM | Link to this
Why don’t all you holier-than-thou loosers out there quit deluding yourself. Big time college football is about winning and money——nothing else.
I don’t contribute and buy season tickets to listen to Jan Kemp and other like-minded do-gooders p** and moan about “academic standards”. I pay money to see my team win.
I think the UGA lawyer was absolutely right. If you can teach these individuals to read and write with some degree of literacy, then that’s at least something better than not being able to read and write at all. Hell, most of these kids come to college to play football as a ticket to the pros and big money and not to pursue academic excellence and become phi beta kappas anyway.
If Jan Kemp and people like her can’t stomach that, then maybe they should teach at Millsaps or Emory.
So far as I am concerned, I agree with those who say “good riddance” to Jan Kemp. She was nothing but a trouble maker anyway.
By CAS
December 9, 2008 7:35 AM | Link to this
Being an Alumni of UGa, I just want to say thanks to Jan Kemp for what you did. You changed the face of UGa Sports for the better.
By NCAA Rules Committee
December 9, 2008 7:41 AM | Link to this
Shouldn’t there be an asterisk beside UGA’s 1980 National Championship similar to the one we want for Bonds’ Homerun record.
It could state…
UGA’s national championship was won with players that should not have graduated High School but UGA decided to offer them football scholarships to keep them from becoming “Garbagemen”. Georgia rigged their only National Championship also in part by buying “dyslexic Hershel” with a brand new Transam. Talk about a joke of a school. For further details see Jim Harrick, Jr.
By PA
December 9, 2008 7:47 AM | Link to this
There were guys on that 1980 team who were seniors with regards to playing eligibility, but sophmores academically.
By Z. Itchy
December 9, 2008 8:01 AM | Link to this
She’s just a typical liberal, as are you Jeffrey. Instead of trying to improve things to make more programs successful, they’d rather bring the successful down and spread the misery. Women’s sports just don’t attract the same audience as football. Whatta ya gonna do? Just swallow it and get over it. But you can save yourself, professionally, Jeff. Start being an actual journalist instead of just a news employee. There are always, always two sides to every story.
By Gene
December 9, 2008 8:08 AM | Link to this
Jeff provides a good assessment of academics at Georgia and elsewhere. Anyone who thinks that things have changed need only look back a few years to the Basketball 101 disaster. Adams personally admitted Tony Coles to the university, an addition that even the disreputable Jim Harrick opposed. Coles had been trouble everywhere, and there was no indication that he would be different at UGA. Adams is the garden-variety fund raiser and overpaid politician. He is in no way an educator. Coaches have learned to place athletes in classes taught by graduate assistants, who have no job security. A few years ago, a Georgia football player roughed up a teaching assistant who caught him cheating with a cell phone. She intended to file assault charges, but backed off when she learned that her assistantship would evaporate. It is the job of academic coordinators at Georgia and elsewhere to keep the Thurmans and Ellerbes, out of classes taught by tenured professors who would resist academic tampering—not that any of these non students would aspire to credit coursework. There are some real student-athletes at Georgia and elsewhere. If the NCAA enforced academic standards in a uniform manner, the quality of play on the field would not change much. Strict academic standards and an atmosphere of discipline would probably reduce criminal arrests that presently run around 10 percent for football scholarship players at Georgia. It is just a matter of time before one of Richt’s gun-packing problem children kills someone, to Adams’ shock and dismay.
By The Voice
December 9, 2008 8:21 AM | Link to this
While Hale Almond’s opening statement in the trial may seem offensive to some the truth is that he was right. Many atheletes at UGA then as now were given opportunities they would never had otherwise. What is the injustice in that? I don’t want to kick a corpse but we must also remember the Jan Kemp served a lengthy jail sentence after the case because of refusing to follow court orders in a child custody case. When we speak of Jan Kemp we are not speaking of a hero. Rather we are speaking of a troubled woman that besmirched a great institution and caused a great deal of hardship to some fine individuals who did much, much, more for the Univeristy of Georgia in five minutes than Jan Kemp did in her whole tenure.
By T
December 9, 2008 8:50 AM | Link to this
WOW Jeff… this article is your best work !!!
By keniboy
December 9, 2008 8:54 AM | Link to this
compared to congress the indiscretions of the NCAA are minor but lousy. ms. kemp seems to have done what she thought was right, leveling the field, so to speak. RIP
By NoDooleyStatue
December 9, 2008 9:12 AM | Link to this
What a sick group of people. You were really proud to have a football team of illiterates as long as you were winning. You not only didn’t have a problem with the coach responsible for the mess, you honor him by erecting a statue of him at the stadium. I am so glad Tech beat you on that day, you don’t deserve to ever win a game as long as there is a statue of that piece of excrement!
By Mike Fulford
December 9, 2008 9:38 AM | Link to this
Jan Kemp’s passing is a sad day for academic integrity at UGA. As we erect a statue of Vince Dooley riding off on his players shoulders, I observe this strange twist of logic at a university. Coaches use players to better themselves. Faculty use themselves to better their students. We herald the coach and scorn the faculty member. Only 1% of the college players will ever play pro and make money. Less than 45% will graduate. That is a huge gap filled with ex-football players that were never given a true perspective or real support by a system that uses them to make millions for coaches and billions for the media.
In the middle of an economic crisis where everyone is being asked to cut back and people are being laid off, we will some how make sure that Paul Johnson, Mark Richt, and other coaches still make millions to coach. We will still make sure that Georgia State spends the full $10.4 million dollars to start its football program which will only lose money in the end.
Jan Kemp refused to be bullied by this machine that has evolved called college football. In the end, she died because of it.
By Kevin
December 9, 2008 9:41 AM | Link to this
BirdMahn is the type of fan that never graced a single hall on any institution of higher learning. UGA has too many of these types of fans, actually; fans that we would all be better off without.
By LaBrawnDaBrain, PhD
December 9, 2008 9:45 AM | Link to this
The creature called intercollegiate athletics has always been a mixed-breed, multi-headed beast. At some universities, one could ask whether the academic managers or the athletic department managers are the greatest influence on campus. Where athletics dominates, it is the fault of weak academic leaders. American culture recognizes only one place, first, whether in scholarship competition or the athletic arena. Tangible signs around most schools seem to indicate a preference for athletic success. I would be curious to see the sales figures for t-shirts, car tags, flags and stickers extolling the number of Rhodes scholars at dear old alma mammy. To compete for first place, institutions of higher learning must admit athletes who would never qualify under a school’s admission standards for non-athletes. This is also the case at some high schools. Admissions policies for athletes do vary from one school to the next; some private schools set and enforce higher standards. Many state universities use the NCAA minimum standard as their gate keeper. Jan Kemp exposed conditions that were bad for UGA and the young people who were placed in developmental studies. The Kemp media frenzy played a small role in the NCAA’s effort to prohibit the practice of permitting athletic department academic advisors to assign athletes to remedial and/or introductory-level courses for three or four years. Current NCAA rules require scholarship athletes to pass a minimum number of credit hours that can be applied toward matriculation of some type. Nevertheless, this, and other NCAA rules are fraught with loopholes. So, my fellow literate sports fans, lend your support to the point or points along the academic-athletic continuum you feel most compatible with.
By HH
December 9, 2008 9:47 AM | Link to this
To Gene et al:
If you really want to improve academic excellence at the college and university level, do away with tenure. That disgusting practice allows worthless, overpaid academics to continue their parasitic existence at the expense of individuals who contribute much more to the worth of the institution than the “tenured” professor who has nothing better to do than to decompose as he or she sits in his or her office.
It’s time for the academic institutions in the US to be cleansed of the worthless and the “dead” once and for all.
By doggone
December 9, 2008 9:57 AM | Link to this
I don’t know where you guys get your info about academic standards at Georgia but I know that we loose players all the time because they don’t make the academic grades. I know it’s not perfect, but UGA athletes are expected to make the grade and there is NO evidence that anyone is getting a “free pass”. We also have as good or better graduation rates as the “Recreation Science” majors at the North Avenue Trade School.
By typical bulldawg fan
December 9, 2008 9:57 AM | Link to this
To hell with all this skoolin crap, we need to win more football games! UGA is the best semi pro team in colledge footbawl!!!
Whooo Hoooo!!!
National champs in 09!!!
Please come back stanford and moreeno!!!
we love you!!!
By Tell It Like It Is
December 9, 2008 10:21 AM | Link to this
Its too bad that we do not have more Jan Kemps around especially in primary and secondary schools. If they were, we would not have all the special classes for athletes(Urban Studies, General Studies, etc.) in college. Athletic programs are not trying to create good citizens as the athletic directors and coaches try portray. They are being hired and fired based on winning and losing. Every one gets paid except the athletes. It is big business. Colleges are nothing but plantations for mostly black athletes with professional contracts being their goal and not a good eduacation.
The coaches make millions and that’s why they are so concerned about their players. The players are investments. The investment is good as long as they play well and win. If they lose or are injured, then they are discarded as bad investments. Ask Fulmer, Tuberville and Grooms about why they were shown the door. Their investments(players) did not win. Why not call it like it is.
By Aghast
December 9, 2008 10:22 AM | Link to this
Okay, Georgia fans; It’s “losing” on Saturday, not “loosing”. Also, you do not “loose” players because they cannot live up to academic standards, you “lose” them. The spelling and grammar used on these posts by UGA fans pretty much says it all.
By Old GT Nut
December 9, 2008 10:31 AM | Link to this
It is profound irony that just a couple of days apart, a massive bronze statue of Vince Dooley is unvailed, and Jan Kemp passes away after a debilitating illness.
Some of the comments posted here are simply shocking beyond description.
Among many(but certainly not all) UGA fans & alums, one is hailed as a hero, while the other is villified as evil incarnate and even cussed in death. It seems like UGA(mascot) is held in higher regard, than someone, like Kemp, who was UNWILLING to compromise her personal & professional integrity.
Her family should rightly be proud of such a defining and NOBLE legacy she has left to them.
In ALL aspects of Life, you are either for Truth & Integrity, or you are not. You either respect Honesty & Ethics, or you do not. You either have character, or you do not.
Some of these posts reflect the appreciation for personal integrity, while some of these posts are profoundly disturbing…like HH who proclaims “I pay my money to see my team win,” or The Voice who says that Hale Almond’s opening comment to the jury was right. People like HH and The Voice and others like them see ALL PEOPLE as simply chattel, nothing more. To them, peoplpe in general, including athletes, are simply “disposable.”
You will NEVER, EVER see the likes of HH or The Voice or those like them, appear IN PUBLIC to make the same kinds of statements they are posting here, because they themselves would be publicly villified for spouting such aggregious attitudes and opinions that reflect the Darkness of their Character.
As for Warner Todd Huston who proposes that “Sports teach nothing at all.” Wow. I mean…WOW!! Go seek mental health care immediately, because you need it…badly.
The fact that opinions about the whole Jan Kemp affais are as polarized now as they were then, speaks to the greater issue of the differences between those who believe in Truth, no matter how inconvenient, and those that use the Truth and their fellow man as a disposable item.
By Wow
December 9, 2008 11:23 AM | Link to this
I knew when I read of Jan Kemp’s passing yesterday that it would cause some embarrassing opinions from rabid Dawg fans. RIP Ms. Kemp. She did the right thing.
As for all you self-righteous rival fans, please. It was embarrassing for UGA, but most rational, honest folks know that Kemp’s actions caused the folks at schools across the nation to quietly scramble to make some changes.
To the UF fan: the Gators spent the entire decade of the 80s on probation. I mean, seriously.
Techies: I remember Joe Burns, and you can bet there were many more before him and will be after him. You self-righteous folks need to quit kidding yourselves too. Tech has no doubt pushed athletes through, just as UF, AU, Bama, and every other institution of higher learning that has rabid fanbases. It is what it is.
Great piece Jeff! Other than the embarrassing responses from Dawg fans (I am in fact an alum), it was a sad but true commentary on where we are with how we treat college athletes and probably elite athletes in general.
By DawgGirl32
December 9, 2008 11:29 AM | Link to this
Ummm let’s be real here. This is not just a “UGA” problem. This is a problem at MANY D-1 schools with major sports programs. No other schools need to come on this blog preaching- your schools are probably doing the same thing. That’s the sad reality, and unfortunately, I don’t see it changing anytime soon. C’mon, admit it. If we suddenly started recruiting straight A students and losing all of our football games, the majority of the UGA fanbase would be unhappy. It’s sad, but it’s true. The upside is that we’re giving our athletes academic opportunities that they might not have otherwise had. Those people who are saying “good riddance” and other nonsense probably aren’t and never were students so don’t generalize what they say to be the thoughts of the university.
By NCAA Enforcement Division
December 9, 2008 11:36 AM | Link to this
Wrong, we are always watching schools that have gone on probation due to institutional control issues. I can guarantee that any school that loosens the control of the athletic department, and returns to their old ways will be investigated immediately. Their penalty will be much harsher the second (or more) times around. Jan Kemp was a whistle blower to the NCAA, but believe this, we have folks reporting to us from every major NCAA member in the country.
By Oh of Course
December 9, 2008 11:44 AM | Link to this
Of course you fail, Jeff, to mention Tech’s own student athlete woes.. of course.. I mean, thats why they just “forgot” about a couple seasons worth of games…I think they call it a forfeit. Take another shot at the biggest target. Forget about the North Ave Trade school whose business management degree requires NO freaking math courses.. cute..
By Wow
December 9, 2008 11:46 AM | Link to this
NCAA Enforcement Division?!? lol, love it!
By The Ole Ball Coach
December 9, 2008 11:47 AM | Link to this
Jeff, Jeff, Jeff,
You are biased Write an article about Reggie Bush Chair staking U, The OSU, ther non punished NCAA violations at least UGA paid and still is paying. Ask Georgia Tech about their past issues write something about that?????????? U never will.
By Jason
December 9, 2008 11:50 AM | Link to this
AJC could post a headline reading something like “Tree falls in the woods” or “Study finds rice to be bland” and all it would do would be a chance for all you stupid morons to find a way to make it a forum of rabid chest pounding about which team is better than the others…get a life. Here’s a thought, log off, look for a job, get back into the workforce and give yourself something to do besides live in these forums.
www.careerbuilder.com www.monster.com
you do the rest.
By DawgGirl32
December 9, 2008 12:04 PM | Link to this
Wow Jason. Stupid morons? The majority of people on here are having intelligent discussion about a pretty serious issue that our university faces. Don’t post on this blog and then tell other people to get a life when they do the same. Thanks for the website references, though. I’m sure everyone on here will listen to your great advice.
By DawgGirl32
December 9, 2008 12:06 PM | Link to this
Wow Jason. Stupid morons? The majority of people on here are having an intelligent discussion about a pretty serious issue that our university faces. Don’t post on this blog and then tell other people to get a life when they do the same. Thanks for the website references, though. I’m sure everyone on here will listen to your great advice.
By scdawg
December 9, 2008 12:20 PM | Link to this
Dooley was forced to bring in black players, it was the law of the land, UGA had to fill its quota. These players, while coming out of tough backgrounds, had to be utilized because the NAACP was watching. And those black players did more to help the intergration transition work smoothly in America than all the Jan Kemps in the world did. If she had her way they would have been sent back home.
By Poodles-R-Dogs-Too
December 9, 2008 12:45 PM | Link to this
Those uga fans are nasty, I urge the authorities to do a full autoposy on Jan, especially a toxicology screen for neurotoxins like tetraethyl lead and other heavy metals…I would not put poisioning past them.
By Hungry Dawg
December 9, 2008 1:16 PM | Link to this
Poodles-R-Dogs-Too Get off the computer and give me fries with that. Are you working window 1 or 2?
By HH
December 9, 2008 1:21 PM | Link to this
To: OldGTNut:
I assure you that I have no problem stating my opinions in public. At my point in life, I don’t have to worry about what anyone thinks or cares. It is irrelevant. I would tell you to your face the same thing, and you would do nothing about it—-that is if you had good sense.
So far as I am concerned, people like you have no concept of reality. Your self-righteous blather amounts to not a tinker’s damn.
This is the 21st century and I suggest you wake up to that fact. It is people like you that have caused the US to degenerate to the level of an undisciplined society such as it is now fast becomming.
Everyone knows that in the US in the past 40 years, the academic standards have been dumbed down to the point where they are almost laughable. The plain fact of the matter is, the student-athlete who goes to school to get an education will and those who go for other reasons won’t.
So, go ahead and morally pontificate all you please. See how much good it will do.
HH
PS: I suggest the Chinese, the German, and the Russians languages be more emphasized in US academics in the future. It may very well pay off.
By Kemp Had Integrity Vince doesnt
December 9, 2008 1:23 PM | Link to this
From ESPN today…
Kemp’s lawsuit helped bring academic reform to college sports
Associated Press Updated: December 9, 2008, 11:21 AM ET
ATHENS, Ga. — Jan Kemp, the University of Georgia professor who was fired after publicly criticizing the university for allowing athletes who failed remedial classes to continue playing sports and stay in school, has died. She was 59.
Kemp’s lawsuit to get reinstated led to sweeping reforms at UGA and helped lead to tougher academic standards for athletes nationwide.
Her 26-year-old son, Will Kemp, said his mother was pronounced dead Thursday at an Athens nursing home of complications from Alzheimer’s disease. He described his mother as a person who wanted to cure injustice.
“My mom didn’t do it for the attention,” he said about her battle against the state university, where he is currently enrolled. “It was in her nature. If she saw something unfair, she would always handle it.”
Kemp was fired from the university in 1982. She sued in federal court the following year, claiming she was targeted because she protested UGA’s preferential treatment of athletes. The jury awarded her $2.57 million in 1986, though that was later reduced to $1.08 million. Kemp was reinstated.
Before the Kemp case, athletes with SAT scores that reflected little academic prowess were routinely admitted to Georgia. Today, all NCAA schools must adhere to standards on test scores, grade-point averages and the type of courses taken in high school.
“I love the University of Georgia. I love the years I’ve worked there, and I’m looking forward to returning,” she told The Associated Press in May 1986.
But the shake-up made Kemp a pariah, especially among football fans. A newspaper columnist once wrote Kemp should be “the next teacher in space” — not long after Christa McAuliffe, an elementary school teacher chosen by NASA’s Teacher in Space Project, died in the shuttle Challenger explosion.
Kemp, a former English teacher, retired from the university on disability after suffering a back injury from a car accident in 1990. Will Kemp said his mother moved into a nursing home two years ago.
ARTICLE: Outrageous comments from Georgia’s Adams By Terence Moore; Thursday, October 12, 2006
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
You had that silly revolt by Georgia boosters over the ouster of Vince Dooley as athletics director. Folks continue to turn the deepest shades of red and black over tailgating changes at home football games. And who is this guy to take the “cocktail” out of whatever he now wishes to call the Georgia-Florida game?
During the hugely controversial decade that Michael Adams has served as president at the University of Georgia, he has been less popular around the Bulldog Nation than fleas in Uga VI’s doghouse. Maybe that’s why he appeased his barking (as in those against him and those for the Bulldogs) critics with two of the most outrageous comments of the year.
No, ever.
Let’s start with this: According to the latest NCAA statistics for a six-year period that began during the late 1990s, when Adams came to Georgia, the graduation rate for Bulldogs football players was 41 percent. That was the worst in the SEC, which isn’t the Cradle of Rhodes Scholars among athletes. The graduation rate for Georgia basketball players was nine percent, the second-worst among the 319 Division I schools.
Even so, Adams told the AJC last week that Georgia would continue to accept some student-athletes who didn’t meet the university’s admission requirements because, “We still have to compete in the [Southeastern Conference].”
Was Adams speaking freely, or was he being dangled over the edge of Sanford Stadium by a dog collar? I mean, surely he didn’t mean to say what he was quoted as saying. Not with Georgia barely free of that Harrick mess. Adams hired the older Harrick, Jim, who hired his son, Jim Jr., who taught that infamous course at Georgia called “Coaching Principles and Strategies of Basketball.” You know, with multiple-choice questions such as, “How many points does a 3-point basket account for in a basketball game?”
This also is the same Georgia athletics department that was exposed during the 1980s as a plantation system in the Jan Kemp scandal. Back then, the objective was to use a slew of remedial courses to keep as many studs playing for the Bulldogs as possible, just as long as they could identify an “X” from an “O.” Back then, the feeling among the Bulldog Nation was that, “We still have to compete in the [Southeastern Conference].”
Guess Adams was speaking freely, because three days after he was quoted as making that statement, he wrote a lengthy op-ed piece in the AJC. He stressed his displeasure with those graduation rates of Georgia athletes, and he mentioned his commitment to getting it right with a $7 million center on campus dedicated to helping the student-athlete. The thing is, while boasting that “at-risk student-athletes” are given mentors by the university, he delivered his other outrageous comment: “… yes, we have made an institutional decision to be competitive in the Southeastern Conference, and therefore recruit some students who require academic assistance.”
It is what it is, and it is about gobbledygook when you have Georgia saying this week that the graduation success rate (GSR) for its athletics department isn’t as important as the academic progress rate (APR). What Georgia’s APR shows is that, over the past three years, no player is in danger of losing his or her eligibility. Which means they likely will be around to help what Adams is saying with those two outrageous comments: To appease the barkers, Georgia doesn’t want too much of this academic stuff to get in the way of winning SEC football games.
University of Hartford President Walt Harrison paused over the phone from Connecticut. Not only is he the chairman of the NCAA committee on academic performance, he is the chairman of the NCAA executive board that also features Adams. “First, a disclaimer: I don’t think there is a president in the country that I admire more than Mike. I just think that he’s a tremendous academic leader, and I consider him a friend,” Harrison said. “If he was somebody I didn’t know, I might have a different feeling about it. But I don’t think that [not letting academics get in the way of winning SEC football games] is exactly what he was saying.”
I didn’t think so, either. But Adams said so twice. In different ways. Within three days, and to the same newspaper.
By Algonquin J. Calhoun
December 9, 2008 1:28 PM | Link to this
“We may not make a university student out of him, but if we teach him to read and write, maybe he can work at the post office rather than as a garbage man …”
No noble intent can be imputed to the motives so flimsily hidden in this statement. This is plantation mentality exhibited for all to see. That sort of thinking did not die back in the eighties. It flourishes today. Big-time college football is professional football and the schools get rich off it, while the players get nothing. Pay the players, on the table and not under it, and stop the hypocrisy! The schools, the TV networks, the sponsors all make hundreds of millions off the work of people being paid nothing or next to it. This is the concept of slavery. Stop it!
By Massdawg
December 9, 2008 2:02 PM | Link to this
It was painful but Jan Kemp did the right thing. I was at UGA when it happened. I am as rabid a Dawg fan as there is and it was embarrassing when this came to light but everyone knew it was going on. What wasn’t pointed out in the article or the subsequent posts was the requirements afterwards for Georgia. It was not against the rules to take non-qualifiers. They had to get qualified after enrolled. What Kemp exposed was the sham of getting them qualified. Afterwards Georgia stopped taking non-qualifiers. Only Vandy and UGA did this for years. Put us at a disadvantage but it spoke loudly as to what was more important. UGA is one of only 3 schools from the SEC listed as a top 80 school in US News rankings. That says something about who we compete against each year (the others are FLA and Vandy).
By PADAWGFAN
December 9, 2008 2:40 PM | Link to this
I am a little surprised at home much venom this article has caused. Living in the Pittsburgh area, I of course have no idea what happens on the campus of UGA. But since I do have a college degree from an BCS member school that loves college sports as much as the next school. I can tell you that there are IDIOTS that have no business on a college campus everywhere. This includes athletes and non-athletes. Also for all of you who seem to not like big time college sports and the athletes that play them….You can always choose not to watch!
By Red Elephant
December 9, 2008 3:30 PM | Link to this
People, come back to reality. Stop being so naive. Football players are recruited to play football. Period. Open your eyes……I don’t like it, but it is reality. I had a friend on the UVA team in the late 80’s-early 90’s. He told me a prominent player on the offensive side of the ball could barely read….This was at THE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA!!!!!
By Algonquin J. Calhoun
December 9, 2008 3:40 PM | Link to this
Big-time college sports is not amateur athletics. If it were recruitment would not be necessary. Schools would field teams of whomever elected to attend and go out for the various teams. That’s not the way it is! Schools hire coaches on the basis of their ability to recruit because landing the talented athlete is the first step in making a team successful. In order to do this coaches, and their assistants and alumni backers, will violate and circumvent any rule or law that stands in their way. the only thing that matters is putting together a winning team. The athlete may not be academically qualified and he may have previously transgressed laws of the land but that doesn’t enter into the equation. Can he play? If the answer is yes then he’s qualified. These athletes are used for the benefit of the colleges, the coaches, the television entities, the sponsors, etc. When they are out of eligibility, if they aren’t good enough for the pros, they are out of luck. Many don’t graduate or have any sort of skills to show for their time in the university system. Dexter Manley, and I doubt he’s alone, couldn’t even read after college. Purely, simply, this is a plantation system where people work hard for ole Massa and get nothing out of it for themselves. As for watching it, I do. It’s entertaining but it’s time to change it. college football is professional football for everyone connected to it except the guys who play it. Stop the hypocrisy and get off the backs of the people putting hundreds of millions into the accounts of ole Massa!
By TheVoice
December 9, 2008 4:02 PM | Link to this
A few items about the whole “Kemp Scandal” that one never hears. During the time of all the abuses a player named Tyrone Sorells was dismissed from UGA for academic reasons. He enrolled at TECH and played for Bill “I’m So Ethical” Curry.
Another forgotten item was that the Kemp verdict was overturned. The settlement she received was an out of court settlement from UGA to prevent the ugliness of another trial.
By the way Old GT Nut.. I have aired many of these thoughts in public and will do so again if need be. The truth is the truth. And for the record I probably have more sheepskin on my wall than you, in fact I’ve had a couple of good Tech grads work for me.
By Pitbull
December 9, 2008 4:20 PM | Link to this
I am not surprised that Ms. Kemp never taught again at a major university.
Whistleblowers may or may not be admirable, but they usually end up having difficulty getting anyone else to hire them.
It is interesting that she would move back to Athens after all of the negative feelings towards her.
I seem to recall an AJC story on her being jailed in Cobb County in the early 1990’s for something related to her divorce and her kids after the UGA thing.
That was the last I ever heard of her until this. Sounds like her life got rough for her after she left UGA.
Jeff, how about a full length article on the scandal at Tech where 11 academically ineligable football players were on the team for 7 years and resulted in a 3 year NCAA probation?
I never got the full story from the AJC, which just seemed to gloss over it.
Perhaps you could interview Shane Olivett, Larry New, and Mike Knobler. If you need some details, here is some help:
Ex-adviser alleges Tech Coverup Clough, Braine named in suit by former academic adviser
By MIKE KNOBLER The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Published on: 03/01/06
President Wayne Clough, athletics director Dave Braine and another Georgia Tech official deliberately concealed some of the NCAA violations that led to the school being put on NCAA probation, a former Tech academic adviser alleges in a wrongful termination lawsuit.
Tech, already stung by the May 2003 announcement it had dismissed 10 football players from school, decided it couldn’t afford the public relations hit it would take from further academic bad news, Shane Olivett’s suit alleges
The suit seeks Olivett’s reinstatement and unspecified monetary damages from the Georgia Tech Athletic Association, Clough, Braine and senior associate athletics director Larry New. The suit, filed last week in Fulton County Superior Court, represents one side of a legal argument.
The NCAA infractions committee found Tech guilty of a lack of institutional control over its athletics program but did not charge the school with intentionally concealing rules violations.
“It’s unbelievable he’d accuse the president of a university of a cover-up,” Braine said Tuesday. “[The NCAA] looked at it. There was never any intent to cover up anything. It’s unbelievable he would say that. He might end up being sued for libel.”
At a July 2003 meeting to discuss the eligibility of five or six football players, football coach Chan Gailey “explained that he could not weather another academic-related scandal and try to recruit quality student-athletes to Georgia Tech,” the suit says. “Defendant New repeatedly warned Defendant Braine that another eligibility scandal, if brought to the public’s attention, would ruin Georgia Tech’s athletic and academic reputations.”
Olivett argued Tech had an obligation to self-report rules violations, but Braine and New rejected his advice, the suit says. Clough, who was not present at the meeting, and Braine “made the decision to conceal these facts from the NCAA and the public,” the suit says.
Less than a year later, the NCAA enforcement staff learned of Tech’s rules violations via an anonymous tip and informed the school, which conducted an audit of its athletes’ academic records.
In the end, the NCAA ruled Tech had allowed 17 ineligible athletes in four sports to compete. Tech and the NCAA said the violations were inadvertent, and Tech blamed its failure to uncover the problem in 2003 on communications failures within the department.
The NCAA characterized Tech’s 2003 self-investigation as “inadequate,” but the NCAA never accused the school of intentionally committing or concealing any wrongdoing. Clough and Olivett did not immediately respond to telephone calls seeking comment Tuesday afternoon.
New and Gailey declined to comment. The NCAA enforcement staff interviewed Olivett during its investigation of Tech. Olivett’s suit alleges Braine “chastised” him for what he said to the NCAA and the athletics department stripped him of duties, restricted his computer access and threatened him with firing “should he continue to uncover and call attention to the eligibility issues plaguing the Georgia Tech football program.”
Olivett worked at Tech from October 2002 until June 2005. He now coordinates academic advising in the Akron athletics department.
Olivett’s suit claims Tech violated his First Amendment right to free speech, his 14th Amendment right to due process and his rights under Georgia’s whistleblower law. Mistreatment by Tech caused him “severe emotional distress, mental anguish, and humiliation,” his suit alleges.
Tech is appealing some of its NCAA sanctions, including cuts in football scholarships for the 2006 and 2007 seasons and a requirement to wipe past seasons from the record books. Tech has begun a two-year probation, its first ever.
Braine is retiring for health reasons; new athletics director Dan Radakovich is scheduled to begin work by April 1.
By Algonquin J. Calhoun
December 9, 2008 5:23 PM | Link to this
Ms. Kemp worked at UGA but this story was, and is, applicable to any of the big-time universities. Pointing a finger at Ga. Tech, while probably accurate, misses the meaning. It’s the entirety of the big-time athletic schools that are guilty, not just UGA. Football is a product for sale. The schools, television networks, sponsors and coaches reap millions and the players get nothing. Football players can not go directly from high school to the monopolistic NFL. They must go to college. The colleges use the players and give no financial compensation. Any way you cut it, this is a plantation system and it’s time to acknowledge it and abolish it!
By Dogbyte
December 9, 2008 7:31 PM | Link to this
No matter how long you beat a dead horse(no pun)you can’t turn it into fillet.
By Dogbyte
December 9, 2008 8:12 PM | Link to this
Wipe that smile off your face, Schultz. People are not looking at you. They are checking out that crotch-shot over your head.
By Dogbyte
December 9, 2008 8:15 PM | Link to this
Now it’s gone. The censor-natzi has been at work.
By Appalled
December 9, 2008 8:48 PM | Link to this
As someone who knew Dr. Kemp, I am appalled at how venomous some of you still are towards her. She loved UGA, and lived in Athens all her life, and for every redneck jerk who came up to her in the grocery store to cuss at her and harass her, there were two more who would come up and thank her for what she did. It’s a college. Education comes first. These players were being done a huge disservice by the institutions of the NCAA by being passed through classes when they weren’t even functionally literate. If they didn’t make it onto the NFL, what kind of future did they have in front of them? They didn’t. Dr. Kemp did her best to change that, for the benefit of the students. Those of you who claim she only did it to protect her own job obviously do not know Dr. Kemp. Dr. Kemp was an advocate for the disenfranchised, the abused, and the powerless for all her life. She was a fixture in regional courts, lending support to battered women seeking to escape their husbands. How dare you speak so poorly of a woman who, while troubled, was a crusader for what she felt was right. Dr. Kemp never compromised her morals, and for that, I am forever grateful. Thank you, Jan, for everything. May you find your eternal reward in Heaven.
By Hillbilly Deluxe
December 9, 2008 10:43 PM | Link to this
Maybe the NFL should pay for its own minor leagues like MLB does.
By Dr. Vajajay
December 10, 2008 9:41 AM | Link to this
That’s what we need: more football leagues. I cant believe arena football is still around. What for? It’s just a backyard scrimmage that we all played all our lives. Remember? Those melees would be interrupted by moms hollering that dinner was ready? That was halftime. then we’d all meet up in about a half hour for the second half, which was over when it was too dark and the dads would be yelling that it’s bedtime.
Unless the game ended over a “he stepped out of bounds, no he didn’t, yes he did” fight.
If only us sandlotters had instant replay back then, we would have got in more football time. (actually, I would have settled for cheerleaders).
By ACC
December 10, 2008 10:50 AM | Link to this
To the person who said: “Forget about the North Ave Trade school whose business management degree requires NO freaking math courses.. cute..”
You have no clue what you are talking about. You have to take calculus as a management major along with a science (Physics, Chemistry, Biology),computer programming, statistics.
At least the players who do graduate at Tech have real majors. Take a look at the UGA roster and majors. What the f*ck is a Consumer Economics major? Does that teach you how to buy groceries? Cute. And Stafford is probably really challenged in his Speech Communication major. Does that teach him how to communicate/talk? Cute.
By Daddy-O
December 10, 2008 1:20 PM | Link to this
As a UGA graduate from the Jan Kemp era who now lives in the Midwest, I am very proud of Jan Kemp and what she did.
I have recounted the Jan Kemp story scores of times over the years…usually after someone tried to engage me in a “sports at all cost” conversation. And I don’t stop at “Fred Davidson lost his job”. I include the Vice President of Acidemic Affairs, Virginia Trotter and the head of the remedial studies program. I also mention the influence she had on the entire NCAA farm system.
The athletic department should have a “JK” embroidered on their uniforms for the next 20 years.
Daddy-O UGA ‘77 & ‘84
By character still matters
December 10, 2008 2:07 PM | Link to this
Daddy-O & Appalled:
a well written statement on integrity
forget the vitriolic diatribes of dinosaurs like birdman, dog44, hh and voice
By The Voice
December 10, 2008 4:21 PM | Link to this
To character still matters:
You are correct on the importance of integrity. I certainly lament the loss of Jan Kemp’s life. Further I regret that she passed at such a young age from such a hideous disease. My heart goes out to her family. All I have said in my posts is that we need to remember all the facts when it comes to Jan Kemp. There are always two sides to a story and all of the facts of the Kemp case need to be discussed. Selective memory is a terrible thing. If we want to talk about integrity lets talk about all the facts and not a select few. I don’t believe that makes one a “dinosaur” and that certainly isn’t a “vitriolic diatribe.”
By Boo Boo
December 10, 2008 4:49 PM | Link to this
From 1988 to 2001. Twelve years to go from one embarassment to another. That was when UGAs lust for national basketball prominence (to go along with football prominence, and baseball, and gymnastics, and tennis; and basically any sport, with all educational prominence a waste of time) led to the exposure of courses designed for basketball players (not college students), with final exam questions like:
How many quarters are in a high school basketball game?
Plus,
How many halves in a college football game?
These questions had multiple choice answers.
Yes, the University of Georgia has come a long way since Jan Kemp blew her whistle. So far that they are now again nothing but a small part of the grease and stain that coveres the floor of NCAA athletics. UGA is dirt just like all the other schools that just luckily always attract the biggest, fastest, strongest athletes in the nation to go to their schools. These boys and girls, who often lack basic skills, skills like basic reading, basic math, basic science, like basic education, could benefit from some institution teaching those skills to them; but that should not be the focus of a college or university. Public schools teach those skills to students that actually show up to learn, rather than drop out of school and practice playing games at the park playground. Colleges and universities certainly should not take a seat away from a true student seeking higher education, to take on the role of basic educator to the uneducated. They certainly should not raise the cost of a seat for a student accepted for enrollment at a college or university, one who has given the effort (and trained to learn) to become educated enough for higher education.
Jan Kemp simply alarmed us how sick America had become in 1988. Rather than treat that illness, we just turned off the alarm. Now look at us.
By Michael
December 10, 2008 9:27 PM | Link to this
Issues like Jan Kemp are why I was disgusted with the talk of firing Dennis Felton after the last basketball season. He started kicking off players who apparently were talented but weren’t willing to play by the rules. Had he pulled a Jim Harrick, he may have won a lot more games. But he went the high road and has gained my respect.
Jeff’s comment about powerful boosters getting coaches fired seems to be aimed right at Auburn and Bobby Lowder. He has poisoned that school for a long time and will continue to with his micromanagement of the athletics. Auburn has now fired two football coaches with undefeated seasons within 5 years of such accomplishment. At least Tennessee waited a decade after Fulmer’s national title to can him.
By Kevin
December 11, 2008 6:43 AM | Link to this
It goes to show that Birdmahn and most Georgia Fans never attended the University or any other higher educational institution. The woman did the right thing and that is what she will be remembered for. I can imagine what the comments will be when Birdmahn passes away.
By Straynger
December 11, 2008 8:55 AM | Link to this
Those knumbskulls that run colleges and their athletics programs will never put the athlete first. A college scholarship is worth so many hours of course work towards a degree and you are not allowed do overs if you fail. I played football in college and fully understand the sacrifice the athlete makes especially when its their turn to represent the school in their respective sports. Trying to study when your body screams for rest is a major undertaking for a kid fresh out of high school. And for all you ultra conservatives in the “Bulldog Nation,” what Jan Kemp did was saved the Ga. tax payer a truck load of money by getting more bang for their bucks by allowing deserving STUDENT-athletes with a good chance of graduating the opportunity to do so. Basketball 101? Everybody knows there are three qtrs in a college basketball game. THANK YOU JAN KEMP FOR ALL DID FOR US!