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Is it legal to not hire someone because they have tattoos?

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Is it legal to not hire someone because they have tattoos?

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In recent years there has been an increase in the number of reported cases of employees taking legal action against employers for discrimination relating to their appearance. Claimants have only succeeded where their appearance has been linked to a protected attribute.
In Australia
The Human Rights Commission in Australia states that an Employer can legally set rules regarding the appearance of employees in the workplace. However, it is important to ensure that any such rules do not amount to discrimination.

Discrimination is against the law when people are treated unfairly because of a personal attribute that is protected by law, including race, sex and gender identity.

Discrimination can happen when employers put in place conditions or requirements which appear to treat everyone fairly but which actually disadvantage some people because of a personal attribute they share.

An example: Say you have a policy to refuse to hire any worker with visible tattoos, even for roles that involved no customer contact. You could find yourself liable for racial discrimination if a Maori job applicant who had a tattoo for reasons connected to his ethnic origin was not hired because of his tattoo.

Some lawyers in Victoria are of the opinion that tattoos may be considered a physical feature and protected by the Equal Opportunity Act 2010. This has yet to be tested in court.

The Equal Opportunity Commission of SA web site currently states that "it is not discrimination to ask staff to cover tattoos if they are serving customers."

"You can set a reasonable standard of dress and appearance that suits your industry, as long as you do not discriminate. A dress code is discriminatory if it treats one group of people less favourably than another, and it is unreasonable to do so". Interestingly the EOC states that asking men to wear ties and women to wear skirts may be sex discrimination
Overseas
A case for Starbucks in America hit a snag when a male was sacked for having tattoos. The issue was that female workers also had tattoos and kept their jobs.

Female worker tattoos are generally considered "less offensive" because they are usually "more cute", for example flowers. Employers seeking to allow these tattoos will need to outline in policies what their definition of "offensive" is.

In the UK, a similar ruling is found in their Equality Act 2010. In this Act, Tattoos and body piercings are specifically excluded from the definition of 'severe disfigurement'. In the UK primary teachers must have their tattoos covered, Metro police are banned from getting any visible tattoos and required to register all current tattoos.

In 2013, Air new Zealand was forced to public defend its rejection if a job applicant because she held a Maori tattoo, saying that it could frighten or intimidate travellers. The debate escalated into a national discussion with Politicians weighing in. The tattoo depicted her heritage (via a traditional ta moko tattoo) and her children. Although the airlines stance was deemed legal, it led to an internal review of the airlines standards for grooming and visible tattoos.
Tattoos are on the rise
Tattoo is a growing trend in Australia.

In the US more than one in three gen-nexters (18-25 year olds) has one or more tattoos.

Conversely just as many youngsters are getting them removed.

Two fifths of US thirty-something's are estimated to have a tattoo.

In the UK one in five Britons has a tattoo according to The British association of dermatologists.

Those looking to remove them for improving job prospects are mostly the not-so-proud owners of wrist and neck tattoos.

Currently tattoo removal requires anywhere from six to 15 treatments and cost between $180 and $300 per session. The process is painful. Practitioners are often only able to remove 95% of the tattoo depending on the age and color.
Why discriminate?
A study by Andrew Timing while at St Andrews University in England found that Words like "untidy", "repugnant" and unsavoury were all used to describe perception clients were likely to gain of the organisation if someone decorated in this way was hired.

Consensus from a poll on job seekers was that, unless you are in a very creative field, it is best to cover up tattoos during an in interview and definitely remove nose rings.

A common lament from young job seekers with visible tattoos, regardless of how good they are at their job, is the anti-tattoo corporate policies within large stores. On the flip side, many of these job seekers have taken this as motivation for higher education - and getting their tattoos removed once completed.

If it is very important for you to be employed at a place where showing tattoos are acceptable, then leaving then uncovered might be wiser.

That way you can gauge whether your particular tattoo is going to be a concern.
Many people employing gen-nexters are over the age of 50.
In their days, those with tattoos were the rough and tough sort of people.

A large majority had been in prison or were mentally ill.

Some high end retail stores surveyed stated that they would not hire a sales person with arm and hand tattoos. They stated that they have an image to uphold, and although many owners liked tattoos, they believed that many of their customers would not. They also saw a sales person's role as a stepping stone into management and could not see a manager with tattoos being taken seriously.
What are your thoughts?

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Is it legal to not hire someone because they have tattoos?

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In recent years there has been an increase in the number of reported cases of employees taking legal action against employers for discrimination relating to their appearance. Claimants have only succeeded where their appearance has been linked to a protected attribute.

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I applied and interviewed for a position at Victoria’s Secret once. The original position was for “customer service associate,” i.e. the store was looking for someone to fold clothes and setup...

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How Abercrombie Ended up Being Sued by 250,000 Employees - The Fashion Law

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How Abercrombie Ended up Being Sued by 250,000 Employees - The Fashion Law

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"A lot of people don't belong [in our clothes]," Mike Jeffries told Salon in 2006 explaining the culture of the brand he was tasked with overseeing at the time. "That's why we hire good-looking people in our stores. Good-looking people attract other good-looking people, and we want to market to cool, good-looking people. We don't market to anyone other than that."

That brand was Abercrombie & Fitch, of course, the traditional mall retailer known for its "clean and classic" apparel, its ad campaigns, complete with semi-nude models, and its explicitly exclusionary attitude. This is something Jeffries, who had been hired in 1992 to revamp the brand (following its bankruptcy and subsequent acquisition by Limited Brands in 1988), would freely admit. "Are we exclusionary?," he asks himself aloud. "Absolutely."

The rationale behind Jeffries' flippancy: "I don't want our core customers to see people who aren't as hot as them wearing our clothing."

Jeffries, himself, came of age in Los Angeles (hence, his bleach blonde hair and penchant for the word "dude") before studying at the London School of Economics and Columbia Business School, from which he would earn him MBA. He joined Abercrombie from Paul Harris, a Midwestern women's chain at age 48. Despite his wildly controversial public dialogue about the Abercrombie's revamp, within just a few years as CEO, he had succeeded in crafting the retailer into one of the hottest brands of the 1990's.

In its heyday, Abercrombie boasted a network of 700 dimly-lit and thoroughly fragranced stores, 22,000 strikingly attractive employees and nearly $2 billion in annual sales. The entrance ways of the individual stores were flanked with shirtless teenage boys, the walls covered with Bruce Weber-lensed ad campaign imagery of more toned and tanned teens. The music was loud and the offerings - A&F logo-ed tees, $90 distressed jeans and ripped denim skirts which went up to size Large (no XL for girls and certainly no XXL) - irresistible to teens that wanted to embody the lifestyle it was selling and could afford to do so.

The Look Policy

By the early-to-mid-2000's, Jeffries had, irrefutably, taken the dusty 100+ year old casual wear brand and turned it into one of the most relevant destinations for the all-American collegiate types. In large part, Jeffries - who was bringing in $71.8 million in compensation as of 2007 - succeeded thanks to the wildly specific branding he put in place.

Abercrombie was an apparel business, with its relatively pricey mini-skirts and house-branded polos, but let us be clear, under the direction of Jeffries, the retailer was selling sex, first and foremost. And it was only selling it to " good-looking, cool kids."

This is where the retailer's now notorious "Look Policy" came in handy. Specific guidelines on everything from the color and length of employees' hair to the specifics of girls' makeup ("must be worn to enhance natural features and create a fresh, natural appearance") to the length of fingernails helped to ensure that, as Forbes put it, "the sales clerks all looked like your biggest high school crushes."

Treating hiring like model castings also worked to further this narrative: "Store managers would often approach attractive white customers who had the 'look' and urge them to apply for sales jobs," according to Think Progress. It was imperative for Jeffries - who, according to Salon, made "every decision - from the hiring of the models to the placement of every item of clothing in every store" - that everyone from the greeters in the stores' entryways to the individuals behind the cash registers looked the part.

The "looking the part" requirement was observed so strictly that according to a lawsuit filed in 2003, any Asian-American, African-American, and Latino individuals who were hired by Abercrombie were relegated to stockrooms where those staffers could not be seen by customers. The retailer settled the suit a year later, agreeing to pay $40 million to put an end to the litigation.

That lawsuit was followed up by another headline-making case just over 5 years later when the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission filed suit against Abercrombie after the retailer refused to hire a young Muslim woman, arguing that because she wore a hijab (in accordance with her religious views), she did not comply with the company's strict dress code. Despite a ruling from the Supreme Court in June 2015 that Abercrombie's "Look Policy" ran afoul of federal law, the company was undeterred.

Any doubts as to whether Abercrombie's "Look Policy" - which was made clear via internal company documents and posters, such as its "Hairstyle Sketchbook" - was still being enforced to any meaningful extent after America's highest court called foul were clarified when yet another lawsuit was filed against the retailer.

62,000 Employees

It was 2015 - one year after Jeffries retired from his CEO position in light of 11 straight quarters of same-store sales declines and after he was ousted as chairman of Abercrombie's board of directors due to investor pressure - when Abercrombie was hit with another damning lawsuit.

Former employees Alexander Brown and Arik Silva filed suit against the retailer in federal court in California, alleging that Abercrombie management required that its hourly workers purchase the brand's clothing to wear on the job. In doing so, Abercrombie was, according to the lawsuit, running afoul of various state labor codes, including those in California, Florida, New York and Massachusetts.

As Brown and Silva set forth in their suit, Abercrombie policy "forced" employees to buy new Abercrombie clothes "each time a new sales guide came out." The suit further alleged that the retailer failed to reimburse employees despite obligating them to wear a specific "uniform." In accordance with California, Florida, New York and Massachusetts labor law, employers are required to reimburse any employee that is required to purchase a work uniform as a condition of employment or business-related expenses. Abercrombie did no such thing, per Brown and Silva.

What started as a seemingly small-scale lawsuit filed by two individuals turned into a legal bombshell in July 2015 when a California federal judge held that the case could be extended to a much larger pool of former and then-current Abercrombie employees. Overnight, the lawsuit went from having two plaintiffs to potentially allowing some 250,000 different individuals to join the fight.

In order to avoid trial and further litigation costs, Abercrombie agreed last week to settle the case with a payment of $25 million into a class settlement fund, a portion of which will be distributed to plaintiff employees that were not reimbursed for Abercrombie apparel they purchased specifically to wear on the job. ($7.5 million will be used to pay the plaintiffs' attorneys' fees and an additional $1 million will be used to cover administrative costs and other legal costs).

According to a statement from an Abercrombie spokeswoman: "Abercrombie & Fitch Co. and Abercrombie & Fitch Stores, Inc. has agreed to settle two putative class action lawsuits and a national collective action case, originally filed in 2013, alleging that the company required its employees to purchase its clothing dating back to 2009. At that time Abercrombie had, and continues to have, clear written policies and associate handbooks in place that stated its employees were not required to purchase or to wear company merchandise, nor were they obligated to make use of their employee discounts."

The spokesman further told TFL, "Abercrombie strongly contests the allegations, however, it believes it is in the best interest of the company and all its stakeholders, including its employees, to settle this matter."

As for Jeffries, he may have left Abercrombie in 2014, but his penchant for strict - and in some cases, downright illegal - branding techniques lives on. And as he put it during his tenure as CEO, "Do we go too far sometimes? Absolutely."
* The case is Alexander Brown et al v. Abercrombie & Fitch Co. et al,:14-cv-01242 (C.D.Cal)

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How Abercrombie Ended up Being Sued by 250,000 Employees - The Fashion Law

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"A lot of people don't belong ," Mike Jeffries told Salon in 2006 explaining the culture of the brand he was tasked with overseeing at the time. "That's why we hire good-looking people in our stores. Good-looking people attract other good-looking people, and we want to market to cool, good-looking people.

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Abercrombie's Legal Defeat-and Its Cultural Failure

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Abercrombie's Legal Defeat-and Its Cultural Failure

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"Culture" is a word activists like to deploy nowadays-there's "rape culture" to condemn or a "culture of respect" to strive for-and sometimes it can sound like a vague or lazy way to invoke how power or discrimination work. Once in while, though, you see why that tote bag of a term makes sense-how the culture of a company or an institution matters very specifically when it comes to people's rights. This week, that reminder came from the Supreme Court, which ruled, in an 8-1 decision, that Abercrombie & Fitch, the purveyor of pricey, preppy, body-conscious clothing for tweens and teens, had violated civil-rights law when it refused to hire a young Muslim woman who wore a head scarf to her job interview.

Samantha Elauf was seventeen when she applied for a job at an Abercrombie & Fitch Kids store in a Tulsa, Oklahoma, mall in 2008. She loved the mall, which she described as her second home, and was excited about the employee discount. The assistant manager who interviewed her deemed her qualified but worried that her hijab would violate the company's "Look Policy," a weirdly exhaustive rulebook that reads as though it had been dreamed up by a middle-school queen bee on a Ritalin bender. (BuzzFeed published parts of it, revealing, for example, that beards or mustaches were unacceptable on male employees, and that "sun-kissed" highlights were allowed but "no streaks, blocks or chunks or contrasting colors"; a New York article in 2014 added that strings on peasant blouses were required to remain untied and skinny jeans cuffed at one and a quarter inches.) The relevant prohibition for the assistant manager in Tulsa was one forbidding "caps." When she consulted her district manager, he agreed that there was a problem, and Elauf was not hired, despite receiving a high rating as a potential employee.

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission filed suit on Elauf's behalf and a district court found in her favor, awarding her twenty thousand dollars in damages. The Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the decision, with the peculiar reasoning that an employer could not be held liable for failing to "accommodate a religious practice," even if it had failed to do so, if an employee or prospective employee had not specifically asked for the accommodation. But as Justice Antonin Scalia, who wrote the majority opinion in this week's decision, noted, "an employer may not make an applicant's religious practice, confirmed or otherwise, a factor in employment decisions." Abercrombie managers could have asked Elauf if she'd be wearing the head scarf for religious reasons while on the job-as Justice Samuel Alito said during oral arguments, maybe she was just having a bad hair day when she came for her interview. They didn't-they deemed it too awkward-but they did assume that Elauf covered her hair as a religious practice, and they rejected her on the basis of that assumption.

Any employer can have a dress code, of course, but it cannot use it to discriminate against an individual on the basis of his or her religious practice. If an employer fires or refuses to hire a Muslim who wears a hijab, an Orthodox Jew who wears a yarmulke, or a Sikh who wears a turban because of that religious practice, without even trying to find an accommodation, then that's discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Announcing the opinion from the bench this week, Scalia declared the case "really easy." (Clarence Thomas was the sole dissent: he argued that Abercrombie's decision was based on a neutral anti-cap policy.)

So how was it that Abercrombie continued to fight all the way up to the Supreme Court in a case that Scalia-no pushover, even on matters of religious liberty-deemed an easy call? Maybe because the company's culture-and the style and the attitude it marketed-persuaded it that its exclusionary policies would seem acceptable.

In 1992, Abercrombie was a hundred-year-old company known for its safari wear when a new C.E.O., Mike Jeffries, came in to update it. Jeffries had a vision, and it was not a broad one. As he told in a 2006 interview, "In every school there are the cool and popular kids, and there are the not-so-cool kids. Candidly, we go after the cool kids. We go after the attractive, all-American kid with a great attitude and a lot of friends. A lot of people don't belong [in our clothes] and they can't belong. Are we exclusionary? Absolutely." Under Jeffries, Abercrombie photo spreads partook of a certain Leni Riefenstahl-at-a-frat-mixer aesthetic-lots of well-toned, bare-chested young white men (at the brand's Hollister outlets, customers were greeted by shirtless men known, in company parlance, as "lifeguards") and, among the young women, a surfeit of "sun-kissed," long-haired blondeness and tanned bare legs. Salespeople hired for the stores were called "models" and subjected to the rigors of the Look Policy. Abercrombie did not sell women's clothes in sizes above ten. In his New York piece, Matthew Shaer cited a catalogue of P.R. missteps with a similar flavor: "the quickly recalled line of Asian-themed t-shirts, which featured men in rice paddy hats and cartoonishly slanted eyes; a line of thongs, marketed to girls as young as ten, with the words wink-wink on the crotch." For a while, the whole approach worked well, and profitably, for the company, and Jeffries converted a brand known for outfitting Teddy Roosevelt and Ernest Hemingway into one with candy-like allure for suburban middle-schoolers. At its height, Abercrombie had a thousand storefronts.

The culture of the place also shaped its hiring practices in ways that got it into trouble. Elauf's was not the first major discrimination suit against Abercrombie. In 2004, the company agreed to pay fifty million dollars to several thousand employees in order to settle a class-action lawsuit charging that it discriminated against African-Americans, Latinos, and Asian-Americans in both its hiring practices and its advertising. Among other things, the suit alleged that non-whites were regularly shoehorned into back-of-the-store jobs where customers wouldn't see them as much.

Jeffries found it difficult to imagine that there might be cool kids who were not popular or, for that matter, blonde and white. The eventual result was a major downturn for the brand. The recession and the rise of stores like H&M, Forever 21, and Uniqlo that sell fun, stylish clothes cheaply, were factors. But there was also that aggressively conventional vibe. Erik Gordon, a business-school professor at the University of Michigan, told New York, "This generation is about inclusiveness and valuing diversity. It's not about looking down on people." That may be a bit hopeful, but there's something to it: this is the era of transgender cover girls and Sikh Gap models. In the deeply if imperfectly pluralistic United States, even during moments of high anti-Muslim feeling, a policy like the misguided one in France, which forbids the hijab in public schools, would never get serious consideration. Elauf went on to be hired at Forever 21 and Old Navy, and a photo in the Wall Street Journal this year showed her working at her most recent job, as a merchandising manager at Oklahoma's first Urban Outfitters: she's wearing a black head scarf, artfully shredded jeans, and ankle boots, and she's smiling. Abercrombie was out of touch.

In its marketing strategy if not its legal one, the company is trying to catch up. Last December, after protests from shareholders and many months of declining store sales, Jeffries stepped down as C.E.O. In April, the company let it be known that it would pursue "more inclusive and diverse" hiring practices and allow for a dress code that was "more individualistic." It was clearly announcing these changes in hopes of reversing its sales slump. That might seem trivial. But if it's no longer profitable to tout your cultural intolerance, that's pretty cool.

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Abercrombie's Legal Defeat-and Its Cultural Failure

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"Culture" is a word activists like to deploy nowadays-there's "rape culture" to condemn or a "culture of respect" to strive for-and sometimes it can sound like a vague or lazy way to invoke how power or discrimination work.

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Ugly Policy Alleged at NBC: Only Beautiful People Need Apply

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Ugly Policy Alleged at NBC: Only Beautiful People Need Apply

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​Whether right or wrong, it's human nature to make snap judgments about people based on physical appearance. But is it illegal to base hiring on good looks?A recent lawsuit suggests it is, but most management attorneys say it isn't technically prohibited by federal law. Regardless, they caution that discriminating based on appearance, even if subconsciously, isn't the way to get a crackerjack workforce and carries with it some legal risk.In the lawsuit, Stephanie Belanger, an NBC audio-visual coordinator, claimed that the company's recruiter told her in the recruitment process that NBC specifically asked for good-looking employees. The recruiter demanded to see her pictures on Facebook or Instagram before she could be interviewed, reported the New York Post. Belanger was hired but demoted after she had two epileptic seizures at work and later fired, she alleged, in retaliation for complaining about sexual harassment by her boss. She claims that he called her a "whore" and said he had to fire her or his girlfriend would break up with him.

"Although it may be surprising to hear, discrimination in employment based on physical attractiveness is not in itself illegal under federal or state law," said Laura Harshbarger, an attorney with Bond, Schoeneck & King in Syracuse, N.Y., though she noted that a few cities nationwide, including Madison, Wis., Urbana, Ill., and Washington, D.C., have laws prohibiting such discrimination.

She cautioned, however, that preferring a certain physical look could be illegal under federal or state laws if it results in discrimination on a basis that is unlawful, such as race, religion, age, disability or sex. "If an employer, for example, refuses to hire an older man as an account representative on the belief that customers will give more business to a young woman, that is discrimination based on sex and age, which is illegal," she said.

Harshbarger added that a workplace that values physical attractiveness not only is a breeding ground for sexual harassment but also fosters competition among applicants on the relatively irrelevant issue of appearance.

The goal of hiring should be to employ the most qualified person for a job, she noted. "Attractiveness is no indicator of intelligence, attitude, work ethic or any of the other attributes that make for a stellar worker," she said. "An employer that hires based on attractiveness may be missing out on fantastic workers, even if it is not acting illegally."

Appearance Standards Upheld

Some courts have upheld appearance and even weight standards, noted Jill Cohen, an attorney with Eckert Seamans in Princeton, N.J. For example, the New Jersey Appellate Court upheld the personal appearance standards of Borgata Hotel Casino and Spa in Atlantic City, N.J. The hotel required that certain employees called "BorgataBabes" could not gain or lose more than 7 percent of their body weight, barring medical reasons. The employees had to submit to periodic weigh-ins.

"The company imposed the same 7 percent above baseline weight increase for men as for women, and therefore the court held that the weight standard was not facially discriminatory," said Daniel Schlein, an attorney in New York City.

But the court returned the case to a lower court to determine if 11 of the plaintiffs were subjected to a hostile work environment over the policy's enforcement. Some of these plaintiffs exceeded the 7 percent limit because of medical or post-pregnancy conditions and alleged the weight standard resulted in harassment due to gender, ABC News reported.

Appearance standards may be considered a bona fide occupational qualification when they are necessary for the operation of an employer's business in limited circumstances, such as for a movie part or a fashion show, Schlein noted.

"It is not much of a stretch to recognize that for similar reasons, the television industry wants attractive on-air personalities," said Mark Kluger, an attorney with Kluger Healey in Florham Park, N.J. "If the same criteria for on-air talent were applied to off-air positions, however, there could be more legal complications depending on who may be screened out. Age discrimination will most likely always be a potential problem with appearance-based hiring criteria."

Appearance policies can involve characteristics beyond mere attractiveness. The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, for example, upheld an employer's right to rescind an offer to a candidate who refused to cut her dreadlocks, citing a grooming policy, Cohen said. "Tattoo and jewelry policies are also commonplace for employers," she noted. "Appearance standards regulating facial hair and style may implicate religious or national origin discrimination, so employers need to be careful," she said.

"Since beauty is in the eye of the beholder, reasonable people may differ on what 'good-looking' means," said Laurent Drogin, an attorney with Tarter Krinsky & Drogin in New York City. While employers technically may seek out only good-looking employees without violating federal or state law, they may as a practical matter wind up with disparate impact claims, such as for gender or age discrimination, he cautioned.
[SHRM members-only HR Q&A: What are disparate impact and disparate treatment?]
Social Media Question Dicey

Schlein said requesting access to social media accounts opens the door to potential issues relating to race, color, religion, disability and age. "Even where the employer does not actually rely upon the information it learns in a search of an applicant's social media, it may be difficult later to dispel the suggestion that it harbored a discriminatory intent," he noted.

Currently, 25 states ban employers from requesting access to an applicant's or employee's social media accounts. "New York does not have such a law; New Jersey does," Kluger noted.

"Since there is no known correlation between good looks and ability to perform a job, focusing on looks guarantees a workforce where some better people are excluded, while at the same time alienating employees who will arguably lose their good looks over time and become potential plaintiffs," Drogin said.

NBC and Daniel Kaiser, Belanger's lawyer, declined to comment.

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Ugly Policy Alleged at NBC: Only Beautiful People Need Apply

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​Whether right or wrong, it's human nature to make snap judgments about people based on physical appearance. But is it illegal to base hiring on good looks?A recent lawsuit suggests it is, but most management attorneys say it isn't technically prohibited by federal law.

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ARCHIVED WEBSITE

This topic was archived on Mar. 22, 2024, in light of recent developments. A reconsideration of the topic is possible in the future.

The NCAA (National Collegiate Athletic Association) is a nonprofit organization formed in 1906 that regulates college athletics, including game rules, athlete eligibility, and college tournaments. As of Mar. 2021, the NCAA was composed of "[n]early half a million college athletes [who] make up the 19,886 teams that send more than 57,661 participants to compete each year in the NCAA's 90 championships in 24 sports across 3 divisions."

The NCAA is seemingly the final authority to decide whether college athletes should be paid to play college sports. However, in 2019, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed the Fair Play Act that allows college athletes to hire agents, sign endorsement deals, and be paid for the use of their likeness.

California was the first state to pass a NIL (name, image, and likeness) law, which takes effect on Jan. 1, 2023. But California was quickly followed by more states. As of June 10, 2021, 18 states have passed NIL laws; five more states have passed bills that were awaiting the governor's signature to become law; 14 states have introduced NIL bills; and one state has a bill passed by the Senate and awaiting a House vote, according to the Business of College Sports.

The NCAA was scheduled to vote on new NIL rules in Jan. 2021, but it then postponed the vote, citing "external factors." Days before the scheduled vote Makan Delrahim, JD, Assistant Attorney General for the Antitrust Division of the United States Department of Justice under the Trump administration, questioned the proposed rules' compliance with antitrust laws.

Additionally, the US Supreme Court agreed to hear a case (National Collegiate Athletic Association v. Shawne Alston, et al.) about whether the NCAA is violating antitrust laws by restricting college athletes' compensation. The Supreme Court heard arguments on Mar. 31, 2021 as the NCAA March Madness tournament heads into Final Four games just days later on Apr. 3. Respondents were split 50/50 in a June 1, 2021 New York Times survey about whether the NCAA strictly limiting paid compensation is constitutional.

Gabe Feldman, JD, Professor of Sports Law, Director of the Sports Law Program and Associate Provost for NCAA compliance at Tulane University, noted that the last time the NCAA was at the Supreme Court was in 1984 (NCAA vs. the Board of Regents of the University of Oklahoma). The ruling changed the broadcast regulations for college football. Feldman explained, "That was a shape-shifting decision that in many ways fundamentally changed economics of college football and college football television. And ever since that 1984 decision, courts have been relying on that language to try to interpret antitrust law applies to all NCAA restrictions, including player compensation."

On June 21, 2021, the US Supreme Court ruled unanimously that the NCAA cannot ban certain payments to student athletes under the premise of maintaining amateurism. Associate Justice Neil Gorsuch, writing for the majority, stated, "traditions alone cannot justify the NCAA's decision to build a massive money-raising enterprise on the backs of student athletes who are not fairly compensated. Nowhere else in America can businesses get away with agreeing not to pay their workers a fair market rate on the theory that their product is defined by not paying their workers a fair market rate. And under ordinary principles of antitrust law, it is not evident why college sports should be any different. The NCAA is not above the law."

On June 28, 2021, the NCAA Division I Council recommended to the NCAA Division I Board of Directors that student athletes be allowed to profit from their name, image, and likeness. Schools would not be allowed to pay students and no one could offer compensation for students to attend a particular school. If adopted, the rule would only apply to Division I schools and would be temporary until the NCAA or Congress acts.

On June 30, 2021, fewer than 12 hours before some states' NIL laws went into effect, the NCAA Division I Board of Directors issued an interim ruling stating that Bylaw 12 (the rules that say athletes cannot receive payment) will not be enforced. Divisions II and III of the NCAA followed suit and the changes went into effect for all three divisions on July 1, 2021.

The University of North Carolina became the first school to organize group licensing deals for student athletes in July 2021. UNC athletes will be able to earn money for NIL marketing including UNC trademarks and logos in groups of three or more athletes. For example, a student athlete will be compensated for the sale of a jersey featuring their name, or for a sponsorship deal in which they appear wearing a UNC jersey. Group licensing deals in theory can allow lesser-known players to reap the benefits of appearing alongside a well-known player.

By Jan. 2022, without a clear NIL structure from the NCAA, some schools were questioning how to navigate deals for players or whole teams without violating NCAA policy.

NCAA president Charlie Baker sent a letter on Dec. 5, 2023, to the 362 Division I member schools calling for reformations including creating a separate division for the top-earning schools that would mimic professional sports and updating NIL regulations so female athletes could better benefit. The rule changes will have to be considered by the NCAA governing boards, a process which could take up to a year.

A 2019 Seton Hall Sports Poll found that 60% of those surveyed agreed that college athletes should be allowed compensation for their name, image, and/or likeness, while 32% disagreed, and 8% were unsure. This was quite a change from polling conducted in 2017, when 60% believed college scholarships were enough compensation for college athletes.

Should Colleges and Universities Pay College Athletes?

Pro 1

The NCAA, colleges, and universities profit unfairly from the work and likenesses of college athletes.

The NCAA reported over $1.06 billion in revenue in 2017 (the most recent available numbers). In 2018, NCAA president Mark Emmert was paid more than $2.7 million. Nine other NCAA executives were paid more than $500,000 in 2018, with one paid more than $1.3 million.

Michael Sokolove, author of The Last Temptation of Rick Pitino (2018), explained, "If you look at a program like [University of] Louisville, ...they generate about $45 million a year in revenue. They give out 13 scholarships. That adds up to about $400,000 a year. The rest of it gets spread out to the coach, who makes $8 million a year, to the assistant coaches, who make as much as a half-million dollars a year. All throughout the athletic department, people are making six-figure salaries. It does not go to the players, what I call the unpaid workforce."

As of Nov. 17, 2020, the University of Alabama head football coach Nick Saban was the highest paid NCAA college football coach, making $9.3 million per year. 81 other head football coaches made more than $1 million annually and another 29 more than $500,000.

The highest paid men's basketball coach was the University of Kentucky head coach, John Calipari, who was paid $8.2 million per year. 69 other head men's basketball coaches were paid more than $1 million annually, and another three more than $500,000.

Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh, who was forecast to earn about $11 million in 2023, says, "I would take less money for the players to have a share. I hope other coaches would use their voice to express the same thing."

College athletes, arguably the stars of the show who earn millions year after year for the well-paid NCAA executives, coaches, and staff, were forbidden by the NCAA from not only being paid for their work-, but from seeking other related compensation such as endorsement deals. And, as John I. Jenkins and Jack Swarbrick, President and Athletics Director of Notre Dame University argue, "We have been vocal in our conviction that student-athletes should be allowed to... profit from their celebrity - for one simple reason: Other students are allowed to. If a college student is a talented artist or musician no one begrudges him the chance to make money from his skills. And athletes should as far as possible have the opportunities other students enjoy."
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Pro 2

College athletes are risking their bodies as well as their future careers and earning potential to play for colleges and universities while often receiving a sub-par education.

Governor of California Gavin Newsom, stated, "Collegiate student athletes put everything on the line - their physical health, future career prospects and years of their lives to compete. Colleges reap billions from these student athletes' sacrifices and success but, in the same breath, block them from earning a single dollar. That's a bankrupt model."

Zachary Kerr, PhD, Researcher at the University of North Carolina's Center for the Study of Retired Athletes, stated, "I definitely think research indicates strong evidence that injuries during one's sports career can potentially be associated with adverse health outcomes later in life."

In 2017, 67% of former Division I athletes had sustained a major injury and 50% had chronic injuries, 2.5% higher than non-athletes.

Azmatullah Hussaini, MD, President of the New York/New Jersey chapter of the American Muslim Health Professionals, and Jules Lipoff, MD, Assistant Professor of Dermatology at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, offered additional context: especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, "[g]iven that athletes are disproportionately Black in the biggest revenue-generating sports - football and basketball - this dynamic also evokes America's horrific history of unpaid slave labor. It's hard to ignore the racist undertones when the financial benefit to these institutions is based on the unpaid work of young Black men."

The NCAA requires players to have health insurance but does not pay for that insurance and can refuse to pay medical expenses for sports injuries, some of which can have life-long consequences for the players' bodies and career opportunities. The NCAA also does not prohibit schools from canceling injured athletes' scholarships, leaving athletes without a sport or education.

Adding insult to sometimes literal injury, college athletes are also frequently denied the NCAA's other form of "compensation": a quality education. As Jon Solomon, Editorial Director for the Sports and Society Program at the Aspen Institute explained, "The most glaring example occurred when the University of North Carolina was found by outside parties to have organized fake classes that enabled dozens of athletes to gain and maintain their eligibility... of the 3,100 students who took the fake classes over 18 years, 47.4 percent were athletes... North Carolina avoided NCAA penalties by essentially arguing that the NCAA should stay out of irregularities in college courses." The NCAA polices athletes' finances but does not ensure a quality education.
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Pro 3

College athletes are often valued at more than $1 million, but they (and their families) frequently live below the poverty line.

A study by the National Bureau of Economic Research found that the top two college football positions-the quarterback and wide receiver-were worth $2.4 million and $1.3 million per year respectively, while starting men's basketball players in the Power Five schools were worth between $800,000 and $1.2 million per year.

If college players earned about 50% of their teams' revenues like the NFL and NBA players do, the average football player's yearly salary would be $360,000 and the average basketball player's yearly salary would be $500,000.

The study found that "[t]he player-level analysis reveals that the existing limits on player compensation effectively transfers resources away from students who are more likely to be black and more likely to come from poor neighborhoods towards students who are more likely to be white and come from higher-income neighborhoods."

College athletes are required to make up the difference between NCAA scholarships and the actual cost of living. Tuition shortfalls amount to thousands of dollars per year and leave about 85% of players to live below the poverty line. For example, fair market value for a University of Texas football player was $513,922. However, players lived $778 below the federal poverty line and owed $3,624 in tuition.

About 25% of Division I athletes reported food poverty in the past year and almost 14% reported being homeless in the past year. Erin McGeoy, a former water polo athlete at George Washington University, explained, "a common occurrence was that we would run out of meal money halfway through the semester and that's when I started to run into troubles of food insecurity." She turned to boarding dogs in her no-dogs-allowed apartment in order to pay rent because housing costs increased each year but her housing allowance remained static.

The NCAA keeps players in poverty and denied them ways to earn money, while making millions on their performance.
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Con 1

Scholarships are fair financial compensation for college athletes, especially considering the precarious finances of athletic departments.

According to the NCAA, the organization provides "more than $3.6 billion in athletic scholarships annually to more than 180,000 student-athletes." Divided equitably, each student would receive about $20,000 per year. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, the average total cost of public college (tuition, fees, room, and board) for the 2017-18 academic year was $17,797. Considering other scholarships and aid are widely available and not all college athletes require financial aid, the NCAA scholarships are generous.

Further, most college programs do not generate the income needed to run their athletic programs, much less pay athletes. In fiscal year 2019, the collective expenses of the 65 Power Five schools-the largest and richest Division I schools in the NCAA-exceeded revenue by $7 million. Other Division I schools had an almost $23 million collective difference between revenue and expenses. No Division II or III schools' revenue exceeded expenses.

If students were paid, the NCAA argues, many colleges and universities would have to offer fewer scholarships and the remaining scholarships would be distributed unfairly to top football and men's basketball players because those two sports bring in the most revenue. Schools would also have to cut unprofitable sports including gymnastics, swimming and diving, tennis, track and field, volleyball, and wrestling. Discrepancies between men's and women's sports such as the weight room during the 2021 NCAA basketball tournament would only worsen.

Paying players would also limit the literal and figurative playing fields to elite universities with large budgets. As John Thelin, PhD, Research Professor of History of Higher Education & Public Policy at the University of Kentucky, explained, "paying salaries to players will increase [athletic] program expenditures without necessarily increasing revenues... [and] a handful of powerful programs will stand to gain in competition for athletic talent simply because they can afford to pay salaries. Others will mimic as they try to keep up but eventually will fall short in trying to outbid Auburn University, Florida State, the University of Southern California or the University of Texas in the college player arms race."
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Con 2

Very few college athletes will go pro, so athletes should take advantage of the education being offered in exchange for playing a college sport.

The reality is that the vast majority of college athletes will never play professionally. Of the 36,011 college baseball players, only 8,002 are eligible to play professionally each year. 1,217 will be draft picks, but only 791 will be drafted yearly, meaning about 9.9% of college baseball players will go pro, which is the largest likelihood in NCAA sports.

The major money-makers, football and men's basketball, have very low odds. Of the 73,712 NCAA football players, about 16,380 are draft-eligible and 254 will be drafted, meaning about 1.2% of college football players will go pro. Of the 18,816 male basketball players, 4,181 are draft-eligible and 60 will be drafted, but only 52 will go pro, or a 1.2% chance a college basketball player will play professionally. The odds are even lower for women's basketball at 0.6%.

The NCAA noted, "[p]rofessional opportunities are extremely limited and the likelihood of a high school or even college athlete becoming a professional athlete is very low. In contrast, the likelihood of an NCAA athlete earning a college degree is significantly greater; graduation success rates are 86% in Division I, 71% in Division II and 87% in Division III."

In other words, it would be more prudent and more profitable for college athletes to focus on education as their compensation.

Data analyzed from the Department of Labor showed nine out of 10 new jobs were going to employees with college degrees in June 2018. Further, a Gallup poll of "74,385 U.S. adults with a bachelor's degree, finds that college graduates who participated in NCAA athletics experience a host of positive long-term life outcomes at greater rates than non-athletes."

Those positive outcomes include: 70% of NCAA athletes graduated in four years or fewer, 50% agree that college was worth the cost, 39% earned an advanced degree, 33% have "good" jobs after graduation, and 24%
"are thriving at the highest levels," all higher percentages than their non-athlete peers.

Amy Perko, CEO of the Knight Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics, said of the Gallup findings, "It's a positive report for the educational benefits for college sports, and it reinforces the point that we've tried to make over the years. There's an important role for college sports in higher education, and that role needs to be placed in the proper perspective as part of the educational mission, not apart from it."
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Con 3

Paying college athletes would not solve the real problem: the American amateur sports system is broken.

Football and basketball players cannot play professionally immediately after high school. The NBA requires players to be at least 19 and a year out of high school, while the NFL requires players to be three years out of high school. These rules can effectively limit players' options to playing in college or choosing another profession altogether. Most players have no real "amateur" sport option and those who would rather not go to college have no other established feeder system to make it to a professional team.

Further confusing the issue, the NCAA does not have a consistent or fair definition of "amateurism" and allows some significant forms of financial compensation. College athletes are allowed to compete in the Olympic Games and be financially compensated, such as Joseph Schooling, a University of Texas swimmer, who earned a $740,000 bonus for winning Singapore's first gold medal ever at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Summer Games for the 100m butterfly. College athletes may also play a second sport professionally and be compensated, such as Clemson quarterback Kyle Parker who earned a $1.4 million baseball signing bonus from the Colorado Rockies in 2010 while still playing football for the Tigers. Tennis players may earn up to $10,000 in prize money yearly while playing college tennis and college football players may earn up to $550 in bowl gifts.

B. David Ridpath, EdD, Associate Professor of Sports Administration at Ohio University, noted, "The only amateur quality about college athletics is that colleges refuse to pay their players." Ridpath explained, "The United States is the only country in the world that has a significant portion of elite athletic development and commercialized sport embedded within its education systems. Consider that ten of the biggest outdoor sports stadiums in the world (excluding auto racing venues) are American college football stadiums. None of the largest ones are NFL stadiums."

To fix the problem, and separate athletes who are getting an education just because they want to play a sport from those who actually want to go to college, the United States needs a true amateur or minor league that feeds into professional sports.
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Discussion Questions
1. Should college athletes be paid? Why or why not?

2. Should the college athletics system be revised in another way to compensate amateur athletes? Explain your answer.

3. How should the NCAA (or another governing body) balance college athletes' sport, educational, and financial interests? Explain your answer(s).

4. Do you think well-established minor-league systems would be attractive to high-school graduates and college athletes less interested in (or ill-prepared for) higher education? Explain your answer(s).
Take Action
1. Consider the pro position of the National College Players Association that paying college athletes is a civil rights issue.

2. Explore the NCAA site and think critically about the organization as the governing body of college athletics.

3. Analyze the argument that paying athletes would "ruin college sports" from Cody J. McDavis, former college basketball player.

4. Consider how you felt about the issue before reading this article. After reading the pros and cons on this topic, has your thinking changed? If so, how? List two to three ways. If your thoughts have not changed, list two to three ways your better understanding of the "other side of the issue" now helps you better argue your position.

5. Push for the position and policies you support by writing US national senators and representatives.
Sources

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Should College Athletes Be Paid? Top 3 Pros and Cons

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Proponents say colleges profit unfairly off of the athletes. Opponents say the athletes are paid in tuition. Explore both sides of the debate.

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When is Appearance Discrimination OK? - FindLaw

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When is Appearance Discrimination OK? - FindLaw

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
When is Appearance Discrimination OK? - FindLaw

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
There is no such thing as appearance discrimination under federal laws. Employers are generally free to hire only the pretty people. But if you do base all of your hiring and employment decisions on looks, you may be opening yourself up to a bevy of lawsuits. So what gives? If you are allowed to dis…

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Student athletes will soon join professionals in profiting off their fame

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Student athletes will soon join professionals in profiting off their fame

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Newsela | Student athletes will soon join professionals in profiting off their fame

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College basketball players will soon be able to cash in on their fame.

# data[].attributes.headline
The Beauty Bias: Can You Hire Based on Looks?

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The Beauty Bias: Can You Hire Based on Looks?

# data[].attributes.body
https://www.yourerc.com/blog/post/the-beauty-bias-can-you-hire-based-on-looks#:~:text=No%20federal%20legislation%20currently%20exists,gender%2C%20ethnicity%2C%20and%20disability.

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When Scott Simon, the host of Weekend Edition, referred to the Washington Redskins as "the Washington football club whose team name I refuse to utter," the divided reaction by listeners crystallized a creeping ethical and moral dilemma for NPR and all the mainstream media.

"Kudos to you, Mr. Simon," wrote Steve Bambara of Raleigh, N.C., "for refusing to use the name 'Redskins' when talking about the Washington-NFL. I have thought this is the best solution. If all media refuses to use the term, it will fade into the background."

The call for banning the name in news reports is being pushed by a coalition of more than 250 tribes represented by the National Congress of American Indians. Among the dozen or so news outlets that have agreed to do so are The Oregonian, San Francisco Chronicle, The Seattle Times, Kansas City Star, The New Republic, Slate and Monday Morning Quarterback, an online part of Sports Illustrated.

A second front against radio and television, meanwhile, opened when Reed Hundt, a former chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, and 11 other broadcast experts co-signed a letter last spring to the Washington team raising the threat of regulatory intervention over coverage. They called the team's name "an unequivocal racial slur" and "the most derogatory name a Native American can be called," which Hundt explained in The Washington Post may violate the FCC's decency rules for public airwaves.

But the reaction by NPR listener Fielding McGehee of San Diego, Calif., to Simon presented the dilemma in a different way. The team name is "unfortunate," McGehee said, however adding: "But the problem is, you are a newsman, and as such, your role is to report the facts. It doesn't matter what you think about the facts, the truth of the matter is, the name of the Washington football team is the Redskins, and as a reporter-and until such time as the name has been changed-you need to bring yourself to say the word."

NPR editors and sports reporters this past season met on the issue and decided to continue to use the team's name in news reports, editors told me. "Since the name of the team is the Washington Redskins, we use that in our reporting," Deputy Managing Editor Chuck Holmes said. But he added, "We also continue to cover issues prompted by the name."

And so it is that since the beginning of last year, 23 NPR segments used the name of the team without comment, and another 14 either focused on the name dispute or mentioned it in passing. Hourly newscasts were not counted.

Use of the name is in keeping with the practice of the overwhelming number of mainstream news outlets. Many, such as the hometownWashington Post, have editorialized against the name. So have a growing number of sports columnists and personalities, among them NPR's Frank Deford, NBC's Bob Costas and Cris Collinsworth and more than a half dozen associated with ESPN. But they still repeat the name.

So, which side is ethically correct?

My first reaction, and that of most colleagues I consulted, was " Give me a break," and to agree with the newsroom and listener McGehee: NPR reports. It is up to society to change the usage of the name, or to the team to change the fact of it-not NPR.

But as I sifted further through the arguments, I discovered that the answer is not so easy. It turns on how you answer several more questions and weigh their importance.

The word "redskins" is a racial slur. No doubt about it. But is it in the context of the team's 80-year-old name? Do most Americans think anything negative about Indians when they cheer, jeer or just say the name? What do most Native Americans hear in the name? Are the protesters just overzealous advocates long on "political correctness" and short on humor? Is there any proven harm being done to Natives? Or, relatedly, have we made mascots out a defeated people without asking them how they feel about it? On what side does the history of the name fall?

Those are just the factual questions. There is a moral one, ethics and morality not being the same thing. Is there a deeper moral issue of right and wrong at stake here, no matter what polls or studies show? If so, at what point does a news medium, especially a publicly supported one, have a responsibility to take a moral position? Or is its higher moral responsibility the professionally ethical one of being journalistically neutral?

Each of us will answer and weigh the questions in our own way, but my own conclusion based on the investigation that follows is that NPR should begin to purposefully disassociate itself from using the Redskins or the Washington Redskins on air and online.

The name should be avoided in Web headlines and used only infrequently in stories. Some news stories-not all-should note the name dispute in passing. Other features and analytical stories should continue to directly focus on the dispute and the use of Indian mascots by other teams, as was done this past season. Scott Simon, who has some leeway as a long-time host who also does commentaries, should be left to do what he is doing, as a major voice inside NPR reflecting a Native American view.

The hope is to encourage a public debate, allow Native Americans to be fully heard and see what social consensus emerges.

This course I recommend is necessarily messy, but it reflects how the accepted meaning of the name is being questioned and is in transition: changing, but not enough for NPR to put a moral stake in the ground and ban the name altogether.

Yet.

While editors can't predict the future, I am willing to wager that the Washington team won't be called Redskins in 20 years, and maybe not even in 10. Team owner Daniel M. Snyder insisted in an interview with USA Todaythat as "a lifelong Redskins fan," he will never change the name. "It's that simple. NEVER-you can use caps," he said.

Snyder is neither evil nor a racist, best I can tell; he is merely sentimental, tied to tradition and team spirit, like most of us. The billionaire owner has even taken it upon himself to quietly visit Indian reservations across the country, many of them impoverished, to see how he might help them. Who knows? In a genuine national and local discussion over the team name, Snyder might be able to prevail.

But my sense is that the tide of history is unmistakably moving against him-certainly enough so for NPR and the rest of the mainstream news media to begin to pull back and calibrate their use of the name.

High schools and colleges have already largely abandoned Indian names and mascots. The NCAA in 2005 banned any college with "hostile or abusive mascots, nicknames or imagery" from hosting championship competitions. Most universities had by then eliminated Indian references altogether anyway. The Stanford University Indians became the Cardinal in 1973, for example. Sports teams at the Miami University of Ohio were actually called the Redskins but became the Redhawks in 1998. The University of North Dakota dropped the name Fighting Sioux after voters in a 2012 state referendum decidedly rejected it.

The NCAA, with approval of the National Congress of American Indians, made an exception for teams carrying the formal name of a tribe, such as the Florida State Seminoles, the University of Utah Utes and the Central Michigan Chippewas. In these cases, the universities collaborate closely with the tribes.

Meanwhile, 28 high schools across the country stopped calling themselves Redskins between 1990 and 2012, according to the Indian congress. Cooperstown Junior-Senior High of Cooperstown, N.Y., home of the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum, did so last year.

The National Education Association in 1991 and 1992, the American Counseling Association in 2001, the American Psychological Association in 2005 and the American Sociological Association in 2007 passed resolutions recommending the end of using most Native American names and mascots in sports. So have the United States Commission on Civil Rights ( 2001) and religious organizations such as the United Methodist Church ( 1996). Groups representing other minorities, such as the NAACP in 1999, have closed ranks with the Indian coalition.

A political noose is tightening, too. The Washington City Council in November overwhelmingly passed a resolution calling the team name "racist and derogatory" and urging it be changed, a longstanding council position. Mayor Vincent C. Gray publicly agrees. This can hardly be a good harbinger for getting needed city support as the team considers building a new stadium in the district. Lest it feel comfortable in its current quarters across the state line in Maryland, all the Democratic Party candidates for governor there made statements critical of the R-word in just the last several weeks.

Washington being the nation's capital, Congress has gotten in on the act. The Democratic leaders in both houses-Senator Harry Reid of Nevada and Representative Nancy Pelosi of California-have called on the team to change its name, as has Tom Cole, an influential conservative Republican congressman from Oklahoma and member of the Chickasaw Nation. Last month, he and Democratic Senator Maria Cantwell of Washington, chair of the Indian Affairs Committee, sent a sharp letter to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell charging that it was inappropriate for the NFL as a tax-exempt organization to "profit from the continued degradation of tribes and Indian people" by having a franchise called the Redskins. Since 1966, the IRS has classified the league as a 501(c)(6) tax-exempt organization, similar to chambers of commerce and other professional sports leagues.

Even President Barack Obama, an avid sports fan, has weighed in. He told the Associated Press in October that if he were owner of the team, he would "think about changing" the name because it offends "a sizable group of people."

"I don't know whether our attachment to a particular name should override the real legitimate concerns that people have about these things," he said.

The trademark protection of the team's name is also under threat. Just this week, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office rejected the patenting of "Washington Redskins Potatoes." In December, the office rejected the patenting of "Redskins Hog Rinds" for another company. The patent office has rejected about a dozen petitions to use the "redskins" name on the grounds that redskins is derogatory. Federal law prohibits registered names that are disparaging. Since 1992, Native groups have been pressing the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board of the U.S. Patent Office to lift protection of the name and logo of the team itself. The Indian group won once before the appeal board, only to be overturned in federal court, but the potato and hog rind rulings now appear to set a new precedent. Removing patent protection would allow anyone to sell Redskins merchandise without paying the team.

For the moment, however, Snyder is hardly under much economic pressure to change. The Redskins is the third most lucrative franchise in the NFL, according to Forbes Magazine's annual valuation of teams. Snyder's most immediate problem was a disappointing season; some fans have taken to calling the team the "deadskins."

Team officials also have on their side three public opinion polls done last year. It is the overwhelming results of these polls that force caution before editors take the newsroom headlong down Scott Simon's path.

A national poll of 1,004 adults done for the Associated Press-GfK found that 79 percent of Americans don't think that the team's name should change, versus 11 percent who do. The margin of error was 3.9 percent.

A second national survey by Public Policy Polling, a firm associated with the Democratic Party, fleshed out partisan differences. Fully 90 percent of registered Republican voters said a name change is unnecessary, compared to 59 percent of Democrats, according to the poll. But this is still a majority of Democrats. Overall, 71 percent of Americans were found to oppose changing the name. The margin of error for the 741 respondents was 3.6 percent.

Curiously, it is the fan base of the greater Washington area that is somewhat less loyal to the name. In a poll of 1,106 adults in the Washington area by The Washington Post, 66 percent favored keeping the name and 28 percent opposed. The margin of error was 3.5 percent.

This is still more than two-to-one in favor of the name. But local support for the name might be less than nation-wide because of the proportionally large number of blacks and Democrats in the Washington area and the greater exposure locally to the arguments against the team's name. In what might seem a contradiction, for example, the local poll found that 56 percent of residents who favored the name believed at the same time that "redskins" is an "inappropriate way to describe a Native American Indian."

These polls, along with my own informal sampling of some 50 colleagues and university students, suggests that to the extent that Americans think of Indians at all when they think of the team, they at least tacitly accept the explanation of the name offered by Snyder. "'Washington Redskins' is more than a name we have called our football team for over eight decades," he wrote in a letter to fans in October. "It is a symbol of everything we stand for: strength, courage, pride, and respect-the same values we know guide Native Americans and which are embedded throughout their rich history as the original Americans."

It's a noble thought, but not one embedded in the history of either the word or the naming of the team.

Full-blooded Native Americans do not actually have red skin. They are tan or brown. According to the authoritative Oxford English Dictionary, the term was first recorded by the British in the late 1600s in referring to the Algonquin peoples of the American Northeast because of their vermilion body and face paint. Historian Ives Goddard of Washington's Smithsonian Museum told NPR's Code Switch that Indians were the first to actually use the word to distinguish themselves from the mostly white-skinned British and French in negotiations. The name Oklahoma is derived from Choctaw words meaning "red people."

Over the course of the 1800s, however, the word "redskin" in English evolved from being a neutral descriptive to a slur used mostly by whites. This was the century of the forced eviction of Indians from the East, the Indian Wars in the West and the confinement of Indians to reservations.

Every dictionary I could find describes the word today as derogatory.

When owner George Preston Marshall purchased a Boston football team, the Braves, and decided in 1933 to change the name, team lore holds that he picked Redskins to honor his flamboyant new coach, William "Lone Star" Dietz, who claimed to be all or part Lakota Sioux from South Dakota. The balance of the evidence, however, is that Dietz's claim was a fraud, invented at different times to get into free Indian schools, to avoid the World War I draft as a non-citizen Indian and to live out a romantic image of the lost noble warrior. Dietz was born in Wisconsin to a German-American father and probably a German-American mother. The coach, nonetheless, did bring four Native players with him and did seem to be sincere in his admiration for Indian culture. That, however, didn't stop Marshall from firing Dietz after two years and later moving the team to Washington.

The romantization of an Indian past was popular in those years, even though the treatment of living Indians was quite different. Federal "civilization regulations" sought to extirpate Native culture by outlawing their dances, language and ceremonies, restricting their movement and coercing families to put their children into boarding schools and white adoption homes to make the children "white." A popular Tom and Jerry cartoon titled "Redskin Blues" in 1932 depicted the cartoon heroes as being attacked by stereotypical Indian savages and saved by the U.S. cavalry.

If Marshall and his contemporaries were honoring Indians in naming teams after them, it seems to have been more as a marketing gimmick based on an image of Indians as fierce, much like when Pittsburgh called its baseball team the Pirates. The Native Americans had been defeated; no one polled them to ask if they minded being the mascot or name for a white person's team.

Marshall, meanwhile, was hardly enlightened about race. He was a leader in keeping another race-blacks-out of the NFL. Under him, Washington was the last team in the league to integrate, and only did so after the Kennedy Administration threatened to take away the lease for his stadium, which was on federal land.

But years of fan loyalty stoked by marketing, media coverage and genuine entertainment value have long since turned the name of the Redskins into a seemingly anodyne icon of good sports fun. This would seem innocent enough, were it not for the impact still today among Native Americans themselves.

There is no good measure of Indian public opinion. Native Americans make up just two percent of the population. To do a scientifically random national poll, an extraordinary number of people have to be interviewed to scoop up enough Native Americans to be representative. The only attempt was as part of the University of Pennsylvania's 2004 National Annenberg Election Survey. Out of more than 65,000 adults interviewed over the course of nearly a year, 768 respondents self-identified as Native Americans. For them, one question was added. It asked: "The professional football team in Washington calls itself the Washington Redskins. As a Native American, do you find that name offensive or doesn't it bother you?"

Ninety percent picked the answer saying that they didn't find the name offensive. This is the source of the repeated assertions by Snyder and NFL Commissioner Goodell that nine out of ten Native Americans support the name. This, too, is a reason why NPR and the mainstream news media should not rush to judgment on banning the name. But it is not reason enough to continue using the name freely.

One problem is with the poll. It is nearly 10 years old. Also, it is unclear who these "self-identified" Native Americans were, a constant issue in Indian matters. As the Associated Press reported, 2 million Indians are enrolled in the 566 federally recognized tribes, but another 3.2 million people said in the last Census that they, too, are Native American. There is no way to know what is Native about them. Adding to the confusion is that even among those who are enrolled in tribes, different tribes have different blood percentage requirements.

Still, nine out of 10 is such a lopsided margin that many Indians, by whatever definition, clearly said in that poll that they weren't bothered by the name. This in part reflects a greater diversity among Indians themselves than is often recognized. Some genuinely like the attention that comes from the names and mascots. A high school football team on the Navajo Nation reservation, for example, is called the Red Mesa Redskins. The Spirit Lake Reservation in North Dakota opposed scrapping the Fighting Sioux nickname for the state university team.

But not too much should be made of these limited examples and the poll question. Some Indians use the R-word as blacks use the N-word. More generally, many Native Americans, like many struggling people, seem prone to acquiesce to labels and injustices, either out of resignation or because they have larger concerns to worry about. Native Americans suffer by far the highest rates of poverty, teenage suicide, drug abuse, alcoholism, fetal alcohol syndrome, teenage pregnancy and early mortality of any racial or ethnic group in America.

Does anyone doubt that disparaging names don't have a psychological impact? We don't quite know how at a mass level, but anything that adds to the stigmatization already felt by Native Americans, and especially young ones, is terrible. Of all the academic denunciations of Indian mascots and team names, the one I take most seriously is that of the rigorous American Psychological Association, which in its 2005 resolution said that "the continued use of American Indian mascots, symbols, images and personalities establishes an unwelcome and often times hostile learning environment for American Indian students that affirms negative images/stereotypes that are promoted in the mainstream society." Self-esteem appears to be particularly damaged, the association said.

Growing up partly in the South, I remember how impoverished black Americans there often shuffled along to get along, no matter how you addressed them. This was until the Civil Rights and Black Power movements exploded in the 1960s and African Americans took charge of their own destiny and what names they wanted to be called. Black Americans have made immeasurable strides toward equality as a result.

The overwhelming opposition to the names and mascots by tribal councils represented by the National Congress of American Indians and other leaders across the country carries great weight, as most of them are elected. North Dakota, which demographically as a state has one of the largest proportions of Native Americans, may be the indicative. Though members of one reservation in 2010 supported the university's Fighting Sioux team name, leaders of the state's seven tribes and affiliated tribes in 2012 convinced Natives and whites alike to vote overwhelmingly to kill it.

The position of tribal leaders, moreover, is not some phenomenon of recent "political correctness." The National Congress of American Indians first filed against trademark protection of the name in 1963-51 years ago. As the smallest and poorest of the racial minority groups, however, Native Americans have been little heard.

But this is changing, largely because of money. Casinos and other new sources of income have given them the new wherewithal to assert themselves in the modern American way: lobbying and undertaking public relations campaigns.

If you are a doubter about the complaints, as I was at first, I dare you to watch these two video spots recently released by the National Congress of American Indians and the Oneida Indian Nation. " I Am Not A Mascot" collects sound bites from women and men Native leaders across the country. " Proud To Be" is an evocative portrait of Indian diversity. It ends with the background voice intoning, "Native Americans call themselves many things, but the one thing they don't..." And the voice trails off to show a picture of a football helmet with the Redskins logo.

Perhaps team owner Snyder can spark a groundswell of Native Americans whose voices will drown out their leaders and support the name of the Redskins. But how many of us believe that is really going to happen?

No, the name most likely is toast.

Editors setting newsroom standards have to keep their fingers in the air to judge which way the winds are blowing on the changing meaning of words in American society. Leaders of both the National Congress of American Indians and the Oneida Nation separately insisted to me that, among Native Americans at least, the meaning of the Washington team's name is clear and that it is well past time for NPR and the rest of the mainstream news media to ban saying it.

"I urge NPR to be ahead of the curve," Jacqueline Pata, executive director of the Indian congress and a Tlingit tribal member from Alaska, told me. "You are a primary news media outlet for Indian Country, where radio is popular. The studies all say that the language you use about us has an impact on the self-esteem of our youth and who we are as a people."

"We need you being a viable partner in saying that for educational purposes, this term is not acceptable anymore," she said.

Ray Halbritter, the Oneida Nation representative and CEO of Oneida Nation Enterprises, told me: "It's an offensive term; it's a racial slur. It's a name you wouldn't use in casual or everyday conversation. Quite candidly, media outlets shouldn't play a role in perpetuating its use."

"Do you use other derogatory names for other races?" he asked. "Shouldn't you be consistent? Is it wrong for me to ask for that: to be consistent as a news outlet?"

"There is no gray area here," Halbritter told me.

These are powerful arguments that point to the moral question of right and wrong. No matter our good intention or what the polls say, it is up to Native Americans to say what honors and what offends them.The word is a slur and was immoral all along for us to use. We just weren't ever forced to stop to think about it. Sentimentality over a team name got the better of us. It did of me, at least.

And while Indian leaders consider the Washington team name to be the most egregious offender, their grievances apply as well to some of the mascots, cheers or logos associated with the Cleveland Indians, Atlanta Braves, Kansas City Chiefs, Chicago Blackhawks, Golden State Warriors and others.

We do not make team mascots and names of any other race or ethnic group, aside perhaps from the Boston Celtics or the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, names Irish Americans themselves encouraged. Since the nation's founding, the majority culture has used derogatory terms and hate speech for almost every newly arrived racial, ethnic and religious minority and has dropped those words as that minority has assimilated and demanded and won respect. Think of your own group. How we treat Native Americans-the First Americans-is an exception.

I personally have come to agree with Scott Simon and would like to ban the name on NPR now, but I recognize that there is still a chance that the difficult-to-measure public opinion of ordinary Native Americans might embrace the team name. NPR, moreover, has a competing concern. To get too far ahead of its audience, as reflected by the polls, is self-defeating and challenges the viability of the broadcaster itself. Most editors at every independent, non-partisan, fact-based news medium that I know suffer over judging what is professionally ethical, what is moral, what is patriotic and how much they should lead or reflect the nation in their coverage. These dilemmas are felt doubly so inside a public medium.

But help may be on the way: Washingtonians may be opening a hole toward daylight. In the Washington Post poll last year, 28 percent of area residents favored a name change. Thirty percent is often considered a threshold proportion that allows something major to happen. Thirty percent of employee approvals, for example, forces a union election under federal rules. Thirty percent also seems to be the magical tipping point in a Kickstarter campaign; a deluge of contributions and success are said to be likely if you can get past 30 percent of your fundraising goal.

I don't know what the magical poll number is for NPR to decide that the meaning of the team's name has sufficiently changed for the moral and other arguments to tip the balance and justify banning the name on air. Every editor and every member of the NPR audience will have an opinion on this. But I do know that 28 percent of local public opinion and the force of the other arguments legitimize being judicious. This seems to be already happening on its own, judging by the large number of stories-14, on a national, non-sports network-that have addressed the naming issue since the beginning of last year. Reporters and editors, after all, are fans, too, but feel the growing local discomfort in Washington, home of NPR's headquarters.

It is not NPR's position to be an advocate for what Snyder should do, but NPR does have responsibility over its own use of language. The newsroom makes word choices every day that reflect the institution's values. On issues as heated as abortion, gay marriage, tax policy, health care and foreign wars, advocates often use terms that NPR has decided not to use because an alternative is fairer, more accurate or not hateful. That the name of the team is its own and innocently repeated by most of us does not make it any less of a slur to many Native Americans.

The United States is one of the rare multicultural nations in history to have succeeded. A main reason is that we have a Constitution that protects free speech but also protects minorities from the majority. The Supreme Court and most of our national institutions recognize race as a particularly sensitive class that deserves protection if the whole body politic is to hold together. We can disagree over what that protection should be, but almost all of us as Americans instinctively have come to show respect for each other's race. The name of a football team is not something worth clinging to if it challenges our fundamental social and political structure.

If Native Americans want to adopt "redskin" as a self-description, as African-Americans have adopted "black," that's fine. But I don't see that happening. To me, the clock is ticking on the team name and what NPR should do about using it.
Editorial Researcher Kiana Fitzgerald contributed to this post.

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Ethics, Morality And A Ticking Clock For How To Report On The R**skins

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When Scott Simon, the host of Weekend Edition, referred to the Washington Redskins as "the Washington football club whose team name I refuse to utter," the divided reaction by listeners crystallized a creeping ethical and moral dilemma for NPR and all the mainstream media.

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Fun Facts About College That Will Surprise You

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Fun Facts About College That Will Surprise You

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When it comes to pursuing higher education, there is a lot of information to absorb before even enrolling in the college of your choice. There are so many different types of colleges out there, from online schools to traditional campuses. Once you decide the type of institution you want to attend, then you get to decide what you want to study. There are lots of decisions to make, so this list of college fun facts might help shed some light on things you may have not otherwise known.

College Fun Facts

This list consists of facts about college, ranging from describing where the idea of college even came from to how study-abroad programs work.

Take a look to see what you can learn!

1. Graduation Requirements:

Depending on what and where you study, degree lengths vary. For example, associate degrees typically take 2 years to complete, whereas bachelor degrees are generally 4 years. However, these requirements are changing (and becoming stricter). As such, some bachelor degrees are starting to take 5 years to complete.

2. More Females Attend College Than Males:

Did you know that more women attend college than men? Countries all over the world are realizing this fact. However, despite the educational gender gap, there is still a wage gap between men and women with men earning more than women.

3. 24/7 Food Options:

College campuses used to have strict hours for when they would serve food. However, as more restaurants enter campuses and delivery like UberEats exist, students can get food around the clock.

4. Study Abroad is Recommended:

As a college student, there are many opportunities and programs dedicated to studying abroad. Studying abroad means that you go complete college credits in a different country. Study-abroad programs offer enriching experiences without compromising one's educational goals.

5. Campuses are Intentionally Impressive:

In the United States alone, there are over 5,000 institutions for higher education. That's without counting online institutions like University of the People. As such, traditional colleges that are on-campus have to make their campuses impressive to be desirable. That's why they have amenities like swimming pools, state-of-the-art gyms, theaters, and more.

6. Dorm Rooms are Lacking:

Despite impressive college campuses, dorm rooms are still stuck in the past. While some universities have single rooms for those who live on campuses, many still rely on shared amenities like bathrooms and showers within suites or for the whole floor.

7. The "College Experience" is Real:

There's more to attending college than just receiving the degree. As such, colleges play towards the "college experience" as a marketing tactic, but it also is made real by the opportunities. For example, colleges have Greek rows (fraternities and sororities), sports teams, clubs, and more that make going to college a memorable experience.

8. Schools are Becoming More Sustainable:

As climate change continues to pose a threat to the world, college campuses are taking an active stance in their positioning. Many colleges value "going green" and have initiatives like refillable water stations, recycling programs, and even competitions for which dorms can use the least electricity.

9. Colleges Show Off Students' Achievements:

One of the major reasons why people earn their higher education is for better job opportunities. It's a fact that people who receive bachelor's degrees earn more than their counterparts who have a high school diploma. Therefore, people can evaluate an institution's value by seeing where their alumni get jobs. Colleges often share this information as a selling point.

10. Campus Security is a Priority:

Most schools have strict security measures in place. For on-campus schools, this means 24/7 security monitoring and emergency alarms located around the campus. For online schools, security may include anti-bullying rules and data protection.

11. Community College, Public, and Online = Best Value:

Private (for profit) institutions operate like businesses. As such, they maximize their bottom line by having very high tuition. On the other hand, there are countries where college is completely free with many public institutions to choose from. Also, online and community colleges offer students with high value at relatively low costs. For example, the University of the People offers tuition-free higher education degree programs.

12. College Can be Totally Online:

Many institutions have started to offer online classes. Additionally, some schools are 100% online, like the University of the People. This means that no matter where you are, you just need internet access to be able to attend class and take tests.

13. College Can Be Expensive:

There's a wide range in how much colleges cost. For example, in 2018-2019, the average cost of public tuition was over $10,000 a year. For private institutions, private tuition cost over $35,000 per annum on average. That's why scholarships and tuition-free options like UoPeople are so important.

14. Graduates Earn More Than Non-Graduates:

Over one's lifetime, a person with a bachelor's degree stands to earn $1 million more than someone with a high school diploma. Although higher education can be expensive and the costs continue to increase, the payoff is clear.

15. High Chance to Meet Your Life Partner:

Although it's not likely to be your first reason for going to college, there is a high chance that you will fall in love in college! Being surrounded by your own cohort and sharing in life experiences means that you have a high chance of meeting someone in classes or social activities who may become your partner for life.

More Facts About College

Here are some more specific and less-known fun college facts:

Origin of words:

Alma mater: This is meant to describe the school you graduated from. In ancient Rome, the term was used to describe goddesses as the Latin words mean "nourishing or bountiful mother."

Alumnus: This refers to a person who is a graduate. The word is Latin and means "student."

First college to graduate minorities:

African-American: In 1823, Alexander Lucius Twilight was the first African-American on record to graduate from college in the United States. He graduated with a Bachelor's degree from Middlebury College in Vermont.

Gender-Specific College Count:

College with the lowest acceptance rate:

A college acceptance calculates the ratio of admitted students to those who have applied. In 2019, the college with the lowest acceptance rate was the Curtis Institute of Music with an acceptance rate of 4.2%. It was followed by Stanford University, which had a 4.8% acceptance rate.

The biggest academic library:

In college, the library is a meeting place for study groups and a destination for those seeking research and knowledge. Some institutions with the biggest on-campus library include: Harvard University, University of Illinois, and Yale University.

Kermit the Frog was a Commencement Speaker:

The commencement speech is considered an opportunity of honor for those invited to speak at a university's graduation. In 1996, Southampton College had an unconventional commencement speaker as Kermit the Frog graced the stage and was awarded an honorary doctorate in Amphibious Letters for raising awareness about the environment.

Albert Einstein's Brain is Still in College:

The Freshman 15 is a Myth:

According to an Ohio State University study, freshman don't actually gain 15 pounds during their first year in college. Instead, that number is closer to 2-3 pounds and is mostly correlated to alcohol consumption.

The Takeaway

There are many facts about college to explore and learn. This list is an abbreviated look at some of the most useful, interesting, and outlandish things to know. No matter who you are, pursuing higher education will offer an array of benefits.

What's more is that you have a big choice to make in where you attend university and what you study. If you're looking for an affordable, high-quality education that is tuition-free, learn more about joining the University of the People. Here's a fun fact: There are over 20,000 students from over 200 countries and territories around the world who have already made this choice!

You might also be interested in:

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Fun Facts About College That Will Surprise You

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When it comes to pursuing higher education, there is a lot of information to absorb before even enrolling in the college of your choice. There are so many different types of colleges out there, from online schools to traditional campuses.

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Why Ageism In The Workplace Still Seems To Be Okay

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Why Ageism In The Workplace Still Seems To Be Okay

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A headline on Stanford University Business School's Insights site caught my eye recently: "Workplace Equality for All! (Unless They're Old)." The piece described fascinating research by NYU's Michael North and Stanford's Ashley Martin which found that workers who openly oppose racism and sexism were still prejudiced against older workers.

As these researchers explained in their American Psychological Association article about their study, ageism is alive and unwell in the workplace. What's more, North and Martin discovered after interviewing 348 people, the younger people were, the more likely they were to hold ageist views on older workers. Little surprise that an AARP survey said 78% of older workers saw or experienced age discrimination in the workplace in 2020; in 2018, 61% did.

To learn more about the ageist notions reflected in the idea of equality for (almost) all, I recently interviewed North. Highlights from our conversation:
Next Avenue: What made you interested in doing the research that led to the 'Equality for (Almost) All' study?
Michael North: I actually get asked this a lot, because I'm in my thirties. From a personal standpoint, I had this experience when I was twenty-two, where I was a research assistant for a psychology professor who was coordinating a study on age and wisdom. And he said 'You're going to have to interview people for two hours at a time. Half the time, that person's gonna be in their thirties and half the time that person is going to be in their sixties, seventies or eighties or even older. And as I was leaving, I remember thinking this was not something I was particularly looking forward to - I was fine with the people in their thirties, but I thought the older persons would be boring.

As it turns out, it was a life-altering moment for me, because I enjoyed interacting with all of these groups. I actually ended up enjoying interacting with the sixty and above group more. I just thought that people in their sixties, seventies, eighties and beyond were more interesting.

They were also more interested in me. They were more inquisitive about what the study was about.

A couple of years later, when I was applying to graduate school in social psychology, my wonderful graduate mentor and I got to talking about aging and ageism and age-based prejudice. She said 'Not a lot of people focus on this. It's a very much under the radar.' And so, we basically agreed to study this. That really was the starting point.
Going in, what was your focus for this study you and Ashley Martin did, and why?
Our focus was about this idea of older adults sort of being subtly nudged out the door: It might feel like people aren't taking you seriously as much as they used to. You're left out of meetings. You might get talked over. Your opinion might get missed.

There's this sort of subtle tension where older adults are expected to step aside and get out of the way and stop creating this perceived logjam in the distribution of resources or jobs or positions of influence, so the younger generation can get their turn.
And is this true regarding the way people view both older men and older women?
We did an earlier study and found that older women are spared from some of these expectations compared with older men.
Tell me about the correlations you found regarding racism, sexism and ageism.
Ashley noticed a pattern in our data in earlier studies. The more people tended to endorse this idea that there should be equality for everyone and striving to reduce prejudice toward traditionally discriminated groups, there was this surprising correlation. Those who were more egalitarian - who were striving to reduce prejudice toward traditionally discriminated groups - were less likely to endure racist views and less likely to endorse sexist views but weirdly, they were actually more likely to support ageist views, endorsing this idea of succession; that older adults should step aside and make way for younger generations.
And you found this ageism was more true of younger people?
Is it the case that the younger you are, the more you endorse this idea of succession? The short answer is yes.
How young are we talking?
That's not easy to answer. It's just by and large, the younger you are, the more you endorse these views.
Everybody knows people shouldn't be racist. People shouldn't be sexist. I guess what I'm not sure I understand is why does it still seem to be okay to be ageist?
The most direct way I can say it is ageism is socially condoned to a point where it's not uncommon for folks to overlook it as a prejudice.

I think people see a certain 'truth' to ageism that 'making me feel young is normal.' If you go to any local pharmacy, it's quite socially condoned to see birthday cards that say, 'Ha ha, you're old now.'

I'm often taken aback how stand-up comedians and late-night talk show hosts make jokes about older people. And there's really been no real backlash toward making those kinds of jokes. There hasn't really been a huge, organized civil rights movement to combat this.
There's a federal age discrimination law, but it's not being enforced very much. And the courts have basically gutted it. So workers may feel it's okay to be ageist.
Absolutely. Age discrimination is now extremely difficult to prove.
I'm sixty-four and trying to put myself in the shoes of people in their twenties and thirties. I could see why some would think older people are blocking them. There are a lot of older workers, and when you're young, you often want to move up the ladder. I don't know that I would call this ageist. I would call that maybe just sort of a realistic view of the world of work and demographics.
Think of how many hiring decisions, firing decisions, promotions, raises and opportunities are allocated based on so-called 'fit.' Man, the word 'fit' is so loaded when it comes to age, right? It's a code word.

Tech companies don't explicitly say old people need not apply, but in almost every way, that's kind of what they're saying in their job descriptions. Not to mention in their ball pits and Foosball tables that some of their workplaces have.
What do you think?
Well said. Thank you for phrasing it that way, too, because I think it's really, really important if we're actually going to solve this issue.

Like you said, there are certain pragmatic realities. I think the question is: To what extent is it a bias and to what extent is it not? That's a huge question and really difficult to answer.

It seems like everything is becoming more competitive. There's sort of a tension between the old guard and the new guard. So, I can see being younger and being like, 'Well, if these older folks would just get out of the way, that would free up resources and opportunities.' And you know, it's tough to say that's a hundred percent wrong.
Are older workers blocking younger workers?
I would say though, it's not as simple as that.

As the economy does well, younger and older workers all do well. As the economy does poorly, they all do poorly. Generations are not in direct competition with one another, even though it might seem that way.
What do you think is an ageist view in the workforce?
If you were to just think about how an organization typically runs, the kinds of roles, by and large, that someone in their fifties or sixties tends to do are probably pretty different than someone in their twenties. An entry-level job is vastly different from a more managerial job.

One of the big, misguided arguments against hiring older workers is there's this belief that older workers don't perform as well as younger workers. And I'm sure that might happen in some cases, or in some industries or in some roles. But statistically, job performance does not decline with age.

It seems really unfair to dismiss an older person in the room's viewpoint because 'they don't know how things work anymore.' What most of the other people in the room don't realize is that this person probably saw the same kind of thing unfold back in like 1979.
Are there things employers could be doing that could help educate people that some perceptions of older workers are wrong?
And they actually remember what worked and what didn't. And they probably have something pretty incisive to say about it. Will it be the perfect answer? Not necessarily.

I think it's a healthier view to say, 'My elders have been there before; I have a lot to learn from them.' And vice versa. The older guard should not just dismiss the younger guard and say they're gunning for your job.

It seems to me, if you're a business and you have senior employees and they want to stick around and want to contribute, there are ways that you can do that.

I actually have a piece on this in the Harvard Business Review, co-authored with my friend Hal Hershfield, who teaches at UCLA. It's called 'Four Ways to Adapt to an Aging Workforce.'
Are there things older workers could, or should, be doing that could help change perceptions about blocking and succession?
They include things like offering flexible work arrangements and making certain ergonomic changes.

It's saying: We recognize that there is value in older workers.
Will we see less ageism in the workplace, and why should we?
Do whatever you can to contribute. I know that sounds really silly and obvious, but if you're making the effort to help out your colleagues, to mentor, that's a hugely gratifying way of contributing.

If a younger person sees an older person who is overtly giving back or helping out the younger generation, the older person is seen in even more positive regard than if a middle-age or a younger person is doing the same thing.

I'm an optimist. If you are living, you're aging. And whether it's in your workplace, in your community or in your family, showing cross-generational empathy goes a long way.

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Why Ageism In The Workplace Still Seems To Be Okay

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A headline on Stanford University Business School's Insights site caught my eye recently: "Workplace Equality for All! (Unless They're Old)." The piece described fascinating research by NYU's Michael North and Stanford's Ashley Martin which found that workers who openly oppose racism and sexism were still prejudiced against older workers.

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Ending the Era of Harmful "Indian" Mascots

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Ending the Era of Harmful "Indian" Mascots

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Latest News

Key NCAI Resources

NCAI's Longstanding Opposition to Harmful "Indian" Sports Mascots

As the nation's oldest, largest, and most representative American Indian and Alaska Native advocacy organization, NCAI has long held a clear position against derogatory and harmful stereotypes of Native people - including sports mascots - in media and popular culture. Since NCAI launched its campaign to address stereotypes of Native people in popular culture, media, and sports in 1968, significant progress has been made in pursuit of ending the era of "Indian"

NCAI's position is clear, longstanding, and deeply rooted in our 78 years as a leading voice for Indian Country - we advocate for and protect the civil rights, social justice, and racial equity of all Native people in all parts of American society.

NCAI's Work to End "Indian" Mascots

NCAI is the oldest, largest, and most representative national organization that shares the unified voice of hundreds of Tribal Nations representing millions of Native people, and that voice has been consistent and clear for decades: sports mascots are symbols of disrespect that degrade, mock, and harm Native people, particularly Native youth. NCAI's work to end "Indian" or Native "themed" mascots, used interchangeably here, is guided by our numerous resolutions pertaining to cultural appropriation and the harmful effects of these mascots. For decades, NCAI largely focused its efforts on ending "Indian" mascots at the professional level, directing specific attention to the former mascot of the NFL's Washington "Commanders". In 2020, NCAI formally expanded the initiative to include work at the K-12 level, which included the development of the National School Mascot Tracking Database . In 2021, NCAI further expanded the initiative to include work at the state level, developing a State Activity Tracker and engaging directly with state legislatures pursuing mascot bans through legislation .

NCAI's Ending "Indian" Mascots initiative currently focuses on three primary levels: the K-12 school level, the state level, and the professional sports level.

To request NCAI's help at the K-12 or state levels, please email mascots@ncai.org .

Archive of NCAI News and Updates

November 2021
Ending "Indian" Mascots Update: More School Districts Retire their Native "Themed" Mascots, NCAI Shares Statement on Atlanta "Braves" Mascot and Fan Rituals (11.04.21) NCAI Reiterates Longstanding Opposition to Atlanta Braves' Mascot and "Tomahawk Chop" Fan Ritual as Team Plays in World Series (10.27.21)

August 2021
Ending "Indian" Mascots Update: NCAI Launches State Activity Tracker (08.03.21)
July 2021
NCAI Commends Announcement by Major League Baseball's Cleveland Franchise of Its New Name "Guardians" (07.23.21)
Ending "Indian" Mascots Update: NCAI Presents Overview of National School Mascot Tracking Database; More Native "Themed" Mascots are Retired, Replaced (07.12.21)

NCAI Statement on the Washington Football Team's Retirement of Racist Mascot (07.13.20) June 2021
Ending "Indian" Mascots Update: Colorado and Nevada Pass Bills Banning Native "Themed" Mascots, Logos, and Team Names (06.08.21)

April 2021
Ending "Indian" Mascots Update: The State of Washington Bans Native "Themed" Mascots, Logos, and Team Names (04.28.21)

Ending "Indian" Mascots Update: NCAI President Commemorates Anniversary of Retirement of Washington Football Team's Mascot; More Schools Retire Their Native "Themed" Mascots July 2020

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Ending the Era of Harmful "Indian" Mascots

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As the nation's oldest, largest, and most representative American Indian and Alaska Native advocacy organization, NCAI has long held a clear position against derogatory and harmful stereotypes of Native people - including sports mascots - in media and popular culture.

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Don't Go to College: A Complete Guide to Opting Out & Moving On

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Don't Go to College: A Complete Guide to Opting Out & Moving On

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If you're reading this, chances are a big important question has already crossed your mind. It's a question millions of young adults all over ask themselves every year: Do I really need college to be successful? Short answer - no. You don't have to sit in class for four years, take on a mountain of student debt, and hope it all works out for the best. Today, there are more reasons than ever to skip college - and more options than ever to help you succeed without college.

In this post, we'll give you reasons to rethink college: all the facts about why you shouldn't feel bad about opting out of college and choosing your own path to success, and give you some practical tips on how to move on and what to do instead.
If you're in college and you're thinking about dropping out, read ourguide to dropping out of college and landing on your feet.

10 Reasons You Shouldn't Go to College

Unless you plan to be a doctor or a lawyer or something else that requires specific certifications, there's a very good chance you can reach your goals faster (and certainly more affordably) by skipping college entirely.

Keep reading to find out why we at Praxis say "You don't need college to unlock a career you love!"

1. College Is Getting More Expensive

Today, more than 40 U.S. schools charge more than $250,000 for a four-year degree, according to US News and World Report data. And costs are rising for not only tuition and fees but also textbooks and housing, as the chart below shows.

While it's not impossible to get a degree without racking up a mountain of debt by living at home or going to an in-state public university, many students spend outrageous sums of money chasing the best college and social/networking experience available, which often means spending a lot of money on cross-country flights, gas, and housing.

2. College Is Not the Best Route to Entrepreneurship, According to Entrepreneurs

Raised on stories about inspiring entrepreneurs like Gary Vaynerchuck and Elon Musk, a lot of graduates leave school with big dreams of being entrepreneurs. But in the words of many successful entrepreneurs themselves, college is not necessarily the best way to get there.

Instead, set goals for yourself and hold yourself accountable.

Here's what a few prominent entrepreneurs about college:

, founder and CEO of Tom Ferry International and bestselling author of
"I feel bad for more than half of the young people in college today. I'm not talking about those working toward a specific objective, like becoming a doctor, lawyer, or accountant. I feel sorry for the ones who are trying to "find their path" and racking up massive student loan debt in the process. There are so many ways to learn skills today [...] That time would be much better spent experiencing life and seeking mentors in search of your passion. Once you find it, drill down by attending seminars, taking online courses, reading anything and everything relevant, and even bingeing on YouTube videos to become an expert in that area. There's unlimited information at your fingertips."

3. Avoid Student Loan Debt

More than 44 million Americans are saddled with student loan debt. Americans owe some $1.6 trillion in student loans. According to the Institute for College Access and Success, the average student loan debt for members of the class of 2018 sitting at $29,200 - a 2% increase from the previous year.

4. You're Not Alone

You might be under the impression that everyone goes to college, but you'd be mistaken. According to the Washington Examiner, some 68% of Americans don't have a bachelor's degree. The undergraduate dropout rate in the U.S. is with around 30% of college students dropping out before sophomore year. So if you do choose to drop out, know that you're not alone.

5. You're in Good Company

Dropping out of college is not the career-ender many people make it out to be. In fact, nearly a of billionaires in 2016 didn't graduate from college.

Here's a list of some of the successful college dropouts:

Steve Jobs, Apple's late co-founder and CEO

Brandon Stanton, Author and photographer at Humans of New York

Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook co-founder and CEO

Bill Gates, Microsoft co-founder

Ellen Degeneres, Talkshow host

Natasha Bedingfield, Singer-songwriter

Oprah Winfrey, Talkshow host

Brad Pitt, Actor

Jack Dorsey, Co-founder of Twitter

Jan Koum, WhatsApp co-founder

Scott Fitzgerald, Author

John Mackey, Whole Foods CEO

Ralph Lauren, Fashion designer

Daniel Ek, Co-founder of Spotify

Ted Turner, Founder of CNN

Richard Branson, Founder of Virgin

Travis Kalanick, Founder of Uber

Lady Gaga, Musician and actress

David Karp, Tumblr founder and former CEO

Maybe you're thinking "these celebrity dropouts are outliers, I'm nothing like them!" And the truth is, we only use these examples because they're famous and everyone knows about them, but there are countless people around the world who dropped out or never went to college whose we just don't know.

You don't have to be famous to be a success and build a rewarding, engaging career that makes you excited to get out of bed in the morning.

6. The U.S. Education Model Is Flawed

The U.S. is actually unusual in how much it values tertiary education. In other countries, a college education is far from viewed as the only path to a successful career. In Germany, for instance, it's very common for young people to train as apprentices in fields ranging from banking to manufacturing, to I.T., with around of young people taking this route.

Meanwhile, in the U.S., apprenticeships are as low as 5 percent and the occupations that offer trade apprenticeships are mainly associated with construction.

7. Learning Out of Obligation Is Less Valuable Than Following Your Interests

When you talk to people who have been to college, you'll often hear them say "I wish I'd been a better student" or "I wish I'd waited before going to college" or "If I could do it over, I would have studied X or Y instead." The problem is that a lot of people simply don't know themselves well enough when they're young to choose the best course of study for them. So they only realize much later in life which fields they found truly useful or interesting and would enjoy studying.

There's no shame in waiting until you have more clarity on what really makes you come alive (and access to funds) before you choose to study. According to by The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, 40 percent of students are over the age of 25, about 28 percent of students have children, and some 62 percent of students must work while studying.

Get some life experience. Figure out what makes you tick. Odds are you'll never need a degree for your dream job, but if you discover a burning passion for botany or philosophy (or whatever floats your boat) later in life and choose to study it in college, you'll be doing it because you know you want to, not because society expects you to.

8. A College Degree Is No Longer a Prerequisite for a Good Job

A growing number of high-profile companies are steering away from the practice of listing higher education qualifications in their recruitment requirements.

Here's a list of top companies that no longer require a college degree:

Now, you might be thinking "But most of those are all tech companies, and I don't know how to code!" but the good news is that these high-profile companies make waves that cause ripples through the rest of the job market. While removing degree requirements from job descriptions probably isn't something you can expect businesses everywhere to adopt overnight, the trend is gaining traction - and driving many companies to rethink their hiring practices.

Not to mention, even when companies list a degree requirement, it's actually far easier than you might think to bypass this altogether - and land the job offer regardless of your educational background. But that's another post for another day.

9. You Can Learn (Almost) Anything Online

We're big proponents of self-directed education. We don't believe that learning only takes place in the classroom. With the right mindset, every experience can be an opportunity for learning, and if you're deliberate about it, you can learn everything you need to know to do a job you love without ever setting foot in college.

There are countless online education options available, ranging from free or cheap courses on e-learning platforms like , Shaw Academy, , and , and YouTube tutorials, to Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), certified online courses like the Open University.

Beyond ordinary self-driven online courses, there are a variety of online bootcamp options like CodeAcademy if you're interested in learning how to code, or for learning practical business skills to equip you for the modern workplace.

10. College Doesn't Prepare You For Work

While there's an argument to be made that college can help you start building a network, the sad truth is that a network of mostly people your same age probably won't start paying dividends for a few years. That aside, an even more startling realization is just how woefully unprepared for the workplace most college students are when they graduate. This is largely because traditional college focuses on theory rather than application. Instead of working on real-world problems or learning how to sell yourself on the job market, students spend their days memorizing textbooks and obscure facts in preparation for tests.

In the real world, you can just assume everything is on the test - everything, that is, except probably what you studied in most of your college courses. Truth be told, employers don't actually care how much you know - they care about whether or not you can show up, work hard, and bring some skills to the table. And most of those skills aren't taught in classrooms today.
Here are the business skills in highest demand in 2020, according toLinkedIn:

Sure, some of these hard skills are technical, but a fair number of them (analytical reasoning, business analysis, affiliate marketing, sales, and video production) can be learned on the job if you apply yourself.

Quite often, employers actually care more about soft skills than hard skills, because it's easier to teach someone hard skills with training than it is to teach someone how to be creative or adaptable. So don't neglect to sharpen your soft skills too!

Don't Go to College: What to Do Instead

If you've decided to skip college, good for you. But unless you already have a specific goal and plan in mind, you're probably wondering what to do now. There's a widespread misconception that if you don't go to college, you'll end up working in the retail or service industry for the rest of your life - but that's simply not true. If you're driven, curious, and creative, you can build a lucrative career and a life you love - yes, without a degree.

Invest In Yourself

The most important thing you can do is make a decision to invest in yourself. What does this mean? It means choosing to be curious and proactive about building yourself up by developing your skills and exploring new opportunities that will teach you more about yourself, specific skills that could come in handy, and the business world in general.

Having sought-after skills, demonstrable professional capabilities, a broad , and varied work experience mean you have choices. But even more importantly, collecting a variety of experiences early in life will teach you what kind of work energizes and excites you, and what frustrates and exhausts you. This is key to figuring out what kind of job will make you happy in the long run, because nobody should have to do a job they hate.

Don't go to college and you'll have a four-year head start discovering what kind of life you want - not to mention a variety of skills employers find valuable.

To help you collect experiences and skills that will help you forge your own path, here's a list of our 10 top college alternatives for 2020.

Top 10 College Alternatives

Take online courses

Monetize your hobby

Do an apprenticeship

Go to community college

Enroll in a coding bootcamp

Start a business

Join an accelerator

Get a job

Move away from your hometown

Enroll in , the ultimate college alternative

Read the full post here: The Best Alternatives to College for 2020 and Beyond.

Discover Praxis

We get it. Choosing to skip college is a big decision. Odds are, you've felt some pressure to get a degree, because, for a long time, the prevailing school of thought has been that you need that credential in order to make a decent living.

While that may have been true a generation or two ago, it's simply not the case anymore. There are many different routes to success, as long as you're hungry for it and willing to do the work to get there.

At , we believe you deserve something different from college. Something that helps you get ahead for good - without taking precious years off your life and unthinkable financial risk. A program that puts you in the driver's seat of your life and career - and that stands 100% behind results. And that's exactly why we've designed our program the way we have.

Our goal is to reduce the unnecessary hoop-jumping required to start your life - to shorten the distance between learning and earning - and to offer you the most direct, effective path possible into the real world. We do that through our 12-month program that combines six months of accelerated practical learning with real-world, paid work experience, accompanied by ongoing coaching and mentoring.

And we're so confident in the results you'll have following our process that we've backed it with a full-guarantee and the option to wait to pay until you're hired and earning an income. Because we believe our success should be directly tied to yours.

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Don't Go to College: A Complete Guide to Opting Out & Moving On

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If you're reading this, chances are a big important question has already crossed your mind. It's a question millions of young adults all over ask themselves every year: Do I really need college to be successful? Short answer - no.

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6 Signs of Ageism in the Workplace and How to Deal With It

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6 Signs of Ageism in the Workplace and How to Deal With It

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6 Signs of Ageism in the Workplace and How to Deal With It

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Chances are you might have dealt with ageism in some capacity in the workplace. Here are the sigs you need to know — plus the obstacles it entails.

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For Native Americans, the fight against mascots is much bigger than sports

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For Native Americans, the fight against mascots is much bigger than sports

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For advocates, dehumanization of indigenous people is at the root of the issue.

More than a decade ago, Sundance, a member of the Muscogee tribe, led a successful effort to change the mascot of a high school from the Oberlin Indians to the Oberlin Phoenix. So when the Major League Baseball's Cleveland Indians announced that they will change their name, it was a "big win" for him and members of the Native community. But is it only the "tip of the iceberg," he said.

Sundance is the director of the Cleveland branch of the American Indian Movement, one of the organizations that has been urging national and local teams with indigenous names and mascots to change their names for more than 50 years.

"There are so, so many issues that we need to address as indigenous people that are certainly more important than the mascot issue, but it is the mascot issue, among others, that prohibits people from seeing indigenous people as people," he told ABC News, adding that the Native American ethnicity is the only one that is widely used as a mascot across the country.

A protestor speaks to a crowd of demonstrators prior to the Opening Day game between the Cleveland Indians and the Kansas City Royals at Progressive Field, July 24, 2020, in Cleveland.

Jason Miller/Getty Images

According to a FiveThirtyEight analysis, hundreds of schools across the country still use Native Americans as their team mascots -- monikers widely seen as racist and dehumanizing to the Native American community.

"There are people who will downplay the importance of the issue and say, 'Gosh, don't you people have better things to worry about?' Well, dehumanization is, I think, the very root of all the other issues that we face," said Heather Whiteman Runs Him, a law professor and director of the Tribal Justice Clinic at the University of Arizona in Tucson.

Protesters sing and play the drums outside of Sports Authority Field at Mile High in Denver, Co., Oct. 27, 2013.

For decades, advocates for Native American rights had been working relentlessly to convince the teams to change their names -- from filing lawsuits to protests to applying pressure on teams and their sponsors.

But it was not until an immense movement swept the nation in the summer of 2020 after the police killing of George Floyd -- an unarmed Black man from Minneapolis -- that some of the most high profile teams relented.

After insisting in 2013 that a name change will "never" happen, Dan Snyder, owner of the Washington Redskins, announced in July that the team would change its name to the Washington Football Team, after FedEx, which has naming rights to the stadium, requested a change.

"Advocates within tribal nations in our communities started working strategically to target the financial backing of the sports --- the Nikes of the world, the FedExes," Fawn Sharp, president of the National Congress of American Indians, told ABC News. "That was part of our strategic thinking, knowing that you're trying to get something that is based on pure morality and a sense of justice is simply not enough -- that the power of the almighty dollar and money in this country, whether you're in sports, or a member of Congress, is such a powerful influence."

Meanwhile, in an interview with the Associated Press, Cleveland Indians team owner Paul Dolan cited the killing of Floyd as an "awakening or epiphany" that contributed to the team's decision, along with conversations with the Native American community.

Before deciding to change their name -- a change that is expected to take place in 2021 -- the Cleveland Indians stopped using the Chief Wahoo logo on their uniforms in 2019.

According to Sharp, who leads the country's oldest and largest American Indian and Alaska Native tribal government organization, the widespread Black Lives Matter protests ushered in a national debate about race and racism in America -- one that finally included the rights of Native Americans.

"We've known that a day of reckoning would come ... the momentum has just been an incredible sacred moment," Sharp said, adding that the organization has brought Indian Country together to advocate for the rights of indigenous people and "to be an ally and partner with others that are disenfranchised."

In this Sept. 13, 2020, file photo, seats at Fedex Field display the Washington Football Team logo in Landover, Md.

The shift in energy comes amid some wins in representation for the Native American community that advocates are hoping will lead to policy changes.

Six Native Americans were elected to serve in the next Congress, a record in U.S. history. Meanwhile, Rep. Deb Haaland, who was nominated by President-elect Joe Biden to lead the Department of the Interior, could become the first Native American to serve in a presidential Cabinet. If confirmed by the Senate, Haaland would be the first Native person to oversee an agency that played a major role historically in the forced relocation and oppression of indigenous people.

Reps. Deb Haaland, right, and Rashida Tlaib, left, are seen in the Capitol's House chamber before members were sworn in on the first day of the 116th Congress on Jan. 3, 2019 in Washington.

Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call via Getty Images, FILE

For Whiteman Runs Him, "there's a tremendous capacity for hope in this moment," but she remains "cautiously optimistic."

"Knowing history, we also have to be vigilant that there's enough done," she said, adding that the success of leaders such as Haaland will also depend on the support they get from other branches of government, especially Congress.

Sundance echoed the sentiment, saying, "What we need are people who will maintain their Native identity in the face of rules and regulations that have been enacted to keep us oppressed."

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For Native Americans, the fight against mascots is much bigger than sports

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The changing names of the Cleveland Indians and the Washington Redskins is a win for Native Americans, but there's still much more to be done, leaders say.

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History of College Education
The American debate over whether a college education is worth it began when the colonists arrived from Europe and founded "New College" (later renamed Harvard University) in 1636. In spring 2023, there were over 17 million college students in the United States, and over 43 million borrowers owe a collective $1.75 trillion in total student debt.

Colonial America produced nine colleges that still operate: Harvard University (1636), the College of William & Mary (1693), Yale University (1701), Princeton University (1746), Columbia University (1754), Brown University (1764), Dartmouth College (1769), Rutgers University (1766), and the University of Pennsylvania (1740 or 1749). These universities were funded by the colony or England and usually catered to a specific religious denomination such as Congregational or Presbyterian (Puritan). Primary and secondary school systems were not yet established so "college students" were sometimes boys as young as fourteen or fifteen years old and were admitted to receive preparatory education with the assumption that they would matriculate to college-level courses

Pro & Con Arguments

Pro 1

Jobs increasingly require college degrees and college allows students to explore careers and earn better job placements.

Colleges offer career services, internships, job shadowing, job fairs, and volunteer opportunities in addition to a wide variety of courses that may provide a career direction. Over 80% of college students complete internships before graduation, giving them valuable employment experience before entering the job market. Colleges provide networking value.

Meanwhile, college graduates have more and better employment opportunities. 85.2% of college freshmen said they attended college to "be able to get a better job." The unemployment rate for Americans over 25 with a bachelor's degree was 1.9% in Dec. 2019, compared to 2.7% for those with some college or associate's degrees, 3.7% for high school graduates, and 5.2% for high school drop-outs. Underemployment, meaning insufficient work, is lower for college grads (6.2%) as compared to high school-only graduates (12.9%) and people without a high school diploma (18.7%). 58% of college graduates and people with some college or associate's degrees reported being "very satisfied" with their jobs compared to 50% of high school graduates and 40% of people without a high school diploma.

Thus, college graduates make more money. The average college graduate makes $570,000 more than the average high school graduate over a lifetime. Career earnings for college graduates are 71% to 136% higher than those of high school graduates. The Federal Reserve Bank of New York calculated a 14% rate of return on a bachelor's degree, which constitutes a good investment. College graduates earn an average of $78,000, a 75% wage premium over the average $45,000 annual earnings for workers with only a high school diploma. 85% of Forbes' America's 400 Richest People list were college grads.

All of that means a college education has a high return as an investment. Return on investment (ROI) is calculated by dividing the gain from an investment (here the money earned as a result of a college degree) by the cost of the investment (the money spent on a college degree). A college degree has a return of 15% per year as an investment, larger than the stock market (6.8%) and housing (0.4%). Completing some college, but not earning a degree, resulted in a 9.1% return on investment. If a student spent $17,860 (the average cost of tuition and room and board in 2012-2013 for four years at a public university), that student could expect a 15% return of $2,679 each year. According to a 2011 Pew Research survey, 86% of college graduates believed college was a good personal investment.
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Pro 2

Because they learn interpersonal and other skills in college, graduates are more productive as members of society.

Students have the opportunity to interact with other students and faculty, to join student organizations and clubs, and to take part in discussions and debates. According to Arthur Chickering's "Seven Vectors" student development theory, "developing mature interpersonal relationships" is one of the seven stages students progress through as they attend college. Students ranked "interpersonal skills" as the most important skill used in their daily lives in a survey of 11,000 college students. Vivek Wadhwa, technology entrepreneur and scholar, states, "American children party [in college]. But you know something, by partying, they learn social skills. They learn how to interact with each other...They develop skills which make them innovative. Americans are the most innovative people in the world because of the education system." [ 7] [ 16] [ 18]

Students live, go to classes, and socialize with other students from around the world and learn from professors with a variety of expertise. The community of people on a college campus means students are likely to make diverse friends and business connections, and, potentially, find a spouse or mate. Access to a variety of people allows college students to learn about different cultures, religions, and personalities they may have not been exposed to in their hometowns, which broadens their knowledge and perspective. 70.7% of college freshmen in 2015 said they expected to socialize with someone of another racial or ethnic group while in college, while 59.1% said college would help improve their understanding of other countries and cultures.

College graduates attract higher-paying employers to their communities. A 1% increase in college graduates in a community increases the wages of workers without a high school diploma by 1.9% and the wages of high school graduates by 1.6%.
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Pro 3

College graduates and their children are healthier and live longer.

83% of college graduates reported being in excellent health, while 73% of high school graduates reported the same. A University of Southern California study found that adults over 65 with college degrees spent more years with "good cognition" and fewer years suffering from dementia than adults who did not complete high school. In 2008, 20% of all adults were smokers, while 9% of college graduates were smokers. 63% of 25 to 34 year old college graduates reported exercising vigorously at least once a week compared to 37% of high school graduates. College degrees were linked to lower blood pressure in a 30-year peer-reviewed study and lower levels of cortisol (the stress hormone) by a Carnegie Mellon Psychology department study. In 2008, 23% of college graduates aged 35 to 44 years old were obese compared to 37% of high school graduates. College graduates, on average, live six years longer than high school graduates.

A medical journal study from 1970 to 2009 shows college graduates had lower infant mortality rates than high school graduates. Mothers with only a high school education are 31% more likely to give birth to a low-birth-weight baby than a woman with a college degree. Children aged 2 to 5 years old in households headed by college graduates have a 6% obesity rate compared to 14% for children in households headed by high school graduates. 18% more children aged 3 to 5 years old with mothers who have a bachelor's degree could recognize all letters compared to children of high school graduates. In 2010, 59% of children in elementary and middle school with at least one college graduate for a parent participated in after-school activities like sports, arts, and scouting compared to 27% for high school graduate parents.
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Con 1

College is not a guarantee of a job or better life.

College degrees also do not guarantee learning or job preparation. Many students graduate from college with little understanding of math, reading, civics, or economics. In 2011, 35% of students enrolled in college reported they studied 5 hours or less per week and there was a 50% decline in the number of hours a student studied and prepared for classes compared to a few decades ago. 36% of students demonstrated no significant improvement on Collegiate Learning Assessments after 4 years of college. In 2013 56% of employers thought half or fewer of college graduates had the skills and knowledge to advance within their companies. 30% of college graduates felt college did not prepare them well for employment, specifically in terms of technical and quantitative reasoning skills. A Pew Research survey found that 57% of Americans felt higher education did not provide students with good value compared to the money spent.

Under- or un-employement also translates into fewer workplace benefits. In 2013, 68.9% of employed new college graduates did not receive health insurance through their employers and, in 2011, 27.2% received retirement coverage (down from 41.5% in 2000).

The total cost of going to college means more than tuition, fees, and books; it also includes an opportunity cost which equals at least four years of missed wages and advancements from a full-time job-about $49,000 for a 4-year degree and $20,000 for a 2-year degree.
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Con 2

Student loan debt is crippling for college graduates, their families, and society.

In spring 2023, there were over 17 million college students in the United States, and over 43 million borrowers owe a collective $1.75 trillion in total student debt. 45% of people with student loan debt say college was not worth it. 10% of students graduate with over $40,000 in debt and about 1% have $100,000 in debt. In Feb. 2018, undergraduate college graduates had an average of $37,172 in loan debt. According to the US Congress Joint Economic Committee, approximately 60% of college graduates have student loan debt balances equal to 60% of their annual income. Missing late for loan payments leads to lower credit scores and additional fees, worsening the debt problem.

Finally, student debt could cause another financial crisis. As of 2012 student loan debt was over $1 trillion dollars, and more than 850,000 student loans were in default. According to the National Association of Consumer Bankruptcy Attorneys, student loans are "beginning to have the same effect" on the economy that the housing bubble and crash created. Former Secretary of Education William Bennett, PhD, agrees that the student loan debt crisis "is a vicious cycle of bad lending policies eerily similar to the causes of the subprime mortgage crisis." On Feb. 3, 2012, an advisory council to the Federal Reserve also warned that the growth in student debt "has parallels to the housing crisis." As of Jan. 2013, the rate of default on student loans hit 15.1%-a nearly 22% increase since 2007.
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Con 3

Many people would be better served learning a trade or pursuing work right out of high school.
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Did You Know?

1. 19.9 million students were enrolled in colleges and universities in 2019, compared to 13.5 million in 1990, 7.9 million in 1970, and 2.7 million in 1949.

2. The underemployment rate was 34% for all college graduates and 41.1% for recent grads in 2019.

3. One in three college graduates had a job that only required a high school diploma or less, including more than 16,000 parking lot attendants, 83,000 bartenders, and 115,000 janitors with bachelor's degrees.

4. College graduates earn an average of $78,000, a 75% wage premium over the average $45,000 annual earnings for workers with only a high school diploma.

5. The unemployment rate for Americans over 25 with a bachelor's degree was 1.9% in Dec. 2019, compared to 2.7% for those with some college or associate's degrees, 3.7% for high school graduates, and 5.2% for high school drop-outs.

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Proponents of college education say college graduates make more money. Opponents say student loan debt is crippling for college graduates.

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Should Businesses Worry About Appearance-Based Discrimination in the Workplace?

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Should Businesses Worry About Appearance-Based Discrimination in the Workplace?

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Conventional wisdom and research posits that, in addition to popularity and access to their choice of a mate, attractive people tend to get higher evaluations and salaries than their peers and more favorable judgments in trials. For getting a job, it's always an advantage to be an attractive man or woman ...right?

Not so. Newer and more sophisticated research demonstrates that the picture is more complex than it might seem. A recent study shows a disturbing conclusion: being an attractive man was an advantage in all jobs sought, while being an attractive woman was considered a disadvantage in many professions. In this study, attractive women were discriminated against and their beauty was considered a detriment when applying for jobs traditionally identified as male jobs such as the manager of research and development (R&D), director of finance, mechanical engineer and construction supervisor. A different study showed attractive women tended to be sorted into more "traditionally female" positions like receptionist or secretary. More than one study has shown that attractiveness was more beneficial for women applying for traditionally feminine-type jobs instead of traditionally masculine perceived jobs. Successful women's opinions about whether their beauty is a help or hindrance in their careers are inconsistent. Some women believe looks are an advantage, others a disadvantage, in career success.

In 2010, Debrahlee Lorenzana, made national news when she sued her employer, Citibank, for telling her not to wear clothes that were acceptable for and worn by other women in the same office. The list of banned clothing included turtlenecks, pencil skirts and fitted business suits "from Zara." ( a clothing brand commonly worn by Catherine and Pippa Middleton) When Ms. Lorenzana argued that she was fully compliant with the Citibank dress code and remarked that her female peers wore far more revealing attire, Citibank managers allegedly argued that due to her body type her clothes were "distracting" and she needed to wear something to obscure her shape. Citibank fired Ms. Lorenzana from her position as a banker after she allegedly complained of her employer's disparate treatment of her, stated her lawsuit.

The issue of appearance bias has been recognized since the late 1970's. Partly as a result of activism by those representing obese persons. As a result of this movement, Michigan became the first state to explicitly prohibit discrimination based on weight and height. In fact, the EEOC now takes the view that extreme obesity, and obesity that results in other physical conditions, is a disability, and that discrimination based on such obesity is prohibited by the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA). The cities of Binghamton, San Francisco and Santa Cruz prohibit discrimination against weight and height as well. Madison, Wisconsin and Urbana, Illinois have ordinances banning discrimination based on a person's "physical appearance" and "personal appearance" respectively, while Washington D.C. prohibits all forms of personal appearance discrimination. A variety of people have sought protection under these laws including those persons required to wear certain attire for religious purposes and person undergoing gender reassignment surgery who had no recourse at the state or federal level. The great majority of these appearance discrimination laws allow for employers to use a bona-fide occupational qualification defense (BFOQ) .

Since federal and state laws do not prohibit this bias, appearance -based discrimination in the workplace has to be fit into one or more of the protected categories under federal and state anti-discrimination laws. Obviously, discrimination based on appearance can easily be a surrogate for more traditional forms of discrimination against Latinos, African Americans, Asians or women. Abercrombie & Fitch was sued in federal court for having a policy of hiring people who had "classic All-American" looks by some Asian-American, Black/African-American and Latino applicants who argued the defendant steered them into stockroom jobs. The parties reached a settlement requiring the retail clothing giant to pay $50 million, less attorneys' fees and costs, to Latino, Black/African -American, Asian-American and female applicants and employees who charged the company with discrimination. Among other relief, the settlement required the clothing retailer to avoid recruiting at fraternities and sororities, and to feature people with different looks in advertisements and TV commercials. Obviously, discrimination based on appearance can easily be a surrogate for more traditional forms of discrimination against Latinos, African- Americans, Asian-Americans or women.

If businesses allow appearance- based discrimination, the courts are likely to step in, without the need for any new legislation. Discriminating against a full-figured, unsightly or beautiful woman because of her appearance is against the law as sex discrimination because such biases generally do not apply to men. While the federal Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) does not offer protections to employees under the age of forty, local and state anti-discrimination laws might be applicable in appearance-based lawsuits, since some states, such as Alaska, Florida, Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, Mississippi, New Jersey and municipalities like New York City prohibit discrimination against younger people (or reverse age discrimination). An employee subject to discrimination because of a youthful appearance or stereotypes predicated on the employee's young age might argue that it is a form of discrimination against young people. In New Jersey, a 25-year-old employee, who was hired as the Vice President of a bank, sued his employer after he revealed his age and was then told he might be fired and should work for the bank in another capacity instead, according to the lawsuit. The New Jersey Supreme Court ruled that a claim for age discrimination based on youth was actionable under the state's anti-discrimination law.

In a recent survey, younger workers (ages 18- 35) were more likely to report age discrimination than older workers. Similarly, 44% of employees from the ages of 18 through 24 believe they are treated fairly on the job in comparison with 64% of employees from ages 45-64, according to a survey conducted by a human resources consulting firm. In fact, reverse age discrimination could be another issue, which a younger generation, concerned that their talent is not recognized and opportunities are not open to them because of their youth, might bring to the fore to create another evolution of anti-discrimination law.

More businesses are likely to face such issues, especially now that independent research has confirmed this type of bias seems to exist broadly across the workplace. To avoid these missteps, business leaders need to establish a work setting that has clear rules that apply to all employees so they continue to attract and retain talented employees. More importantly, human resource policies established by business owners need to make sure all employees are being judged on their performance and not subject to stereotyping. No business should miss its next superstar because it is focusing on age, appearance or any factor other than performance.

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Should Businesses Worry About Appearance-Based Discrimination in the Workplace?

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Conventional wisdom and research posits that, in addition to popularity and access to their choice of a mate, attractive people tend to get higher evaluations and salaries than their peers and more favorable judgments in trials. For getting a job, it's always an advantage to be an attractive man [...]

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Live animal mascots: Cute or exploitative?

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Live animal mascots: Cute or exploitative?

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Live animal mascots: Cute or exploitative?

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Animal rights activists have repeatedly called for college sports teams to stop using real animals as their mascots. Are these complaints fair or an overreaction?

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Free college programs come in different forms but generally refer to the government picking up the tab for tuition costs, while students pay for other expenses such as room and board.

32 states and DC have some variation of free college programs. 9 states have statewide programs with "few eligibility limits," while 23 have "[s]tate sponsored free college tuition programs with income, merit, geographical or programmatic limitations." 18 states have no free college programs.

Tuition at public four-year institutions rose more than 31% between 2010 and 2020. When adjusted for inflation, college tuition has risen 747.8% since 1963. The average student loan debt more than doubled from the 1990s to the 2010s, according to the US Department of Education. About 16.8 million undergraduate students were projected to be enrolled in college in 2022, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.

College tuition is set by state policy or by each individual institution. Some colleges, especially federal land grant schools, had free tuition beginning in the 1860s. And some states had tuition-free policies at state colleges and universities for in-state students well into the twentieth century. According to Ronald Gordon Ehrenberg, Professor at Cornell University, "Public colleges and universities were often free at their founding in the United States, but over time, as public support was reduced or not increased sufficiently to compensate for their growth in students and costs (faculty and staff salaries, utilities etc.), they moved first to a low tuition and eventually higher tuition policy. About 2.9% of American 18- to 24-year olds went to college for the 1909-1910 school year, compared to 40% in 2020.

At the national level, free college programs have been in effect for military personnel since the 1944 GI Bill. At least 26 other countries have free or nearly free college tuition: Argentina, Austria, Brazil, Czech Republic, Denmark, Egypt, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Iceland, Kenya, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Mexico, Morocco, Norway, Panama, Poland, Scotland, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Turkey, and Uruguay.

According to the 2022 Education Next Survey of Public Opinion, 63% of Americans supported free 4-year college and 66% supported free 2-year college.

Should Public College Be Tuition-Free?

Pro 1

Tuition-free college will help decrease crippling student debt.

If tuition is free, students will take on significantly fewer student loans. Student loan debt in the United States is almost $1.75 trillion. 45 million Americans have student loan debt, and 7.5 million of those borrowers are in default. The average 2019 graduate owed $28,950 in college loans. Approximately 92% of US student loans are owned by the US Department of Education.

Student loan debt rose 317% between 1970 and 2021, and public college costs rose 180% between 1980 and 2019. Students are coming out of college already buried under a mountain of debt before they have a chance to start their careers.

Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT), an advocate for free college, stated, "It is insane and counter-productive to the best interests of our country and our future, that hundreds of thousands of bright young people cannot afford to go to college, and that millions of others leave school with a mountain of debt that burdens them for decades. That shortsighted path to the future must end."
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Pro 2

The US economy and society has benefited from tuition-free college in the past.

Nearly half of all college students in 1947 were military veterans, thanks to President Roosevelt signing the GI Bill in 1944 to ensure military service members, veterans, and their dependents could attend college tuition-free. The GI Bill allowed 2.2 million veterans to earn a college education, and another 5.6 million to receive vocational training, all of which helped expand the middle class. An estimated 40% of those veterans would not have been able to attend college otherwise. GI Bill recipients generated an extra $35.6 billion over 35 years and an extra $12.8 billion in tax revenue, resulting in a return of $6.90 for every dollar spent.

The beneficiaries of the free tuition contributed to the economy by buying cars and homes, and getting jobs after college, while not being burdened by college debt. They contributed to society with higher levels of volunteering, voting, and charitable giving.

The 1944 GI Bill paid for the educations of 22,000 dentists, 67,000 doctors, 91,000 scientists, 238,000 teachers, 240,000 accountants, 450,000 engineers, three Supreme Court Justices (Rehnquist, Stevens, and White), three presidents (Nixon, Ford, and H.W. Bush), many congressmen, at least one Secretary of State, 14 Nobel Prize winners, at least 24 Pulitzer Prize winners, many entertainers (including Johnny Cash, Paul Newman, and Clint Eastwood), and many more.

During the post-World War II era, the United States ranked first in the world for college graduates, compared to tenth today.
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Pro 3

Everyone deserves the opportunity to get a college education.

Jamie Merisotis, President and CEO of the Lumina Foundation, stated, "A dramatic increase in the number of Americans with college credentials is absolutely essential for our economic, social and cultural development as a country."

The rapid rise of tuition has limited access to higher education, which is essential in today's workforce: three-quarters of the fastest-growing occupations now call for education beyond high school, according to the US Department of Education. College graduates earn $570,000 more than a high school graduate over a lifetime, on average, and they have lower unemployment rates. Students from low- and moderate-income families are unable to afford as many as 95% of American colleges.

Max Page, Professor of Architecture, and Dan Clawson, Professor of Sociology, both at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, stated: "A century ago high school was becoming a necessity, not a luxury; today the same is happening to college. If college is essential for building a career and being a full participant in our democracy as high school once was, shouldn't it be free, paid for by public dollars, and treated as a right of all members of our country?"
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Con 1

Tuition-free college is not free college and students will still have large debts.

Tuition is only one expense college students have to pay and accounts for anywhere from 28.9% to 73.6% of total average college costs.

On average, 2021-2022 in-state tuition at a 4-year public college cost $10,740 per year. Fees, room, and board for on-campus housing are another $11,950 . Books and supplies are another $1,240, transportation another $1,230, and other expenses cost another $2,170. Without tuition, college still costs an average of $16,590 per year.

Tuition accounts for just 20% of the average community college student's budget, which runs $18,830 annually on average.

Sweden has free college and yet students in that country had an average of $19,000 in student debt for living costs and other expenses in 2013, compared to the $24,800 in debt US college students had the same year.
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Con 2

Taxpayers would spend billions to subsidize tuition, while other college costs remained high.

The estimated cost of Bernie Sanders' free college program was $47 billion per year, and had states paying 33% of the cost, or $15.5 billion. According to David H. Feldman and Robert B. Archibald, both Professors of Economics at William & Mary College: "This will require tax increases, or it will force states to move existing resources into higher education and away from other state priorities like health care, prisons, roads and K-12 education."

According to a 2016 Campaign for Free College report, states could lose between $77 million (Wyoming) and $5 billion (California) in tuition revenue from their state colleges and universities, and have to pay an additional $15,000 (Wyoming) to $55 million (New York) to subsidize a tuition-free plan.

Neal McCluskey, Director of the Cato Institute's Center for Educational Freedom, calculated that free college funded by tax dollars would cost every adult taxpayer $1,360 a year, or $77,500 over a lifetime. "Why should people who want to go to college get it paid for in part by people who pursue on-the-job training or other forms of noncollege education?," he wrote in the Wall Street Journal, adding, "Indeed, why should anyone get a degree to increase their lifetime earnings on the backs of taxpayers?"

College costs have increased for of a number of reasons unrelated to tuition, including fancy dorms, amenities like lazy rivers and climbing walls, student services (such as healthcare), athletics, increases in administrative personnel, and cuts in state funding.
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Con 3

Tuition-free college will decrease completion rates, leaving students without the benefits of a full college education and degree.

Jack A. Chambless, Economics Professor at Valencia College, said that with a free college program, "Potentially millions of young people who have no business attending college would waste their time - and taxpayer dollars - seeking degrees they will not obtain... Free tuition would dupe young people into a sense of belonging, only to find that their work ethic, intelligence and aptitude are not up to the rigors of advanced education."

Under California's community college fee waiver program, over 50% of the state's community college students attended for free (before a 2017 program change), but only 6% of all California community college students completed a career technical program and fewer than 10% completed a two-year degree in six years.

Vince Norton, Managing Partner at Norton Norris, a campus marketing company, stated, "Students will enroll at a 'free college' and borrow money for the cost of attendance. Then, they will drop out and have a student loan - but no skills. Brilliant."
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Discussion Questions
1. Should college tuition be free? For which colleges/universities? Explain your answers.

2. Brainstorm potential pros and cons of free college for individual students.

3. How would free college benefit (or disadvantage) college communities? Explain your answer(s).
Take Action
1. Analyze the goals of the Campaign for Free College Tuition.

2. Explore US News' list of 16 colleges that do not charge tuition.

3. Consider Michael Poliakoff's position that free college could raise tuition costs.

4. Consider how you felt about the issue before reading this article. After reading the pros and cons on this topic, has your thinking changed? If so, how? List two to three ways. If your thoughts have not changed, list two to three ways your better understanding of the "other side of the issue" now helps you better argue your position.

5. Push for the position and policies you support by writing US national senators and representatives.
Sources

11.

Dennis W. Johnson, The Laws That Shaped America: Fifteen Acts of Congress and Their Lasting Impact, 2009

More College Debate Topics
Is a College Education Worth It? - Proponents of college education say college graduates make more money. Opponents say student loan debt is crippling for college graduates.

Should Student Loan Debt Be Eliminated via Forgiveness or Bankruptcy? - Proponents say debt forgiveness would boost the economy. Opponents say people must be held responsible for their personal economic choices.

Should Colleges and Universities Pay College Athletes? - Proponents say colleges profit unfairly off of the athletes. Opponents say the athletes are paid in tuition.

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Should College Be Free? Top 3 Pros and Cons

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Proponents say tuition-free college will help decrease crippling student debt. Opponents say students will still have large debts.

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Don't judge a book by its cover. This is the lesson taught by parents and teachers for generations.

In life and in the workplace, however, studies show that we have an innate tendency to judge people by physical attractiveness-a propensity to subconsciously assume that attractive people possess other desirable traits, such as intelligence and honesty.

While no federal law explicitly prohibits personal appearance discrimination, some state and local laws now provide additional protection in this area. The anti-discrimination statutes in the District of Columbia and in Madison, Wisc., both include "physical appearance" within their lists of protected categories. See D.C. Code §2-1401.02(22); Mad. Gen. Ord. §39.03(2)(bb). Moreover, New York City recently issued guidance addressing issues of discrimination on the basis of hairstyle, and California is poised to become the first state to prohibit discrimination on this basis.

Absent a specific state or local prohibition, employees who claim appearance-based discrimination must assert a link to some protected class to secure statutory protection.

Race Discrimination

Recently, discrimination based on traditionally black hairstyles, such as dreadlocks, cornrows, and afros has gained attention. The NYC Commission of Human Rights issued enforcement guidance emphasizing that discrimination based on natural hairstyles is a subset of race discrimination. According to the commission, NYC law protects "the right of New Yorkers to maintain natural hair or hairstyles that are closely associated with their racial, ethnic, or cultural identities," including "locs, cornrows, twists, braids, Bantu knots, fades, Afros ..." Enforcement Guidance on Race Discrimination on the Basis of Hair, at p. 1.

Accordingly, black hairstyles are protected racial characteristics because "they are an inherent part of Black identity." Id. at pp. 6-7. The commission further emphasized that "bans or restrictions on natural hair or hairstyles associated with Black people are often rooted in white standards of appearance and perpetuate racist stereotypes that Black hairstyles are unprofessional." Id. at 1.

While acknowledging that some employers may have valid health and safety concerns, the commission stressed that these should be addressed through non-discriminatory measures such as a hairnet, hair tie, or some other safety accommodation rather than a request to change hairstyle.

Similarly, California will soon be the first state to protect against discrimination based on natural hairstyle. On June 27, California's state assembly unanimously passed the Crown Act (Creating a Respectful and Open Workplace for Natural Hair). It returns to the Senate, which unanimously passed it in April, for concurrence on amendments. The Crown Act will make it illegal for California employers to discriminate against individuals based on their hair. It is designed to protect those who wear natural or protective hairstyles like braids and dreadlocks and combat the stereotype that black hair is unprofessional.

The federal courts, however, have taken a different approach. EEOC v. Catastrophe Management Solutions, 852 F.3d 1018 (11 th Cir. 2016), involved Chastity Jones, a black woman with dreadlocks, who was offered a customer service position. The offer was withdrawn when she refused to change her hairstyle. The company cited its grooming policy, stating that dreadlocks "tend to get messy," and are contrary to a professional image.

In affirming dismissal of the complaint, the Eleventh Circuit held that Title VII only prohibits discrimination based on immutable traits. According to the court, since the complaint did not assert that Jones' dreadlocks were an immutable characteristic of black people-only that they were culturally associated with the black community, dismissal was proper. Id. at 1030.

Sex Discrimination

Appearance-based discrimination can also be characterized as a form of sex discrimination or sex-stereotyping. Sex-stereotyping claims had their genesis in Price Waterhouse v. Hopkins, 490 U.S. 288 (1989), a case involving a female manager who proved sex discrimination when she was denied a promotion to the partnership because she was not considered stereotypically feminine. The decision-makers had advised Hopkins that she was too aggressive and needed to "walk more femininely, talk more femininely, wear make-up, have her hair styled, and wear jewelry." Id. at 235.

When it comes to actual dress and grooming codes, however, federal courts have upheld these codes-even when employees are required to conform to gender stereotypes-provided that such codes do not impose "unequal burdens" on men and women. Such gender-specific rules have included requiring short hair for men and make-up for women. See Jespersen v. Harrah's Operating Company Inc., 444 F.3d 1104 (9 th Cir. 2006) (policy requiring female beverage servers to wear makeup held not to be discriminatory, "[t]he material issue under our settled law is not whether the policies are different, but whether the policy imposed on the plaintiff creates an 'unequal burden' for the plaintiff's gender.").

Some state and local governments, however, have stepped in and enacted legislation that expressly prohibits discrimination in the areas of dress and grooming codes. The NYC Commission on Human Rights has adopted enforcement guidance emphasizing that the city's non-discrimination law prohibits employers from requiring dress codes or uniforms or applying grooming or appearance standards that impose different requirements based on gender. See Enforcement Guidance on discrimination on the Basis of Gender Identity or Expression: Local Law No. 3 (2002): N.Y.C. Admin. Code § 8-102.

There is no question that employers who allow gender-based stereotypes to affect employment decisions or impose gender-based grooming codes risk violating anti-discrimination laws. Employers must stay abreast of the laws in the jurisdictions in which they do business and ensure compliance in this area.

Practical Considerations

Some suggestions to assist employers in meeting their legal obligations follow.

Review and revise handbooks and grooming policies. Remove requirements for or references to specific hairstyles. While standards designed for safety and security are typically upheld, restrictions based on customer preference or corporate "image" may be suspect. Employers should consider modifying policies to include gender-neutral language, and if dress is mentioned, the focus should be on professionalism, neatness, and cleanliness.

Before adopting sex-specific standards, employers must ensure that such standards are lawful in the jurisdictions in which they conduct business. At a minimum, in accordance with the EEOC's position, employers that maintain different gender-based standards should allow employees to choose the style of dress that comports with their gender identity.

Grant necessary accommodations. Employers have a duty to accommodate employees who are unable to adhere to appearance standards due to a sincerely held religious belief or a disability. Employers should be prepared to engage in the interactive process and consider a host of potential accommodations. There are no magic words needed to trigger an employer's duty.Communication is critical, and individual requests and needs should be carefully and fairly considered.

Train staff. Managers and human resources staff should be trained on how to properly communicate with employees, handle requests for accommodations, and prevent biased attitudes from impacting their employment decisions. Furthermore, all employees should be trained to respect diversity in the workplace and avoid making comments or engaging in behavior that shows or suggests discriminatory animus.

Employers that know the law, carefully craft their policies, and train their staff will be best positioned to avoid appearance-based discrimination claims.
This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Bureau of National Affairs, Inc. or its owners.
Linda B. Dwoskin is special counsel in the Labor and Employment group at Dechert LLP, and is based in Philadelphia. Her practice includes both litigation and counseling on a wide variety of employment and labor issues, including all forms of discrimination, sexual harassment, disability claims, and the Family and Medical Leave Act. Melissa Bergman Squire is an associate in the Labor and Employment group at Dechert LLP, and is based in Philadelphia. She focuses her practice on both litigation and counseling in all aspects of employment law, including discrimination and harassment, wrongful discharge, family and medical leave, and non-competition agreements.
Author Information

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INSIGHT: 'You Look Mahvelous!' Avoiding Appearance-Based Discrimination at Work

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Employers that allow gender-based stereotypes to affect employment decisions or, in some jurisdictions, impose gender-based grooming codes risk violating anti-discrimination laws. Dechert attorneys discuss appearance-based discrimination framed as race or sex discrimination and provides practical advice for employers to avoid liability.

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Nothing says "Go, team!" less than an unhappy animal, and as athletes and fans raise a ruckus on and off the field, there's no reason to subject a real animal to the stress of being a school mascot. Costumed human mascots can lead cheers, react to the crowd, and pump up the team-all things that a frightened animal can't do.
Lions and Tigers and Bears-Goodbye!
Big cats, bears, and other live-animal mascots don't belong on college campuses. Even in the best circumstances, subjecting animals to a busy university environment and forcing them into close proximity to crowds of people day in and day out is stressful and cruel.

Regardless of the length of time that they're kept in captivity, lions, tigers, bears, and other exotic animals don't "get used to" being in public settings.

Costumed human mascots are used by most professional sports teams and at most universities. Some schools offer scholarships to students who are chosen for the role.

One human mascot for the NFL's New England Patriots said, "[W]hile live animals must be tucked away in a corner of a stadium and are rarely seen during the game, a human mascot in costume can be visible, active and instrumental during the entire event."

The mascot coordinator for Major League Baseball's Arizona Diamondbacks said, "The bottom line is that a human mascot can do far more than a live animal mascot [and can do so] with fewer headaches."
What You Can Do
Only a handful of schools still force live animals to act as mascots. Please write to them to voice your objections. If you're a student or an alumni of any of these institutions, inform school officials that you won't attend athletic events or donate money-both huge sources of revenue for universities-until it discontinues its live-animal mascot program.
Louisiana State University
Louisiana State University (LSU) has used a series of tigers named Mike, repeatedly "replacing" each when he dies-which happens alarmingly often. The school has a grim history of failing to keep tigers safe and healthy.

The first Mike died of kidney disease.

Mike II reportedly died of pneumonia less than a month after his arrival at LSU, at only 8 months of age. Reportedly, Mike II was then secretly buried and quickly replaced. The second Mike II was at LSU for only one season. He died from complications associated with multiple fractures to his left rear leg-exactly how or when the leg was injured is unknown.

Mike III died of pneumonia.

After pranksters cut the locks on the cage, Mike IV wandered around the campus before he was shot three times with a tranquilizer gun and recaptured.

He developed a neurologic problem and was transferred to the Baton Rouge Zoo and eventually euthanized after becoming severely disabled.

Mike V underwent three medical procedures: two root canals and one benign tumor removal. After suffering from weight loss and respiratory difficulty, he died of renal failure.

Mike VI, whom the school obtained from a now-defunct sham sanctuary, was euthanized after battling cancer.

Please send polite comments to:

F. King Alexander, President
Louisiana State University
3810 W. Lakeshore Dr.
Baton Rouge, LA 70808
225-578-2111
225-578-5524 (fax)
[email protected]
Baylor University
Baylor University began using live bears in 1917, and the school has used more than 50 live bear mascots since then. It currently displays two bears, 16-year-old Joy and 15-year-old Lady. The sisters were only 4 months old when they were taken away from their mother and sent to Baylor. They came from the notorious West Coast Game Park in Oregon.

Please send polite comments to:

Dr. Linda A. Livingstone, President
Baylor University
1 Bear Pl., #97096
Waco, TX 76798-7096
254-710-3555
[email protected]
The University of North Alabama
The University of North Alabama obtained two lion cubs, named Leo III and Una, born in 2002, and they have been on display ever since. The school also hauls the lions around the local area to make appearances.

Please send polite comments to:

Dr. Kenneth D. Kitts, President
The University of North Alabama
1 Harrison Plz.
Florence, AL 35632
256-765-4211
[email protected]
University of Memphis
For over 40 years, the University of Memphis has exploited tigers as mascots. Tom III, the current one, is forced to attend all home football games and many other school events throughout the year.

Please send polite comments to:

David Rudd, President
University of Memphis
341 Administration Bldg.
Memphis, TN 38152
901-678-2234
[email protected]
Massillon High School
For many years, Massillon High School in Massillon, Ohio, has leased tiger cubs from animal dealers for use as mascots. Despite polite requests from PETA to stop using live-animal mascots, communication from Massillon officials, students, and citizens has been rude, dismissive, and even threatening.

Please send polite comments to:

Richard Goodright, Superintendent
Massillon City Schools
930 17 th St. N.E.
Massillon, OH 44646
330-830-3900, ext. 50101
[email protected]

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Nothing says "Go, team!" less than an unhappy animal, and as athletes and fans raise a ruckus on and off the field, there's no reason to subject a real animal to the stress of being a school mascot. Costumed human mascots can lead cheers, react to the crowd, and pump up the team-all things that a frightened animal can't do.

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Complete the application steps, get a College Board scholarship

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Complete the application steps, get a College Board scholarship

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Newsela | Complete the application steps, get a College Board scholarship

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The College Board has launched a $25 million scholarship program for students who work their way through a checklist of steps in the college application process.

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New Research Reveals Why 'Appearance Discrimination' Is Making Workplaces Even More Toxic

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New Research Reveals Why 'Appearance Discrimination' Is Making Workplaces Even More Toxic

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Although the average company is more tolerant today than ever before, hidden prejudices still run rampant among workers from entry-level employees to executives.

In the workplace, the way you look can be more important than the merit of your work to some supervisors, while coworkers can treat you differently if you don't fit into their idea of professional appearances.

Appearance-based discrimination occurs when someone is treated differently based on how they look, creating an imbalance between someone being evaluated for their performance versus purely based on the way they present themselves.

Often times, this phenomenon will manifest itself through a superior who treats a worker differently because they are physically attracted to them. Or perhaps it can involve a more tomboy-esque female worker being passed over for a promotion because they don't embody traditional female appearances.

These issues represent a slew of different types of discrimination in the workplace that center around someone's body and how they present themselves.

Women and young workers more likely to face appearance discrimination

When it comes to appearance-based discrimination, gender discrimination can be the real motive. A 2017 study conducted by the Saint Louis University School of Law found that workers and job candidates are oftentimes perceived and rated by how closely their features fall under the typical "masculine" and "feminine" physicality, also known as the 'Lack of Fit" model. This creates an imbalance in how "successful" someone appears versus the merit of someone's current or potential work performance.

New research may indicate that young women experience this type of workplace discrimination most often. A new study conducted by social selling skincare company, Univia, discovered key insights about appearance-based discrimination, including an indication that women and younger generations were more likely to become a victim of appearance-based discrimination. Nearly one-third of women surveyed admitted to experiencing questionable treatment at work related to how they look.

In fact, they found that women were more likely than men to agree with statements related to improving one's appearance for the workplace: 32% of survey participants pointed out a difference in the beauty standards that men and women are held to.

Perception of appearance and potential career success

Looks have an impact on our professional lives: 86% of the employees surveyed by Univia believed physical appearance matters in the workplace. Overwhelmingly, respondents noted that appearance is an essential component of career success. Some of the top held beliefs included:

Appearance influences client perception and company image (90%)

Appearance affects employee confidence (85%)

Appearance affects employee competency (73%)

Kevin Hafen, CEO of Univia, speaks to this issue: "Attractiveness bias can greatly impact career success, from the hiring process down to raises and future promotions, This type of unfair advantage can hold many employees back from reaching their full potential and successfully utilizing their skill set. In fact, nearly 1 in 4 of our respondents has experienced appearance-based discrimination. This goes to show how common it's becoming and knowing how to proceed is crucial."

He goes on to optimistically hope for a better future regarding appearance-based discrimination. "Eliminating beauty bias in its' entirety," he says, "is a difficult task, but admitting its' existence and learning to address the issues head-on can improve workplace culture and personal growth."

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New Research Reveals Why 'Appearance Discrimination' Is Making Workplaces Even More Toxic

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Although the average company is more tolerant today than ever before, hidden prejudices still run rampant among workers from entry-level employees to executives. In the workplace, the way you look can be more important than the merit of your work to some supervisors, while coworkers can treat you differently if you don't fit into their idea of professional appearances.

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10 Schools Still Using Live Animal Mascots

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10 Schools Still Using Live Animal Mascots

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In a world where animal rights are receiving increasingly more attention and advocacy, college universities are being scrutinized for using live animals as mascots. Many college students and alumni will argue that their school mascot, whether it's a buffalo, bulldog, or eagle, holds sentimental value and adds to the thrill of sports rivalry. However, having a live animal present is just plain cruel and completely unnecessary. Forcing animals to participate in this long-standing tradition has proved to do more harm than good.

Animals are living, sentient beings, and using them as props in order to hype up a crowd during a football game is just not right. The proximity to thousands of people and the loud sound of a roaring crowd can cause put animals under a great deal of stress. Not to mention the tragic story of Bevo and Uga. Texas mascot Bevo, a big longhorn steer nearly killed tiny Georgia mascot Uga, a small bulldog. Before the Sugar Bowl in 2019, these two were put in proximity of one another to meet before the game. However, this did not go to plan and Bevo charged at Uga, nearly attacking him. This incident easily could have been avoided if schools recognize the inhumane nature of this tradition and stick to human mascots instead. Even in the best conditions possible, subjecting live animals of all sizes and forcing them to perform in front of crowds is cruel. Here are 10 of the schools that still use live animals as mascots:

1. Louisiana State University

Mike the Tiger is the mascot of Louisiana State University (LSU) in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Mike is the name of both the live and costumed mascot. They have used a series of tigers named Mike, repeatedly "replacing" each when he dies. The school has failed to keep tigers safe and is a prime example of why this cruel tradition needs to be abolished. After Mike VI was diagnosed with terminal cancer, animal advocacy groups urged the school to make Mike VI the last live mascot at LSU. The advocacy groups argued that the students are going to the games to watch top college athletes playing the best football in the country, not to see a live tiger in a cage on the stadium field. In response, the university lets Mike decide if he wants to attend the games, by giving him the choice to enter his mobile carrier cage at his own free will.

2. Baylor University

Baylor University began using live bears in 1917, and the school has used more than 50 live bear mascots since then. Not only does Baylor have one live mascot, but two. Their current bears, Judge Joy Reynolds (Joy) and Judge Sue Sloan (Lady), are biological sisters, and the first one was acquired after a military group left it in the care of the university during World War I. Both weigh almost 300 pounds and live in their own habitat on campus. Before the university built a more natural habitat, the bear pit was a mostly concrete facility. Many animal rights groups argued that this previous man-made 'habitat' was inadequate and unfit living conditions for these wild animals.

3. University of Georgia

The Georgia Bulldogs have had a college football team since 1956, and this is when Uga I was established as the nation's most well-known mascot. Over time, Uga has become easily identified by his spiked collar, which serves as a symbol of the position which he holds. "Ugas I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII and VIII are buried in marble vaults near the main gate in the embankment of the South stands." Back in 2018, during the Sugar Bowl, the University of Texas bovine's mascot, a Longhorn steer, charged at Uga. Luckily, Uga survived the incident, however, no animal deserves to be paraded around a loud crowd.

4. The University of North Alabama

The University of North Alabama is the only school in the country with a live lion living on its college campus. Leo III resides on the UNA campus in the 12,764 square-foot George H. Carroll Lion Habitat and carries on a tradition that has covered more than 40 years." His sister Una, passed away after serving as a mascot at UNA since 2002. In the wild, big cats spend their time traveling vast distances to hunt, seek mates, and stake out territory. In the wild, lions are known to spend most of their time traveling long distances to hunt for food, find mates, and defend their territory. However, when they are in captivity, they do not have this freedom and may suffer psychological consequences.

5. University of Colorado

Ralphie the Buffalo is the name of the live mascot of the University of Colorado Buffaloes. The "Ralphie Handlers," who are a select group of varsity student-athletes, run with Ralphie around the University of Colorado's Folsom football field, before each half of each home game (a tradition that has been taking place for 53 years.) During one of CU's Spring games, Ralphie got loose and outran 3 of his handlers, plowed over another, and tried to get away. Luckily, everyone involved was okay. Despite this incident, the university claims that all of its buffaloes are well taken care of. However, this statement is not good enough for many animal advocacy groups. These groups argue that animals should be able to live their lives naturally, without being paraded around for amusement.

6. Colorado State

CAM the Ram is the mascot of Colorado State University and is cared for by a group of student volunteers called the Ram Handlers. "The first woolly mascot, a ram named Buck, made his debut at a basketball game against Denver University on Jan. 11, 1946. President Morgan officially named their mascot CAM the Ram - for Colorado A&M - during halftime at a basketball game versus archrival Wyoming in 1954. CAM has been mascot ever since." Cam's handlers spend most days training him through socialization. They will put on his halter and simulate kids running up to him for example. This training is designed to prepare Cam for any unusual scenarios that could take place at any moment. This psychological stress that Cam is forced to experience could all be avoided if Colorado State University switched to human mascots in costume.

7. Southern Methodist University

SMU's live mascot is Peruna IX, a miniature Shetland pony that was named after an early 20th-century medicine, Peruna Tonic, which was said to have a 'kick'. A Shetland pony was chosen because of its longer lifespan compared to a quarter horse. " Peruna I was donated to the school by T.E. Jones, a racetrack owner, and Cy Barnes, who felt that the 150 lb. powerhouse embodied SMU." On Halloween in 1934, Parsons, the first official mascot (Peruna I, 1932-1934) at SMU escaped from his on-campus home and was struck by a car nearby. As cute as live mascots are, they should be banned from universities and replaced with costumed mascots in order to prevent dangerous incidents like this one from happening again in the future.

8. Massillon High School

Starting in 1970, Massillon Washington High School has been using a live tiger as its mascot. For the last several years, there has been a debate regarding this 44-year tradition and whether it is ethical or not. This controversy has made it legally more difficult to continue. The school purchases the tigers from local private exotic animal breeders, and there has also been concern about these wild creatures being discarded at the end of every season. Once they are no longer needed to entertain the crowd during football season, they are shipped off and left in captivity in other locations. Finally, at their 50th anniversary of the tradition, it was announced that the tradition of having a live tiger as a mascot will be retired.

9. University of Memphis

The "Tigers Of Memphis" is the name of three Bengal Tigers which have served as the mascot for The University of Memphis Tigers. " Since 1972, the sideline mascot for the University of Memphis has been a Bengal Tiger named Tom and that tradition comes to an end with the passing of Tom III." During games, Tom sits in his cage and is bombarded by loud crowds for hours on end. Animal rights campaigners started a petition to end this stressful and cruel tradition. These campaigners argue that wild animals do not belong in cages and as long as universities continue with this practice, they are spreading the message that this is somehow okay. The university partnered with the Memphis Zoo to keep the tradition alive from a distance.

10. University of Arkansas

Tusk is the name of the official live mascot for the University of Arkansas Razorbacks. Tusk IV, is a Russian boar who has been the live mascot since the 2011 season. "He currently resides at the Stokes Family Farm in Dardanelle. 2018-19 was his last season before entering retirement." Tusk IV was the longest-serving live mascot in the history of the University of Arkansas, and he passed away at the age of 9 in January of 2020. Although he died of natural causes, the typical life expectancy for a boar is approximately 10-12 years. Life in captivity is a low-quality one and may contribute to an animal's shortened lifespan.

Many universities would argue that having a live mascot is an essential part of college life and school spirit. However, it is not worth subjecting these animals to all the stress that comes with a raging crowd. Wild animals such as bears, tigers, and buffaloes just don't belong on a college campus, or any public setting, and forced to perform in front of thousands of cheering students. Human mascots dressed in costume provide entertainment and boost school spirit, without the unnecessary animal cruelty!

Sign this petition to demand that the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) tell their members to ban the use of live animal mascots!

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10 Schools Still Using Live Animal Mascots

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In a world where animal rights are receiving increasingly more attention and advocacy, college universities are being scrutinized for using live animals as mascots. Many college students and alumni will argue that their school mascot, whether it's a buffalo, bulldog, or eagle, holds sentimental value and adds to the thrill of sports rivalry.

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MoneyFree college for all is a popular rallying cry, but is it realistic?

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MoneyFree college for all is a popular rallying cry, but is it realistic?

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Newsela | Free college for all is a popular rallying cry, but is it realistic?

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How to manage and award "free" tuition has become a debate poised for the next election year.

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Discrimination in the Workplace: A Complete Overview

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Discrimination in the Workplace: A Complete Overview

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Discrimination in the Workplace: A Complete Overview

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Wondering what discrimination in the workplace is? Learn about the concept, laws, how to identify it, and how to promote a safe environment for all employees.

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The Trouble with Travel Sports - Character and Leadership

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The Trouble with Travel Sports - Character and Leadership

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Tom Brady, quarterback of the New England Patriots made some interesting comments about youth travel leagues. This has created some debate among my friends, but I wonder what the next generation thinks.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/sports/2015/10/05/tom-brady-opens-youth-sports-today/aGAPURaESv6hsdCxUDdBTO/story.html
Tom Brady: "Youth sports, and what I remember from being in youth sports, everything was really localized. There were no travel teams. My parents always exposed us to different things, different sports. It was basketball when it was basketball season. It was baseball when it was baseball season. I didn't play football until I was a freshman in high school. A lot of soccer. There were some camps, but I just played in the neighborhood in our street with all the kids we grew up with. It's just different now, and I'm experiencing it with my own kids with all the organized activities that you put them in. It's just hard, because all the parents are doing it, it seems, and the competition feels like it starts so early for these kids."

Old School: In one generation, youth sports has changed dramatically. I want to paint my childhood experience (k-8th grade). On the bus ride home from school each day, we would vote on the sport we were going to play that day and at whose house we would play. We played all kinds of sports - football, basketball, baseball, kickball, tennis, hockey. We loved it. It was fun, competitive and free. We made our own rules and settled our own disputes.

When we played organized sports, it was Saturday morning basketball or soccer or maybe a Tuesday afternoon baseball league. We never traveled more than 30 miles to play another local team. The thought of specializing in one sport, even in high school, did not exist. Many of my friends lettered in three sports in a high school career.

New School: Fast Forward 30 years. My 4 girls (ages 6, 6, 7 & 9) want to organize a soccer game in the backyard. I tell them to go house to house to get kids to play. They come back a half hour later and tell me that all the neighbor kids are at soccer practice. Another similar event occurs. I call up friends to play a round of golf and many are out of town following their middle school kid to sports tournaments.

So, why does this all matter? And, what does it have to do with character? Let me be clear. Youth travel sports is not leading to the downfall of society. I'm just amazed at the major shifts that happen in one generation that we just accept as if we don't have a choice. I think we should understand how a shift like this can impact our culture, families and the next generation. Here is how I believe the new approach to youth sports is negatively affecting us:

10. New School Approach helps build awesome sports culture, but is not healthy for families. Having a travel soccer league or baseball league in middle school helps build a powerhouse program in high school. Not only are kids playing the sport more often, they are playing it against greater talent at tournaments 100-500 miles away from home. My argument though is that travel leagues are not healthy for families. Here's why:

9. The Tail is Wagging the Dog: It makes the family revolve around the child's sport. Parents are traveling multiple weekends to different towns just to watch their 13 year old play a sport. If they have more than one child, one parent is staying home with the other children while the other parent is traveling with the athlete. Some families have one parent/child headed 100 miles north for a tournament while the other parent/child is headed 100 miles south. I argue that overall, this is not a positive for families.

8. Financial Obligation: Ask these travel parents about the costs involved. There's hotel rooms, food, and fees to play in these organized tournaments. Week after week. My mailman once told me that he spent over $10,000 taking his daughter to soccer tournaments over a 3 year period. He and I surmised that if he had put that money into a 529 College Saving Plan, her college would be more than paid for. Like he said, they do have soccer teams in the next town over. We laughed, but he was serious.

7. Too Much Focus: In any given high school, probably 2-4 players will get a Division 1 or 2 college scholarship for athletics (we had one in our graduating class and he never played in a single travel league). That means for the other hundreds of student-athletes, sports is about having fun, making friends, learning to be a good teammate, competing and building character. Yet, today kids are giving a year-round commitment or traveling 10+ weekends a year to play in tournaments. I believe this commitment is out of whack. Kids need to be kids. Kids need down-time. Kids need to be well-rounded. Imagine if this kind of commitment was put toward starting a small business, learning marketing or understanding the stock market... just sayin'.

6. Creativity and Spontaneity: Think about it, when I was in grade school, we decided what sport to play... we decided the rules... we settled our own disputes. Today adults organize all aspects of sports. They decide what sports are played and when, the starting lineups, the rules, the penalties... heck, if someone gets mad at a teammate, an adult is there to moderate the whole thing. So much is lost with this new system and the kids don't even realize it.

5. The Effect on Parents: If I would have asked my Dad to take me on 5 weekends in a row to go to 5 different cities for sporting events, he would have smiled and asked two questions, "how are you going to get there and how are you going to raise the money." I think today's parents would feel guilty saying, let along thinking something like that. I hope that parents today can feel comfortable sometimes saying, "Your mom and I will not be at your 6th grade basketball game today. Bill's dad will be taking you. Instead, we are going out on a date. Have fun and good luck today." There seems to be an unwritten rule for parents that says the more time you spend watching your kids play sports, the better parent you are. I argue that good parenting has more to do with the amount of time you spend doing things together as a family, not watching.

4. Valuing Excellence over Participation: Mark Hyman, a professor of sports management at George Washington University, said youth sports today look nothing like they used to. "The adults have won," Hyman said. "If we wiped the slate clean and reinvented youth sports from scratch by putting the physical and emotional needs of kids first, nothing would be recognizable." The problem, he said, is that, "We no longer value participation. We value excellence." The kids do not. Amanda Visek, another professor at George Washington, surveyed 150 children about what makes sports fun for them. The kids listed 81 different factors that made them happy playing sports. Winning ranked 48th.

3. Too much competition at an early age: This is not just about sports. There are kids in kindergarten competing to get into "the right" elementary school. Elementary kids are competing to get into the right middle or high school. Kids are taking high-stakes tests more frequently today. The pressure is on kids today like it never has been before. Now, with the new model, we are saying to a child, "Play now, play on this travel league, play year-round" or you will not really have a chance to play this sport in high school. Maybe, it's just me, but that doesn't sound like the childhood I would want for myself, so why would I want it for my kids?

2. Burnout Factor: Brady eluded to this in his statements, "I hope my kids are late bloomers in whatever they do. As they get older or if they feel like they've been in something for so long and it's been hyper-intense and hyper-focused for so long, I think that can wear out a young individual, a young teenager." I was talking to a coach last weekend who told me about kids who were offered scholarships to play in college, but turned them down because they were "tired" of soccer and didn't want their entire college career run by a sport that would never be a career.

1. Bottom line: I feel youth sports (k-8) should be introductory, fun, teach competition and build character. Pressure to join teams, travel teams, year-round teams should not be a part of the equation. I argue it takes away from time spent as a family, costs way too much money, is incommensurate with creating a well-rounded individual and puts undue pressure on a young child. Like Eddie Money (singer from the 80's) sang, "I want to go back."
Your Turn:
After reading the comments from Tom Brady and me, what is your opinion about the modern day approach to youth sports? What changes would you make?

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The Trouble with Travel Sports - Character and Leadership

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Tom Brady, quarterback of the New England Patriots made some interesting comments about youth travel leagues. This has created some debate among my friends, but I wonder what the next generation thinks. https://www.bostonglobe.com/sports/2015/10/05/tom-brady-opens-youth-sports-today/aGAPURaESv6hsdCxUDdBTO/story.html Tom Brady: "Youth sports, and what I remember from being in youth sports, everything was really localized.

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KidsNew Haven promises free college to all who make the grade

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KidsNew Haven promises free college to all who make the grade

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Newsela - New Haven promises free college to all who make the grade

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Imagine a city where one out of every three children is poor. One out of every 10 adults cannot find a job. Only six of 10 students finish high school. That was New Haven a few years ago.

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Age Discrimination Still Thrives in America

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Age Discrimination Still Thrives in America

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The history of the legislation goes back to the creation and passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and specifically Title VII, which made it illegal for employers to discriminate based on race, color, religion, sex and national origin.

Notice anything missing from that last sentence?

An amendment to include age discrimination as one of the protected categories in Title VII failed. Instead, Congress created a commission to study the issue of age discrimination, and that commission determined - without question - that workplace discrimination was rampant at the time (mid-1960s), with 50 percent of employers using age limits to deny jobs to workers 45 and older. That report led to passage of ADEA in 1967. It sought to "promote employment of older persons based on their ability rather than age [and] prohibit arbitrary age discrimination...."

When he signed ADEA into law, on Dec. 15, 1967, President Lyndon B. Johnson remarked: "This act does not compel employers and labor unions and employment agencies to choose a person aged 40 to 65 over another person. It does require that one simple question be answered fairly: Who has the best qualifications for the job?"

Fifty-two years later, that question remains: Are today's jobs going to, and being performed by, the best-qualified workers, regardless of age? Unfortunately, in many cases the answer is no. Part of the problem is the law itself. Although ADEA was supposed to serve as an age-based equivalent of the Civil Rights Act, it never granted age the same level of legislative respect as race, gender or religion, and that's why, in part, its idealistic goals have never been achieved.

Two key factors rendered it, from its inception, weaker than Title VII.

Lack of damages:Even if you win an age discrimination suit against an employer - and even if you prove the discrimination was intentional - the most you can be awarded is twice your lost back pay plus attorney fees if you prevail. Nothing for pain and suffering. So unless a company is facing a large class action suit, it has little to lose. In fact, many attorneys won't even take on individual age-bias complaints for this reason. "This is not the situation for other types of discrimination," explains attorney Alden. "For race, sex, national origin, disability and all the others, the employee, if successful, is entitled to compensatory damages and attorney fees."

"Reasonable factors" are considered in employer's defense: ADEA established two types of age discrimination: intentional ("disparate treatment") and unintentional ("disparate impact"). The latter is defined as an employment policy that seems neutral but adversely affects older workers. An example might be a company deciding to lay off all its vice presidents. Nothing wrong with that on the surface, but since VPs are usually senior people, older workers would be hardest hit. Under ADEA, disparate impact discrimination is permitted if it's based on "reasonable factors other than age." So all a company would have to do to sidestep ageism claims is prove the layoffs were financially necessary.

That all said, although imperfect the ADEA did afford older employees in the U.S. protections against age discrimination.

But then the law came under review by the Supreme Court, and its rulings further weakened the protections it granted to older workers. First the court upheld and even widened the damages and reasonable-factors loopholes. In 1993 it ruled that the Hazen Paper Co. did not discriminate against 62-year-old Walter Biggins when it fired him a few months before he became vested in its pension plan. The company argued that his dismissal was based on cost savings, not age, and the court agreed. Since then the Hazen decision has been relied on to narrow ADEA's reach and to permit arbitrary actions based on inaccurate or stigmatizing stereotypes about age.

Then, in 2009, came Gross v. FBL Financial Services Inc., in which the Supreme Court essentially gutted ADEA. Fifty-four-year-old Jack Gross was reassigned in 2003 from his position as a claims administration director at FBL. His replacement was in her early 40s. The following year, he sued for age discrimination and the case ended up at the Supreme Court. It ruled that in order to prove age discrimination, one must show that age was the determining factor. In other words, even if you proved that your employer intentionally discriminated against you because of your age, if it was not the most important factor in the actions it took, you do not have a case. In addition, the Gross decision placed the burden of proof entirely on the plaintiff, as opposed to putting the burden on the organization to prove it didn't discriminate, creating yet one more hurdle for older workers to overcome.

The rulings in Gross and other cases have not escaped the attention of corporate America. One Wall Street recruiter told the AARP Bulletin that age discrimination is increasing in the financial sector. "If companies know they can get away with something, they'll do it," he says. "It's like an episode of The Simpsons where Mr. Burns is rubbing his hands together with glee and saying, 'We're going to get rid of these senior people and save lots of money!' "

Other companies seem to discriminate against senior people in their hiring practices. AARP Foundation, which files age discrimination suits expected to establish significant legal precedents, is pursuing a case against PricewaterhouseCoopers, the accounting firm. The plaintiff, Steve Rabin, then 50, was rebuffed in his effort to obtain an associate position at PwC. At the time, he had an MBA and more than 10 years of experience in accounting services. The complaint asserts that a PwC manager asked Rabin whether he'd be able to "fit in" with younger employees and made other somewhat derogatory age-related comments. More than 3,000 other plaintiffs have joined Rabin in a class action suit against PwC. The company denies any wrongdoing, arguing that the plaintiffs have failed to offer "some reliable and verifiable way to identify who met the minimum qualifications."

It should be noted that most states also have laws against age discrimination - some are stronger than federal law; some weaker. California, for example, unlike ADEA, allows for both compensatory and punitive damages, and New Jersey explicitly permits employment discrimination against employees over age 70. The former may be why, in some years, California has seen nearly three times as many complaints of age discrimination than its residents report to the EEOC. Some states have lower burdens of proof, and state laws usually cover employers that the federal law does not, such as businesses with fewer than 20 employees. AARP is actively trying to improve state age discrimination laws, most recently in Connecticut, Oregon and New Jersey.

The company perspective on age bias

Frank Cania, president of HR Compliance Experts, believes that ageism is often considered by human resource departments as being on par with other types of workplace discrimination but that HR personnel are not as aware of it as they should be. Although a number of states have recently passed laws requiring employers to provide annual sexual harassment training, he says there's no similar legislation or mandated programs that exclusively target ageism. "The average HR person would say, 'Oh, yeah, that's definitely a problem; it needs to be addressed,' " he explains. "But then they may place a job ad using terms like 'fast-paced environment, energetic, technology ninja' or 'We work hard and party harder.' "

Unsurprisingly, tech companies are some of the biggest age discriminators. With Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg famously declaring in 2007 that "young people are just smarter," Silicon Valley has become a poster child for the youth work culture. According to a 2016 report by Statista, the average median employee age at 17 top tech companies was 32, compared with 42 for the total U.S. workforce. That doesn't appear to be a coincidence. In 2019, Google agreed to pay $11 million to settle the claims of more than 200 job applicants who said they were discriminated against because of their age.

Older tech companies are not immune to the problem. A 2018 ProPublica investigation alleges that IBM deliberately engineered the dismissal of an estimated 20,000 employees over age 40 in a five-year period. "In making these cuts, IBM has flouted or outflanked U.S. laws and regulations intended to protect later-career workers from age discrimination," the article asserts.

The EEOC is looking into these charges, and a class action suit has been filed. But whether the company will ever be held accountable remains to be seen. One workplace consultant who requested anonymity told the AARP Bulletin that IBM's strategy was "brilliant," explaining that its supervisors and attorneys were exquisitely aware of how difficult it is to successfully prosecute age discrimination, and they took full advantage of that. Last year, in response to the allegations in that suit and several individual suits, IBM told Bloomberg: "We have reinvented IBM in the past five years to target higher value opportunities for our clients. The company hires 50,000 employees each year."

EEOC: A watchdog loses its bark

The EEOC is supposed to be our police force in all this. Its job is to enforce federal laws that protect employees or job applicants from all types of workplace discrimination. Its mandate is also one of leadership: It's charged with initiating investigations when warranted and being the overall champion of worker rights.

But when it comes to age discrimination, the EEOC is struggling to keep up, and to bear down. An analysis by the Washington Post found that of 205,355 total age discrimination complaints filed with the agency from 2010 to 2017, just 1 percent resulted in a finding of discrimination. That alone is not dispositive: It's possible that the vast majority of these complaints are not actionable.

But the numbers seem to tilt toward a finding that the EEOC has not been offering enough help in this realm. Indeed, according to the organization's own data, it brought only 10 age discrimination suits in 2018. That's a minute number compared with the disability (84) and sexual harassment (41) discrimination cases it brought that year. When one considers how difficult it is for an individual to file a complaint, the 8 months, on average, it takes for any sort of resolution, and the paltriness of the compensation (if any), you have to wonder whether the hassle is even worth it.

Cathy Ventrell-Monsees is an attorney and senior adviser at the EEOC. She acknowledges the numbers but explains that the agency is trying to be strategic. This means emphasizing tools such as mediation and settlements and bringing to court only those cases with the greatest potential impact. "For example, hiring is a big priority for us right now," she explains. "Our researchers are looking at online hiring systems and algorithms that can incorporate biases in the job-selection criteria."

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Age Discrimination Still Thrives in America

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The history of the legislation goes back to the creation and passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and specifically Title VII, which made it illegal for employers to discriminate based on race, color, religion, sex and national origin. Notice anything missing from that last sentence?

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In the debate on whether or not you have to play club sports to get recruited, NCSA has the answer.

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High-Paying Jobs You Can Get Without a College Degree

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High-Paying Jobs You Can Get Without a College Degree

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Are you seeking a high-paying job, but don't want to invest in a four-year or graduate degree? You don't need to have a college degree to get a good job. There is a new kind of job that emphasizes skills over education and work experience.

"New-collar jobs," also known as "middle-skill jobs," are those that require certain hard skills, but do not necessarily require a four-year college degree (or an extensive work history). Often, employees can get the skills they need for the job through vocational training, a certificate program, an apprenticeship, or a two-year degree program.

Hospitals, state governments, schools, manufacturers, IT companies, and other organizations have begun to search for employees with the right skills, rather than the right degree. Some companies even offer paid training programs for job candidates, which are similar to apprenticeships.

Here is a list of 10 of the top new-collar jobs. These are jobs that do not require a four-year degree, offer good salaries, and are in high demand. Read the descriptions of each job, as well as a list of more opportunities, and see which new-collar job is right for you.

Computer Security Analyst

A computer security analyst (also known as an information security analyst) helps protect an organization's computer networks and systems.

Some employers want analysts with a bachelor's degree in computer science or a related field, and sometimes they even want candidates with a master's degree in information systems. However, some companies are emphasizing skills in computer science, programming, and IT security over a specific degree.

This job is experiencing a much faster than average (32%) growth rate. A computer security analyst earns an average of $99,730 (2019), according to the Occupational Outlook Handbook.﻿﻿

Computer Programmer

Computer programmers create, write, and test code that allows computer programs and applications to function. They typically need to know a variety of computer languages, including Java and C++. They might work for a computer systems design company, or they could work for software publishers or financial companies, among others. Because this work is done on the computer, many programmers telecommute, which allows for flexibility.

While many computer programmers do have a bachelor's degree, some only need an associate degree, or extensive experience in coding. Programmers can also become certified in specific programming languages, so these certificates can also help a job candidate get hired. Another option is to get the skills you need to get hired by attending a bootcamp.

The median pay for a computer programmer is $86,550 (2019), according to the Department of Labor's Occupational Outlook Handbook.﻿﻿

Network and Computer Systems Administrator

Network and computer systems administrators install and operate computer systems for companies. Because almost every industry has network and computer systems, these administrators work in every field, from IT to finance to education.

While some network and computer systems administrator jobs require a bachelor's degree, more and more job openings require only a postsecondary certificate and strong computer skills.

The average salary for this position is $83,510 (2019) per year, according to the Occupational Outlook Handbook.﻿﻿

Computer Support Specialist

A computer support specialist provides help for people and companies with their computer equipment and/or software. They might help IT employees within an organization, or help non-IT users with their computer problems. They help people in person, over the phone, or online.

Computer support specialists generally do not need a college degree. Instead, they need computer knowledge, as well as communication and people skills. Often, they need to have taken a couple of computer or IT courses, or have an associate degree. Some companies require their computer support specialists to go through a certification program.

This job is experiencing a faster than average growth rate. A computer support specialist earns an average of $54,760 (2019) per year, according to the Occupational Outlook Handbook.﻿﻿

Tool-and-Die Maker

Tool-and-die makers are a type of machinist that sets up and operates various mechanically and machine-controlled tools used to produce tools needed for the manufacturing process.

These workers can learn through apprenticeship programs, vocational schools, technical colleges, or through on-the-job training. If the job involves computer-controlled machinery, a tool-and-die maker might need more IT coursework or IT experience.

Tool-and-die maker positions are among the higher paying manufacturing employee positions. The median pay for this position is $45,750 (2019) per year, according to the Occupational Outlook Handbook.﻿﻿

Pharmacy Technician

A pharmacy technician assists pharmacists with dispensing medications to customers and/or health professionals. Most of them work in pharmacies and drug stores, but others work at hospitals or in private practices.

Because most pharmacy technicians learn through on-the-job training, a four-year degree is generally not required. Many vocational/technical schools offer programs in pharmacy technology, some of which award students with a certificate after a year or less.

This job is experiencing a faster than average growth rate, with the average salary at $33,950 (2019) per year, according to the Occupational Outlook Handbook.﻿﻿

More New Collar Jobs

Below is a list of new-collar jobs, including those described above. The list is organized by industry. Look through the list and see if there is a new-collar job that is right for you.

New-Collar Healthcare Jobs

Cardiovascular Technician

Cardiovascular Technologist

Dental Hygienist

Diagnostic Medical Sonographer

Medical Records and Health Information Technician

Occupational Health/Safety Specialist

Occupational Therapy Aide

Pharmacy Technician

Physical Therapy Aide

Radiologic Technician

Radiologic Technologists

Respiratory Therapists

Surgical Technologist

New-Collar IT Jobs

Business Intelligence Analyst

Cloud Administrator

Computer Network Architect

Computer Programmer

Computer Security Analyst

Computer Support Specialist

Computer Systems Engineer

Cybersecurity Architect

Database Administrators

Information Security Analyst

Network Administrator

Network Support

Service Delivery Analyst

Server Technician

Software Developer

Software Engineer

Software Quality Assurance Analyst

Software Quality Assurance Tester

Systems Support

Technical Sales Assistant

New-Collar Manufacturing Jobs

Blender/Mixer Operator

CAD Drafter

Chemical Operator

CNC Operator

CNC Programmer

Computer-Controlled Machine Tool Operator

Electrical/Electronics Repairer

Electromechanical and Industrial Engineering Technician

Grinder/Sharpener

Machinist

Manufacturing Machine Operator

Manufacturing Production Technician

Molding/Casting Worker

Plant Operator

Printing Press Operator

Production Supervisor

Quality Control Inspector

Security Manager

Tool-and-Die Maker

Warehouse Supervisor

Water Treatment Specialist

Manufacturing Machine Operator

Manufacturing Production Technician

Press Brake Operator

Water Treatment Specialist

Welder/Solderer

1. Bureau of Labor Statistics. " Information Security Analysts," Accessed May 10, 2020.

2. Bureau of Labor Statistics. " Database Administrators," Accessed May 10, 2020.

3. Bureau of Labor Statistics. " Computer Programmers," Accessed May 10, 2020.

4. Bureau of Labor Statistics. " Network and Computer Systems Administrators," Accessed Dec. 18, 2019.

5. Bureau of Labor Statistics. " Diagnostic Medical Sonographers," Accessed Dec. 18, 2019.

6. Bureau of Labor Statistics. " Radiologic and MRI Technologists," Accessed Dec. 18, 2019.

7. Glassdoor. " Service Delivery Analyst Salaries." Accessed May 10, 2020.

8. Bureau of Labor Statistics. " Computer Support Specialists," Accessed Dec. 18, 2019.

9. Bureau of Labor Statistics. " Tool-and-Die Makers," Accessed May 10, 2020.

10. Bureau of Labor Statistics. " Pharmacy Technicians," Accessed May 10, 2020.

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10 High-Paying Jobs You Can Get Without a College Degree

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Are you seeking a high-paying job, but don't want to invest in a four-year or graduate degree? You don't need to have a college degree to get a good job. There is a new kind of job that emphasizes skills over education and work experience.

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What Is Body Shaming?

Body shaming is the act of saying something negative about a person's body. It can be about your own body or someone else's. The commentary can be about a person's size, age, hair, clothes, food, hair, or level of perceived attractiveness.

Body shaming can lead to mental health issues including eating disorders, depression, anxiety, low self-esteem, and body dysmorphia, as well as the general feeling of hating one's body.

The History of Body Shaming

In our current society, many people think that thin bodies are inherently better and healthier than larger bodies. Historically, however, that hasn't always been the case. If you think of paintings and portraits from before the 1800s era, you can see that plumpness was revered.

Being fat was a sign that a person was wealthy and had access to food, while thinness represented poverty. In her book "Fat Shame: Stigma and the Fat Body in American Culture," author Amy Erdman Farrell traces the shift from revering heavy bodies to the preference of smaller shapes to mid-nineteenth century England when the first diets books were published.

She noted that the focus on diets, and bodies at large, was centered around women. Author Sabrina Strings says that fatphobia resulted from colonialism and race in her book "Fearing the Black Body: The Racial Origins of Fat Phobia."

According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, the first known use of the term "body shaming" was by journalist Philip Ellis.

Types of Body Shaming

Body shaming is most often about body size, but negative comments about any facet of a person's body count as body shaming.

Below are the various reasons why people might be body-shamed.

One of the most common reasons people are body shamed is because of their weight. Someone might be body-shamed for being "too big" or "too thin."

Saying anything negative about a person being "fat" is body shaming. This is also known as "fat-shaming." Fat-shaming comments are ones like "They'd be pretty if they lost weight," or "I bet they had to buy an extra plane ticket to fit." Men are often body-shamed when people refer to them as having a "dad bod."

People in thinner bodies can also be shamed for their weight. Often called skinny-shaming, it may sound like, "They look like they never eat" or "They look like they have an eating disorder."

Hair grows on the arms, legs, private areas, and underarms of all people, except for those with certain health conditions. However, many people have the idea that women should remove all of their body hair, or they won't be "ladylike."

Examples of body hair shaming are calling a woman with underarm hair "beastly," or telling a woman she needs to shave.

Attractiveness

Known as "pretty-shaming," the bullying or discrimination of people for being attractive, is something that happens regularly. And even more than that, people are bullied for being considered unattractive, which is also known as "lookism." Lookism describes prejudice or discrimination against people who are considered physically unattractive or whose physical appearance is believed to fall short of societal ideas of beauty.

An example of pretty-shaming is how attractive women are less likely to be hired for jobs in which they'd have positions of authority.And an example of lookism would be how unattractive people may receive fewer opportunities.

Food-shaming is generally done in relation to body size. For example, when someone makes a remark about what a person is or isn't eating, that can count as food-shaming. Someone saying, "They look like they don't need to be eating that," is an example of food-shaming.

You can also food-shame yourself. For example, you might say, "I'm so fat, I shouldn't eat this piece of cheesecake."

The 1980s saw the rise of spandex clothing, and there was a popular saying, "Spandex is a privilege, not a right." This meant that people should only wear spandex clothes if they had the "correct" body shape for them. This is a prime example of clothing-shaming.

More recently, the founder of the clothing brand Lululemon was criticized for making fat-shaming comments when he said that some women's bodies "don't work" for the clothes.

Also known as ageism, age-shaming is discrimination or bullying towards people because of their age. This usually focuses on the elderly or the older population.

In relation to body-shaming, an ageist remark may sound like, "They're too old to wear that much makeup." Additionally, news articles that show photos of how "bad" or "old" celebrities look when not wearing makeup are shaming. Making negative comments about someone's wrinkles or loose skin is another form of body-shaming.

Western society has long focused on sleek, shiny, straight hair as the ideal. Thus, hair with curls, kinks, or other textures has been viewed as less attractive. This is known as texture-shaming.

An example of texture shaming is, "They're so brave to wear their hair natural." While that sounds like a compliment, it's actually an insult. That's because it implies that a person's hair is outside what is considered normal and that they are courageous for wearing their hair in its natural state.

Additionally, bald-shaming happens to people of all genders who have receding hairlines or thinning/balding scalps.

Body Shaming's Impact on Well-Being

Body shaming has myriad negative consequences on mental health. Here are some important ones:

Adolescents who are body shamed have a significantly elevated risk of depression.

It may lead to eating disorders.

Body shaming worsens outcomes for obese women attempting to overcome binge eating.

Body shaming can cause dissatisfaction with one's body, which then can cause low self-esteem.

Additional mental health concerns associated with body-shaming include:

Anxiety

Body dysmorphic disorder

Depression

Higher risk of self-harm or suicide

Poorer quality of life (due to body dissatisfaction)

Psychological distress

How to Be More Inclusive

Body shaming may be rampant, but that doesn't mean you should take part in it. Making a point of not body-shaming is the kinder option for all people, yourself included. Being intentional about not engaging in various types of shaming may lead to better mental wellness.

In addition to not body-shaming, it can be helpful to be more body-inclusive. This means encouraging the acceptance and celebration of shape and diversity in appearance, focusing on health instead of size or weight, and appreciating the human body for all that it is and does.

Below are some ways you can stop contributing to body-shaming culture.

Stop Talking About Other People's Bodies

It may be socially acceptable for people to mock and body-shame others, but you do not have to accept, participate in, or tolerate such words or actions. You wouldn't want that to be done to you, and now you know that it can cause real problems for those it happens to.

So, when you are tempted to point out a person's body hair or their hair texture, their size, stop yourself. Instead, why not think of something nice to say to the person?

Clearly, they caught your eye, so you could use this as an opportunity to find a positive attribute. "I like your smile" is one idea of a way to compliment another person without speaking negatively about their body.

Try the following steps:

1. Notice your thoughts and acknowledge your own conditioning, bias, and/or judgments.

2. Make an intentional effort to notice what you like, appreciate, or admire about this person (this may be physical or non-physical traits).

3. Practice this with others and yourself to develop and deepen respect, care, and compassion for yourself and others.

Learn About Body Neutrality

Body neutrality is a practice that has many proven mental health benefits. It's the notion of accepting bodies as they are, without casting judgment on them. This can apply to your own body, and to the bodies of others.

Body neutrality encourages a focus on the positive functions that bodies can perform. Learning about it can make you feel better in your own body, improve your relationship with food, and boost your self-esteem.

Change How You Talk About Your Own Body

In a culture where so much emphasis is placed on what is wrong with us and needs improvement, it can feel like a huge challenge to speak positively about our own bodies. Doing so, however, is a healthy thing to do, and it also saves other people from harm.

By practicing speaking positively about ourselves and our bodies, and noticing qualities about ourselves and others that we like and appreciate, we can deepen our care, compassion, and connection with others and with ourselves.

It isn't realistic to only think positive thoughts about yourself, but you can express your feelings in ways that are less harmful to others. For the above example, you could instead confide in a friend and say, "My pants aren't fitting as they usually do, and it's making me feel self-conscious."

Rather than body-shaming, you'll have opened up to a loved one, creating more closeness and trust between the both of you.

If you've gone through the steps to stop body-shaming yourself and other people, that's wonderful! However, there is still more work to do.

If you see someone making a comment to another person about their body, whether about their clothing or age or size, you can gently let them know that it's unkind to talk about other people's bodies. And if it happens regularly with friends or loved ones, you can bring it up in a bigger way, letting them know that their ways of communicating about bodies don't always feel good for you and others.

Body shaming may be prevalent, but you can do the work to stop perpetuating it and to help heal its harmful effects by practicing body positivity with yourself and others.

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Body shaming is the act of saying something negative about a person's body. It can be about your own body or someone else's. The commentary can be about a person's size, age, hair, clothes, food, hair, or level of perceived attractiveness.

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Participation in traditional sports declines as many kids try something new

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Participation in traditional sports declines as many kids try something new

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Newsela | Instructional Content Platform

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Newsela is an Instructional Content Platform that supercharges reading engagement and learning in every subject.

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Trade Workers: Solution for Labor Shortage

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Trade Workers: Solution for Labor Shortage

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Employment for electricians, carpenters, and plumbers could help address the labor shortage.

Skilled trade workers typically are paid well, get to learn on the job, and have less student debt.

Two experts told Insider that these employers had a rare opportunity to attract new workers.

The jobs of the future are, in part, the jobs of the past: Work for electricians, carpenters, and plumbers could help fix the labor shortage.

As millions of Americans reevaluate their careers during the pandemic and quit their jobs, skilled trades that typically offer higher pay and on-the-job training may be a promising new career choice.

A new annual report from Angi, a marketplace for home services, highlights not only the situation of skilled trades during the pandemic but how skilled trades could take advantage of the so-called Great Resignation in other industries.

"If home trades recognize the connection between what their trades offer and what workers are seeking during the Great Resignation, we could begin to see a narrative change around trade labor and start to reverse the labor shortages that have impacted the trades for years," the report said.

The report suggests people in skilled trades are happy with their work - Angi said that 83% of tradespeople it surveyed said they were at least somewhat satisfied.

"So when two-thirds of the labor force aren't engaged in their work, this is an area where people should be going because it's booming," Mischa Fisher, Angi's chief economist, told Insider.

Angi said there's a demand for these workers because of booming markets in homes and home improvement during the pandemic. An analysis of job data from the industrial-staffing agency PeopleReady also indicated this demand.

Even before the pandemic, there was a shortage of skilled trade workers.

Kevin Ponder, the construction director at PeopleReady Skilled Trades, told Insider that some baby boomers had decided to retire early because of the pandemic. A shortage of workers in construction has also contributed to a record backlog of homes authorized but not started.

Skilled-trade employers need to change how they attract talent

About 46% of skilled-trade employers surveyed by Angi said they recruited workers by word-of-mouth recommendations. But Fisher said this may not be very effective for finding new workers.

"For the most part, tradespeople know other tradespeople, and so word of mouth - it's a very closed ecosystem," Fisher said. He added that recruiters should instead increase their digital presence.

Fisher said recruiters needed to change their messaging as well. Many of the tradespeople in Angi's survey said they were satisfied with their work mainly because they found meaning and value in it. But that isn't being prioritized in recruitment efforts, as indicated in the chart below.

Employers should communicate that "people really like this work - you're going to like your job if you do this," Fisher said. "And so both the message and the medium have to be improved."

Ponder added that trades needed to highlight benefits like receiving good compensation and getting paid while learning on the job through an apprenticeship program and without the burden of student loans.

The following table shows the typical education, training, and pay in some trades:

Fisher added that employers needed to make more of an effort to hire women and people of color, as skilled trades are predominantly white men. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in 2020 women made up only 3.1% of electricians; 2.3% of plumbers, pipefitters, and steamfitters; and 3.8% of construction laborers. More than 86% of construction laborers were white.

Fisher said people in skilled trades were looking for a "willingness to work hard, willingness to learn, customer-service skills, planning, craftsmanship skills," adding, "There's no reason why we couldn't see that rate of women in the trades be much, much higher."

Ponder said that if you're interested in being outside or building something that will be around for years, "you get that in construction, you get that in the skilled trades."

"And that's an opportunity where you get to see something that you've done that may be here 20, 30, 40 years later, and be able to look at your kids or grandkids and say, 'I was a part of that,'" Ponder added.

"So many people that I saw start off at barely over minimum wage, 10 years later they were running million-dollar projects because they worked hard and they learned, and there's just not a lot of industries out there that still have that flexibility and freedom to allow you to grow based on what you're learning on the job," Ponder said.
Did you quit your job during the pandemic and have made the switch into a skilled trade position? Email this reporter at mhoff@insider.com.

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The labor shortage may have an old-fashioned solution: Carpenters, electricians, and other trades are good jobs that make workers happy

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Employment for electricians, carpenters, and plumbers could help address the labor shortage. Skilled trade workers typically are paid well, get to learn on the job, and have less student debt. Two experts told Insider that these employers had a rare opportunity to attract new workers.

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Report shows that teens are drinking less soda, but more sports drinks

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Report shows that teens are drinking less soda, but more sports drinks

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Newsela | Report shows that teens are drinking less soda, but more sports drinks

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Can You Be Successful Without Getting A College Degree? -Infographic

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Can You Be Successful Without Getting A College Degree? -Infographic

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Some of the biggest entrepreneurial success stories -- Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates -- all have a moment when the aspiring business leader decides to forgo degrees from prestigious institutions of higher learning in favor of attempting to get their company off the ground. Stories like these beg the question: In today's economy, what is the value of higher education?

Hartcreations | Getty Images

It depends on a number of factors, ranging from the career path you hope to pursue, what kind of home and family life you see for yourself, and your financial status. Check out the infographic below from Online College Plan to see what to take into account before deciding on an educational path.

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Can You Be Successful Without Getting a College Degree? (Infographic)

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Some of the biggest entrepreneurial success stories -- Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates -- all have a moment when the aspiring business leader decides to forgo degrees from prestigious institutions of higher learning in favor of attempting to get their company off the ground.

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Why Weight Discrimination Persists In The U.S. Workplace

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Why Weight Discrimination Persists In The U.S. Workplace

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Why Weight Discrimination Persists In The U.S. Workplace

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Teams are taking a timeout, but sports lessons are still timely

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Teams are taking a timeout, but sports lessons are still timely

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Newsela - Teams are taking a timeout, but sports lessons are still timely

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Sports teach important life lessons that can be applied to dealing with the coronavirus outbreak

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ARCHIVED WEBSITE

This topic was archived on Mar. 22, 2024, in light of recent developments. A reconsideration of the topic is possible in the future.

The NCAA (National Collegiate Athletic Association) is a nonprofit organization formed in 1906 that regulates college athletics, including game rules, athlete eligibility, and college tournaments. As of Mar. 2021, the NCAA was composed of "[n]early half a million college athletes [who] make up the 19,886 teams that send more than 57,661 participants to compete each year in the NCAA's 90 championships in 24 sports across 3 divisions."

The NCAA is seemingly the final authority to decide whether college athletes should be paid to play college sports. However, in 2019, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed the Fair Play Act that allows college athletes to hire agents, sign endorsement deals, and be paid for the use of their likeness.

California was the first state to pass a NIL (name, image, and likeness) law, which takes effect on Jan. 1, 2023. But California was quickly followed by more states. As of June 10, 2021, 18 states have passed NIL laws; five more states have passed bills that were awaiting the governor's signature to become law; 14 states have introduced NIL bills; and one state has a bill passed by the Senate and awaiting a House vote, according to the Business of College Sports.

The NCAA was scheduled to vote on new NIL rules in Jan. 2021, but it then postponed the vote, citing "external factors." Days before the scheduled vote Makan Delrahim, JD, Assistant Attorney General for the Antitrust Division of the United States Department of Justice under the Trump administration, questioned the proposed rules' compliance with antitrust laws.

Additionally, the US Supreme Court agreed to hear a case (National Collegiate Athletic Association v. Shawne Alston, et al.) about whether the NCAA is violating antitrust laws by restricting college athletes' compensation. The Supreme Court heard arguments on Mar. 31, 2021 as the NCAA March Madness tournament heads into Final Four games just days later on Apr. 3. Respondents were split 50/50 in a June 1, 2021 New York Times survey about whether the NCAA strictly limiting paid compensation is constitutional.

Gabe Feldman, JD, Professor of Sports Law, Director of the Sports Law Program and Associate Provost for NCAA compliance at Tulane University, noted that the last time the NCAA was at the Supreme Court was in 1984 (NCAA vs. the Board of Regents of the University of Oklahoma). The ruling changed the broadcast regulations for college football. Feldman explained, "That was a shape-shifting decision that in many ways fundamentally changed economics of college football and college football television. And ever since that 1984 decision, courts have been relying on that language to try to interpret antitrust law applies to all NCAA restrictions, including player compensation."

On June 21, 2021, the US Supreme Court ruled unanimously that the NCAA cannot ban certain payments to student athletes under the premise of maintaining amateurism. Associate Justice Neil Gorsuch, writing for the majority, stated, "traditions alone cannot justify the NCAA's decision to build a massive money-raising enterprise on the backs of student athletes who are not fairly compensated. Nowhere else in America can businesses get away with agreeing not to pay their workers a fair market rate on the theory that their product is defined by not paying their workers a fair market rate. And under ordinary principles of antitrust law, it is not evident why college sports should be any different. The NCAA is not above the law."

On June 28, 2021, the NCAA Division I Council recommended to the NCAA Division I Board of Directors that student athletes be allowed to profit from their name, image, and likeness. Schools would not be allowed to pay students and no one could offer compensation for students to attend a particular school. If adopted, the rule would only apply to Division I schools and would be temporary until the NCAA or Congress acts.

On June 30, 2021, fewer than 12 hours before some states' NIL laws went into effect, the NCAA Division I Board of Directors issued an interim ruling stating that Bylaw 12 (the rules that say athletes cannot receive payment) will not be enforced. Divisions II and III of the NCAA followed suit and the changes went into effect for all three divisions on July 1, 2021.

The University of North Carolina became the first school to organize group licensing deals for student athletes in July 2021. UNC athletes will be able to earn money for NIL marketing including UNC trademarks and logos in groups of three or more athletes. For example, a student athlete will be compensated for the sale of a jersey featuring their name, or for a sponsorship deal in which they appear wearing a UNC jersey. Group licensing deals in theory can allow lesser-known players to reap the benefits of appearing alongside a well-known player.

By Jan. 2022, without a clear NIL structure from the NCAA, some schools were questioning how to navigate deals for players or whole teams without violating NCAA policy.

NCAA president Charlie Baker sent a letter on Dec. 5, 2023, to the 362 Division I member schools calling for reformations including creating a separate division for the top-earning schools that would mimic professional sports and updating NIL regulations so female athletes could better benefit. The rule changes will have to be considered by the NCAA governing boards, a process which could take up to a year.

A 2019 Seton Hall Sports Poll found that 60% of those surveyed agreed that college athletes should be allowed compensation for their name, image, and/or likeness, while 32% disagreed, and 8% were unsure. This was quite a change from polling conducted in 2017, when 60% believed college scholarships were enough compensation for college athletes.

Should Colleges and Universities Pay College Athletes?

Pro 1

The NCAA, colleges, and universities profit unfairly from the work and likenesses of college athletes.

The NCAA reported over $1.06 billion in revenue in 2017 (the most recent available numbers). In 2018, NCAA president Mark Emmert was paid more than $2.7 million. Nine other NCAA executives were paid more than $500,000 in 2018, with one paid more than $1.3 million.

Michael Sokolove, author of The Last Temptation of Rick Pitino (2018), explained, "If you look at a program like [University of] Louisville, ...they generate about $45 million a year in revenue. They give out 13 scholarships. That adds up to about $400,000 a year. The rest of it gets spread out to the coach, who makes $8 million a year, to the assistant coaches, who make as much as a half-million dollars a year. All throughout the athletic department, people are making six-figure salaries. It does not go to the players, what I call the unpaid workforce."

As of Nov. 17, 2020, the University of Alabama head football coach Nick Saban was the highest paid NCAA college football coach, making $9.3 million per year. 81 other head football coaches made more than $1 million annually and another 29 more than $500,000.

The highest paid men's basketball coach was the University of Kentucky head coach, John Calipari, who was paid $8.2 million per year. 69 other head men's basketball coaches were paid more than $1 million annually, and another three more than $500,000.

Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh, who was forecast to earn about $11 million in 2023, says, "I would take less money for the players to have a share. I hope other coaches would use their voice to express the same thing."

College athletes, arguably the stars of the show who earn millions year after year for the well-paid NCAA executives, coaches, and staff, were forbidden by the NCAA from not only being paid for their work-, but from seeking other related compensation such as endorsement deals. And, as John I. Jenkins and Jack Swarbrick, President and Athletics Director of Notre Dame University argue, "We have been vocal in our conviction that student-athletes should be allowed to... profit from their celebrity - for one simple reason: Other students are allowed to. If a college student is a talented artist or musician no one begrudges him the chance to make money from his skills. And athletes should as far as possible have the opportunities other students enjoy."
Read More

Pro 2

College athletes are risking their bodies as well as their future careers and earning potential to play for colleges and universities while often receiving a sub-par education.

Governor of California Gavin Newsom, stated, "Collegiate student athletes put everything on the line - their physical health, future career prospects and years of their lives to compete. Colleges reap billions from these student athletes' sacrifices and success but, in the same breath, block them from earning a single dollar. That's a bankrupt model."

Zachary Kerr, PhD, Researcher at the University of North Carolina's Center for the Study of Retired Athletes, stated, "I definitely think research indicates strong evidence that injuries during one's sports career can potentially be associated with adverse health outcomes later in life."

In 2017, 67% of former Division I athletes had sustained a major injury and 50% had chronic injuries, 2.5% higher than non-athletes.

Azmatullah Hussaini, MD, President of the New York/New Jersey chapter of the American Muslim Health Professionals, and Jules Lipoff, MD, Assistant Professor of Dermatology at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, offered additional context: especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, "[g]iven that athletes are disproportionately Black in the biggest revenue-generating sports - football and basketball - this dynamic also evokes America's horrific history of unpaid slave labor. It's hard to ignore the racist undertones when the financial benefit to these institutions is based on the unpaid work of young Black men."

The NCAA requires players to have health insurance but does not pay for that insurance and can refuse to pay medical expenses for sports injuries, some of which can have life-long consequences for the players' bodies and career opportunities. The NCAA also does not prohibit schools from canceling injured athletes' scholarships, leaving athletes without a sport or education.

Adding insult to sometimes literal injury, college athletes are also frequently denied the NCAA's other form of "compensation": a quality education. As Jon Solomon, Editorial Director for the Sports and Society Program at the Aspen Institute explained, "The most glaring example occurred when the University of North Carolina was found by outside parties to have organized fake classes that enabled dozens of athletes to gain and maintain their eligibility... of the 3,100 students who took the fake classes over 18 years, 47.4 percent were athletes... North Carolina avoided NCAA penalties by essentially arguing that the NCAA should stay out of irregularities in college courses." The NCAA polices athletes' finances but does not ensure a quality education.
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Pro 3

College athletes are often valued at more than $1 million, but they (and their families) frequently live below the poverty line.

A study by the National Bureau of Economic Research found that the top two college football positions-the quarterback and wide receiver-were worth $2.4 million and $1.3 million per year respectively, while starting men's basketball players in the Power Five schools were worth between $800,000 and $1.2 million per year.

If college players earned about 50% of their teams' revenues like the NFL and NBA players do, the average football player's yearly salary would be $360,000 and the average basketball player's yearly salary would be $500,000.

The study found that "[t]he player-level analysis reveals that the existing limits on player compensation effectively transfers resources away from students who are more likely to be black and more likely to come from poor neighborhoods towards students who are more likely to be white and come from higher-income neighborhoods."

College athletes are required to make up the difference between NCAA scholarships and the actual cost of living. Tuition shortfalls amount to thousands of dollars per year and leave about 85% of players to live below the poverty line. For example, fair market value for a University of Texas football player was $513,922. However, players lived $778 below the federal poverty line and owed $3,624 in tuition.

About 25% of Division I athletes reported food poverty in the past year and almost 14% reported being homeless in the past year. Erin McGeoy, a former water polo athlete at George Washington University, explained, "a common occurrence was that we would run out of meal money halfway through the semester and that's when I started to run into troubles of food insecurity." She turned to boarding dogs in her no-dogs-allowed apartment in order to pay rent because housing costs increased each year but her housing allowance remained static.

The NCAA keeps players in poverty and denied them ways to earn money, while making millions on their performance.
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Con 1

Scholarships are fair financial compensation for college athletes, especially considering the precarious finances of athletic departments.

According to the NCAA, the organization provides "more than $3.6 billion in athletic scholarships annually to more than 180,000 student-athletes." Divided equitably, each student would receive about $20,000 per year. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, the average total cost of public college (tuition, fees, room, and board) for the 2017-18 academic year was $17,797. Considering other scholarships and aid are widely available and not all college athletes require financial aid, the NCAA scholarships are generous.

Further, most college programs do not generate the income needed to run their athletic programs, much less pay athletes. In fiscal year 2019, the collective expenses of the 65 Power Five schools-the largest and richest Division I schools in the NCAA-exceeded revenue by $7 million. Other Division I schools had an almost $23 million collective difference between revenue and expenses. No Division II or III schools' revenue exceeded expenses.

If students were paid, the NCAA argues, many colleges and universities would have to offer fewer scholarships and the remaining scholarships would be distributed unfairly to top football and men's basketball players because those two sports bring in the most revenue. Schools would also have to cut unprofitable sports including gymnastics, swimming and diving, tennis, track and field, volleyball, and wrestling. Discrepancies between men's and women's sports such as the weight room during the 2021 NCAA basketball tournament would only worsen.

Paying players would also limit the literal and figurative playing fields to elite universities with large budgets. As John Thelin, PhD, Research Professor of History of Higher Education & Public Policy at the University of Kentucky, explained, "paying salaries to players will increase [athletic] program expenditures without necessarily increasing revenues... [and] a handful of powerful programs will stand to gain in competition for athletic talent simply because they can afford to pay salaries. Others will mimic as they try to keep up but eventually will fall short in trying to outbid Auburn University, Florida State, the University of Southern California or the University of Texas in the college player arms race."
Read More

Con 2

Very few college athletes will go pro, so athletes should take advantage of the education being offered in exchange for playing a college sport.

The reality is that the vast majority of college athletes will never play professionally. Of the 36,011 college baseball players, only 8,002 are eligible to play professionally each year. 1,217 will be draft picks, but only 791 will be drafted yearly, meaning about 9.9% of college baseball players will go pro, which is the largest likelihood in NCAA sports.

The major money-makers, football and men's basketball, have very low odds. Of the 73,712 NCAA football players, about 16,380 are draft-eligible and 254 will be drafted, meaning about 1.2% of college football players will go pro. Of the 18,816 male basketball players, 4,181 are draft-eligible and 60 will be drafted, but only 52 will go pro, or a 1.2% chance a college basketball player will play professionally. The odds are even lower for women's basketball at 0.6%.

The NCAA noted, "[p]rofessional opportunities are extremely limited and the likelihood of a high school or even college athlete becoming a professional athlete is very low. In contrast, the likelihood of an NCAA athlete earning a college degree is significantly greater; graduation success rates are 86% in Division I, 71% in Division II and 87% in Division III."

In other words, it would be more prudent and more profitable for college athletes to focus on education as their compensation.

Data analyzed from the Department of Labor showed nine out of 10 new jobs were going to employees with college degrees in June 2018. Further, a Gallup poll of "74,385 U.S. adults with a bachelor's degree, finds that college graduates who participated in NCAA athletics experience a host of positive long-term life outcomes at greater rates than non-athletes."

Those positive outcomes include: 70% of NCAA athletes graduated in four years or fewer, 50% agree that college was worth the cost, 39% earned an advanced degree, 33% have "good" jobs after graduation, and 24%
"are thriving at the highest levels," all higher percentages than their non-athlete peers.

Amy Perko, CEO of the Knight Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics, said of the Gallup findings, "It's a positive report for the educational benefits for college sports, and it reinforces the point that we've tried to make over the years. There's an important role for college sports in higher education, and that role needs to be placed in the proper perspective as part of the educational mission, not apart from it."
Read More

Con 3

Paying college athletes would not solve the real problem: the American amateur sports system is broken.

Football and basketball players cannot play professionally immediately after high school. The NBA requires players to be at least 19 and a year out of high school, while the NFL requires players to be three years out of high school. These rules can effectively limit players' options to playing in college or choosing another profession altogether. Most players have no real "amateur" sport option and those who would rather not go to college have no other established feeder system to make it to a professional team.

Further confusing the issue, the NCAA does not have a consistent or fair definition of "amateurism" and allows some significant forms of financial compensation. College athletes are allowed to compete in the Olympic Games and be financially compensated, such as Joseph Schooling, a University of Texas swimmer, who earned a $740,000 bonus for winning Singapore's first gold medal ever at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Summer Games for the 100m butterfly. College athletes may also play a second sport professionally and be compensated, such as Clemson quarterback Kyle Parker who earned a $1.4 million baseball signing bonus from the Colorado Rockies in 2010 while still playing football for the Tigers. Tennis players may earn up to $10,000 in prize money yearly while playing college tennis and college football players may earn up to $550 in bowl gifts.

B. David Ridpath, EdD, Associate Professor of Sports Administration at Ohio University, noted, "The only amateur quality about college athletics is that colleges refuse to pay their players." Ridpath explained, "The United States is the only country in the world that has a significant portion of elite athletic development and commercialized sport embedded within its education systems. Consider that ten of the biggest outdoor sports stadiums in the world (excluding auto racing venues) are American college football stadiums. None of the largest ones are NFL stadiums."

To fix the problem, and separate athletes who are getting an education just because they want to play a sport from those who actually want to go to college, the United States needs a true amateur or minor league that feeds into professional sports.
Read More

Discussion Questions
1. Should college athletes be paid? Why or why not?

2. Should the college athletics system be revised in another way to compensate amateur athletes? Explain your answer.

3. How should the NCAA (or another governing body) balance college athletes' sport, educational, and financial interests? Explain your answer(s).

4. Do you think well-established minor-league systems would be attractive to high-school graduates and college athletes less interested in (or ill-prepared for) higher education? Explain your answer(s).
Take Action
1. Consider the pro position of the National College Players Association that paying college athletes is a civil rights issue.

2. Explore the NCAA site and think critically about the organization as the governing body of college athletics.

3. Analyze the argument that paying athletes would "ruin college sports" from Cody J. McDavis, former college basketball player.

4. Consider how you felt about the issue before reading this article. After reading the pros and cons on this topic, has your thinking changed? If so, how? List two to three ways. If your thoughts have not changed, list two to three ways your better understanding of the "other side of the issue" now helps you better argue your position.

5. Push for the position and policies you support by writing US national senators and representatives.
Sources

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Should College Athletes Be Paid? Top 3 Pros and Cons

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Proponents say colleges profit unfairly off of the athletes. Opponents say the athletes are paid in tuition. Explore both sides of the debate.

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Going beyond appearance in the workplace | AFMD - EM Strasbourg

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Going beyond appearance in the workplace | AFMD - EM Strasbourg

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Going beyond appearance in the workplace | AFMD - EM Strasbourg

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Winning isn't most important for making sports fun, kids say

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Winning isn't most important for making sports fun, kids say

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Newsela | Winning isn't most important for making sports fun, kids say

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A recent study looked at what makes organized sports fun for kids.

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Newsela | Instructional Content Platform

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Newsela is an Instructional Content Platform that supercharges reading engagement and learning in every subject.

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Breaking the wall on appearance-based discrimination

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Breaking the wall on appearance-based discrimination

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Breaking the wall on appearance-based discrimination

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Women's sports leagues band together with SheIS initiative

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Women's sports leagues band together with SheIS initiative

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Newsela | Women's sports leagues band together with SheIS initiative

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Learn about your college career and school options

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Learn about your college career and school options

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Newsela | Learn about your college career and school options

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Do your homework when picking a college or career school to attend

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Readers have been getting in touch about their experiences of terminated job interviews, losing out on promised promotions and leaving jobs because of their tattoos.

It followed a Magazine article which asked whether discrimination against people with tattoos should be banned in the workplace.

Here are some of their stories.
'I was told I'm a bad example to children'
I'm 35 and quite heavily tattooed. I had a job as a mid-day assistant at a school. I was taken on having tattoos and facial piercings which during the winter months was fine as I was covered up, but when the summer arrived my arms were on show.

I was promptly issued with a "standards of dress" guide. It said that visible tattoos and facial piercings were not setting a good example and should be covered up. This was the first bit of communication I had received during my job.

I feel sad that children grow up being taught these shallow-minded views
Karla Valentine

Would you get a tattoo of a company logo?
I was good at my job and the children seemed to like talking about my tattoos. I did start a bit of a campaign but I didn't want to work in an environment that said because I have tattoos and a piercing I cannot do the job.

After a week or so I went to see the headmaster and resigned with immediate effect. He had called me in to have meetings with personnel over the issues I had raised, but I didn't feel I wanted to work in a place that discriminates against tattoos and piercings and I don't believe I should have to fight to justify that I'm a hard worker and a decent person.
Karla Valentine, Suffolk, UK
I just feel it's sad that in 2014 we can be so discriminatory about people's choices, I feel sad that children grow up being taught these shallow-minded views. The best bit was that after a month or so of me leaving they had a school fete with a temporary tattoo stall for the children!

'I had my working hours cut'

My old boss was against body modifications because of her religious beliefs. I was constantly harassed about my piercings and tattoos.

I had hours cut after getting my tattoos, even though they aren't visible. I have both feet done as well, but always wear socks and shoes. I work in childcare and was told that even out in public I had to keep appearances up, so to keep covered, because I might see the children I looked after outside hours.
Sam, Brisbane, Australia
In my uniform you can't see my tattoos. As I keep it professional but I've been told that I'm unapproachable and scary with tattoos and piercings and that could lose potential clients to the business.

'I was told to cover up'

I have both full sleeves and my previous employer stated you had to cover all tattoos when in work hours, which I found wrong because other members of staff were allowed to wear earrings which is another form of body modification. One rule for one et al.
Jef, Teddington, UK
I now work for a company that does not discriminate against tattoos. I am currently a contract manager for a hospital. In my previous job I was an operations manager where their policies stated that all tattoos had to be covered up at all times. This included any contractor working on site.

'My job interview was terminated'

I'm a heavily tattooed 20-year-old girl. I've had very mixed reactions to my art. I find that because I'm such a young girl and have as many as I do (I lost count at 50) that people either love them and find me brave or hate me and insult me by using my tattoos as ammunition.

I've even had an employer hang up the phone on me when they found out I had tattoos.

About a year and a half ago, in 2012, I applied for a job as a waitress. It was a half telephone interview, half seeing when you're free. It was going fine. The employer started talking about the uniform. When he said it was short-sleeved, as soon as I said I had my arms tattooed, he just hung up.

I was working as a shop assistant in a mobile phone shop when a customer started screaming in my face. They had some problems with their top-up I was trying to help them with but they had bought it from another shop and I couldn't give them a refund. They completely switched.

"You've only got this job because you've got tattoos," they shouted. They were saying I was disgusting and I'd let down the company. They just really kicked off - you know, when they do that look when they tut and they spit at the same time. And then walked out of the shop, so I went round the back and cried.

I have had awards for my customer service and in that shop my manager had sleeves, my other manager had a neck tattoo.
Amii Parr, Reading, UK
I'm not rude or horrible. I don't do drugs or anything. I work hard, pay bills, do charity work for animals and yet they call me disgusting names for no reasons. The art I have isn't even offensive. Just cause I'm heavily tattooed doesn't mean I'm nasty, scary or stupid.

'I missed out on a promotion'

I was promised a promotion when I turned 18. I was waiting on this promotion from a buser - a person who buses tables, washes dishes, serves food and stocks coolers - to a server at a bar and grill for five months.

On my 18th birthday I got a half-sleeve and my boss immediately denied me the promotion he promised me even though some of my co-workers had much more visible tattoos and piercings.

I quit a month later.

He didn't say directly that it was because of my tattoo, but the comments he made toward me made it clear he didn't like it. He asked me if I was crazy for getting it and why my parents would let me do this to myself.
Emily, Wisconsin, USA Subscribe to the BBC News Magazine's email newsletter to get articles sent to your inbox.
He also said it's very dark (I don't really know if he meant dark as in black or dark as in creepy) and that I'm better for in the kitchen rather then being a waitress.

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Readers have been getting in touch about their experiences of terminated job interviews, losing out on promised promotions and leaving jobs because of their tattoos. It followed a Magazine article which asked whether discrimination against people with tattoos should be banned in the workplace. Here are some of their stories.

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Rejection from your dream college doesn't have to be the end of the world

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Rejection from your dream college doesn't have to be the end of the world

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Newsela | Rejection from your dream college doesn't have to be the end of the world

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A college rejection - or two - could turn into a learning experience and a new life's path.

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Attractive People Get Unfair Advantages at Work. AI Can Help.

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Attractive People Get Unfair Advantages at Work. AI Can Help.

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One reason for the widespread interest in AI is that it has the potential to reduce the degree of bias underpinning human decisions. For example, meta-analytic studies have long highlighted the pervasive nature of bias in hiring and recruitment.

Even in the rich and liberal world, there are many biases at play in the workplace, which account for the unmeritocratic or unfair advantage that some groups have over others, irrespective of their actual talent or potential: sexism, racism, and ageism, to name just a few.

But one of the most prominent biases is hardly ever discussed or acknowledged, namely the beauty bias - also known as "lookism." Indeed, the existence of a beauty premium in the labor market is well-documented. As a comprehensive academic review summarized: "Physically attractive individuals are more likely to be interviewed for jobs and hired, they are more likely to advance rapidly in their careers through frequent promotions, and they earn higher wages than unattractive individuals." Common manifestations of appearance-based discrimination may include bias against obese, oddly-dressed, or tattooed candidates, or any people who don't fit a society's dominant aesthetic criteria.

Broadly speaking, the beauty bias concerns the favorable treatment that individuals receive when they are deemed more attractive, regardless of whether this happens consciously or unconsciously - and of course few individuals, let alone employers, actually admit to preferring to work with others on the basis of their higher levels of attractiveness. Naturally, there are some exceptions. For instance, in order to join the Chinese Navy, "good looks" are an official requirement, apparently so they can represent the nation with the best image. And although Abercrombie & Fitch was pushed into a $50-million settlement for hiring looking retail assistants, it was not banned from imposing attractiveness standards in its recruitment policies, so long as it recruited diverse - but good looking - candidates.

Here's the good news: Identifying this bias is surprisingly simple. This means that any employer interested in eliminating handicaps against less attractive people should be able to detect this bias, and evaluate the efficacy of any intervention. Now the bad news: you are unlikely to achieve this unless you replace human intuition with data - this is where AI can potentially help, if approached responsibly. So how can we tackle the attractiveness bias?

First, you can measure attractiveness, which is typically a function of consensual ratings of physical appearance. Imagine you ask 10 people to rate 100 people on physical appearance or attractiveness. Although attractiveness is not objective, which is why there are always disagreements between people rating the same person, it is also not entirely subjective, so most people will tend to agree on whether someone is more or less attractive, for instance by using a 1-10 point scale, and not just when they belong to the same culture.

Next, you can correlate this score with a range of success indicators, from interview ratings, to job performance ratings, to promotion or salary data. Given that attractiveness is rarely a formal criterion for picking one person over another - except, of course, in the dating world - there are obvious reasons for evaluating whether and why people's attractiveness scores may correlate with any objective indicator of career success. Here's where AI can help: as a diagnostic tool to predict someone's likelihood of being deemed more effective in the business based on their perceived attractiveness. A significant body of research suggests that a person's attractiveness level is far more predictive of a range of success outcomes than one would hope if we want to live in a fair and unbiased world.

So, what does the science actually tell us?

A pro-attractiveness bias already exists in education, with studies showing that physically attractive students tend to obtain higher grades at university, partly because they are deemed more conscientious and intelligent, even when they are not. Furthermore, attractiveness already helps students get into universities in the first place, by eliciting more favorable evaluations during college admissions interviews. This is consistent with the broader finding of a very well-established "halo" effect whereby attractive people are generally perceived as being more sociable, healthy, successful, honest, and talented. In fact, meta-analytic studies suggest that even children are assumed to be smarter, more honest, and driven, when they are deemed more attractive - and children make the same type of inferences when they evaluate more or less attractive adults.

Unsurprisingly, the beauty bias transfers into the workplace, with scientific studies showing that less attractive individuals are more likely to get fired, even though they are also less likely to be hired in the first place. For example, in an experimental study, researchers sent 11,000 CVs to various job openings, including identical CVs accompanied by candidate photographs of different levels of attractiveness. Attractive women and men were much more likely to get a call back for an interview than unattractive (or no-photograph) candidates were.

There is also a well-established association between attractiveness and long-term income, with above-average beauty translating into 10% to 15% higher salaries than below-average beauty. In the U.S., this beauty premium is similar to the one found for race or gender. Note that this effect is found even among highly successful individuals. For instance, attractiveness ratings of Fortune 500 executives predicted their companies' profits.

As the clichéd phrase notes, correlation does not mean causation, but let's not forget that correlations do have causes. One delicate issue is the possibility - supported by much evolutionary psychology research - that the cause of the correlation between beauty and career success is not (only) prejudice or bias, but (also) actual talent. In other words, could it be that, at least in part, attractive people do better in life because they actually possess more adaptive traits, such as intelligence or talent?

At times, this proposition is hard to test, not least because of the common absence of objective performance data that is not conflated with subjective preference. Consider that most peoples' performance is measured simply by a single subjective rating provided by their direct line manager or boss. If employers lack objective data to distill managers' bias and subjective preferences from their ratings of their employees' performance, how can they quantify an employees' exact contribution to the firm? It is for this very reason that attempts to use AI to measure attractiveness have exposed racial preferences around what is found more or less attractive in a given culture. If we teach AI to imitate human preferences, it will not just replicate, but also augment and exacerbate human biases.

Furthermore, at times it is hard to determine whether appearance should be treated as a bias factor or job-relevant trait: especially when employees' performance depends on the perceptions customers or clients have of them. As a Glassdoor report noted, "there are many industries and businesses that would suffer immeasurably if we were to legislate out beauty bias." In support of this idea, evolutionary scientists report positive correlations between attractiveness ratings on one hand, and scores on socially desirable personality traits, such as emotional stability, extraversion, and ambition on the other. For example, physical attractiveness - just like psychological attractiveness (EQ or likability) - contributes to better sales and fund-raising potential, so is it sensible to stop employers from hiring more attractive salespeople or fundraisers?

Perhaps, because the alternative is to discriminate against less attractive individuals, which will include people from minority groups who don't fit the dominant "beauty norms." But when employers simply pretend to ignore attractiveness, focusing on candidates' past performance or interview performance, and interpreting these data as objective or bias-free, there is no guarantee that less attractive candidates won't be handicapped. It is no different from pretending to ignore race or social class, while selecting on academic credentials, which are actually conflated with race and social class.

Clearly, then, there's an unfair advantage to being deemed more attractive, and an unfair handicap to being deemed less attractive. Although employers can mitigate this bias by eliminating appearance data from their hiring practices - by not only using AI, but also focusing on science-based assessments, past performance, and resume data - such measures will not be sufficient to eliminate bias, since they are also influenced by historical or past bias: if attractive people are evaluated more favorably in the past, they will show up as high performers in their CVs, etc. Still, that is no reason to avoid the issue or perpetuate the beauty bias at work.

Importantly, AI can be a powerful tool to detect and expose the degree of bias underlying human ratings of potential and performance. If programmed correctly, AI could become an objective way to measure what we don't always see ourselves. For example, if you're trying to lose weight, a scale can help keep you honest. If you're trying to exercise more, a fitness tracker can help monitor your progress. And, given the right inputs, AI can help us overcome our conscious and unconscious biases in hiring.

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Attractive People Get Unfair Advantages at Work. AI Can Help.

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One reason for the widespread interest in AI is that it has the potential to reduce the degree of bias underpinning human decisions. For example, meta-analytic studies have long highlighted the pervasive nature of bias in hiring and recruitment.

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Teen girls have more sports-related knee injuries

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Teen girls have more sports-related knee injuries

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Newsela | Instructional Content Platform

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Newsela is an Instructional Content Platform that supercharges reading engagement and learning in every subject.

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A big-name college drops legacy admissions; will others follow?

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A big-name college drops legacy admissions; will others follow?

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Newsela - A big-name college drops legacy admissions; will others follow?

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The pivot away from legacy admission is being lauded by those who say higher education needs to do more to promote fairness and gain the public’s trust.

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Nearly 70% of employees believe that appearance is the deciding factor in the hiring process

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Nearly 70% of employees believe that appearance is the deciding factor in the hiring process

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In defiance of all the noise, there's a nice healthy seethe of "iscims" still permeating the workforce. For the most part, these are both easy to identify and plainly addressed. What casual commentary calls "l ookicism" on the other hand, stands as an ethical outlier. For one thing, I'd have to imagine that even the most behavioral amongst us that find themselves in the favor of beauty biases face some difficulty honestly surveying it for what it is. The provisional casing that holds in all of our squishy meat staffs our impression of worth like no other. A compliment paid to the flesh has a lot of power irrespective of how it's articulated, irrespective of its cost. This evolutionary holdover sticks out like a sore appendix in a professional context, especially in 2019-a year that made an honest go at booting an age of meritocracy.

According to a new survey of about 1,000 working Americans, superficial discrimination thrives in the corporate ecosystem, despite our purported censure of it.

In the hands of the beholder

A little while back Ladders covered a massive academic paper that determined that, on balance, traditionally good looking people earn about 12% more annually than bag-heads in virtually every field. In psychology, an edge achieved by reason of a person's physical appearance is referred to as the " beauty premium." Economically, the phenomenon racks both sides of the velvet rope. For those on the outside, the setback is clear enough. For the privileged few, every stride forward is weighed down by a virulent asterisk; a copper halo. After a while, aptitude becomes lost in a sea of specious metrics.

The new study conducted by Univia, began with a poll of 997 employed adults. Five hundred and sixty-two of which identified as female, and 435 identified as male. The range of ages surveyed spanned from 18 to 74 years old with a median age of 37 and a standard deviation of 16. Atypically, the self-reporting nature that animated the new paper was more of an essential fiber as opposed to a limitation, given the authors quested to gauge workplace perceptions. After all, the sting of appearance prejudices survives on subtlety.

Two in three respondents believe that they should be judged by the quality of their performance though the vast majority (67%) believe that appearance carries much more weight during the hiring processes. Sixty-eight percent of employees are confident that looks even elevate one's chances of getting a raise and a promotion once already employed at a firm. Unsurprisingly, women were more likely to express appearance-based discrimination at work compared to me. The authors add, "The pressure to change appearance was rampant, as the majority - 65% - of employees had worn nicer work attire to fit into their workplace. Fifty-three percent also wore nicer shoes, and 48% got a haircut to accommodate workplace culture. But judgments and corresponding appearance changes got pickier than that: 39% had to choose a new hairstyle completely, 37% started to wear makeup, and 34% tried to improve the way their skin looked,"

It might surprise you to learn than men felt fractionally more pressure to lose weight to improve their economic standing at work compared to women (23% vs. 21 repetitively), but the rest of the data was consistent with conventional wisdom. Women were three times more likely to have difficulty finding suitable attire for work, in addition to fearing that clothes that made them feel comfortable would be viewed as unprofessional.

Many of the employees surveyed that admitted to being willfully influenced by the appearance of their colleagues defended the thought process by saying a person that is well put together is more likely to convey a sense of confidence and authority. Seventy-five percent of the survey pool felt this way in fact, with an additional three-fourths adding that a person's looks also affects their perceptions of an individual's degree of competency. This stands to reason considering age proved to be the most influential predictor of employee reception (60%). This was followed by weight (58%), tattoos (57%), piercings (52%) and gender (48%).

The authors conclude, "Professionalism with regard to workplace attire, however, may be a non-negotiable for certain offices, and perhaps rightfully so. And with data revealing that lengthy morning routines correspond with increased productivity, it might be worth taking a second look at how you choose to wake up and present yourself to the world. Are you choosing behaviors, clothing, and self-care practices that best prepare you for a successful day at work? No matter what you choose to wear, make sure to put your best face forward."

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Nearly 70% of employees believe that appearance is the deciding factor in the hiring process

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In defiance of all the noise, there's a nice healthy seethe of "iscims" still permeating the workforce. For the most part, these are both easy to identify and plainly addressed. What casual commentary calls "l ookicism" on the other hand, stands as an ethical outlier.

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Surf's up in California, where it's now the official sport

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Surf's up in California, where it's now the official sport

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Newsela | Surf's up in California, where it's now the official sport

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Though it began in Hawaii, a new law has made surfing California's official sport.

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Newsela | No more teachers? No more books? Video game will teach college course

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One for-profit college will let students take a business course that costs less in tuition because it uses a video game instead of a professor. The game grades students based on their scores.

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The cost to play school sports is rising and fewer students can afford it

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The cost to play school sports is rising and fewer students can afford it

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Newsela | The cost to play school sports is rising and fewer students can afford it

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School sports have always been a great way to stay in shape, make friends and learn to play on a team. But fewer families can afford the rising costs of fees for equipment and travel.

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Report: Where you attend college could cost more to borrow and refinance loans

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Report: Where you attend college could cost more to borrow and refinance loans

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Newsela | Report: Where you attend college could cost more to borrow and refinance loans

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Students attending two-year colleges, Hispanic-serving institutions, and historically black colleges and universities are being discriminated against when it comes to borrowing and refinancing of education loans.

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Specializing in one sport may hurt your young athlete

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Specializing in one sport may hurt your young athlete

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By Jessica Ennis, for UCHealth

Organized youth sports are becoming increasingly competitive and often very young athletes have begun to focus their energies on a single sport. Your young soccer star may have a true passion for the game, but there's no guarantee she'll end up the next Megan Rapinoe. And, she may be exposed to additional risks by specializing too early.

Dr. David Bubis, who practices at the UCHealth Primary Care - Lone Tree, sees many primary care sports medicine patients. He says he often has to explain to parents why it's important to expose children to a wide variety of sports throughout their youth.

"One of the things parents ask me is how will their kid get a college scholarship if they're not participating in or practicing one sport," Dr. Bubis says. "I tell them that there's a lot of different data to support that early sports specialization could be harmful and there's no evidence that it's beneficial in becoming an elite athlete."

The biggest concern with early specialization is the greater risk for overuse injuries, especially if your athlete hasn't gone through puberty, because their muscles and tendons are still developing.

Participating in multiple sports allows athletes to develop different neuromuscular patterns and increase their adaptive skills. Essentially by moving and falling differently when playing a variety of sports can be a preventative for injury in your chosen sport.

There's also mounting evidence showing kids who specialize too early often drop out of sports all together either due to burnout or because they feel isolated from friends who don't participate in their sport. According to the National Council of Youth Sports, 60 million kids 6-18 participate in some form of youth sports, with up to 70 percent discontinuing by age 13.

"There's so much pressure in sports culture these days, which has changed from the neighborhood practices or pick-up games to more organized sports," Dr. Bubis says. "Some youth leagues are starting with players as young as 7. Young kids should be focused on developing a lifelong love of sports, physical activity, and just having fun."

Deliberate practice just doesn't seem to transfer to becoming an elite athlete, especially before the age of 12. In fact, delaying specialization to late adolescence may help your athlete achieve their goals.

"We know you can reach elite status both ways - and there's lots of examples of that - but we also know by early specialization can lead to reduced physical health, reduced enjoyment and shorter sports careers."

Dr. Bubis offers the following tips to help your young athlete maintain a healthy balance and prevent sports injuries:

Be sure to limit the number of hours your child plays/practices each week to no greater than their age. Athletes who play more hours a week than their age, especially those under 16 years old, have a 30 percent increase in risk for injury, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Take one to two days off from sports each week and one month off sports at least three times a year. This allows for physical and psychological recovery.

Participating in a wide variety of sports - balls, racquets, swimming, biking -strengthens neurodevelopmental skills, helps develop leadership skills and improves self-esteem.

"Parents are the strongest influencers on if and when their child is going to start a sport, what type of sport, and how many sports they play. Coaches are the biggest influencers on training intensity and the decision to specialize," Dr. Bubis says. "Parents should be armed with the knowledge about what could put their kids at risk and make sure they're watching out for them."

To learn more about UCHealth or find a location or provider near you, visit uchealth.org/near-me.

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Specializing in one sport may hurt your young athlete

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By Jessica Ennis, for UCHealth Organized youth sports are becoming increasingly competitive and often very young athletes have begun to focus their energies on a single sport. Your young soccer star may have a true passion for the game, but there's no guarantee she'll end up the next Megan Rapinoe.

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College Varsity Esports Programs on The Rise: How Gaming is Changing College for Gamers

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College Varsity Esports Programs on The Rise: How Gaming is Changing College for Gamers

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You are here: Home / Video Game Design Education / College Varsity Esports Programs on The Rise: How Gaming is Changing College for Gamers

$493 million. That’s the perceived value of the global esports market in 2017. Some expect that number to triple over the next couple of years, reaching $1.5 billion by 2020.

But, with the help of advertisers and investors, that number is rising much faster.

In 2017, investors contributed $750 million, making up 50% of the worldwide market size.

Advertisers and sponsors contributed over $250 million. Those numbers put the end-of-2017 market valuation of esports at 1.5 billion dollars. End-of-year projections expect esports to be a $2.3 billion market in 2022.

That’s some serious growth…

And now, US colleges are jumping on board the global esports train:

Only seven colleges and universities had varsity esports programs in July of 2016. By 2018 there were 63 institutions.

The largest US organization is the National Association of Collegiate Esports (NACE), which formed in 2016. NACE is “a nonprofit membership association organized by and on behalf of our member institutions” (US colleges).

The NACE program describes a varsity esports program as “the principal teams representing a college or university. Primarily these teams compete against similar teams at peer educational institutions.”

Esports, of course, are video games played competitively. This can be anything from 5 v 5 teamwork-testers like League of Legends, to 1 v 1 strategy-dominant Hearthstone, to anything-can-happen PUBG, and beyond.

Why Are College Varsity Esports a Big Deal?

Future Implications?

Varsity Esports by The Numbers

20 Colleges with Varsity Esports Programs

Miami University (of Ohio)

Boise State University (Idaho)

Georgia Southern University (Georgia)

Georgia State University (Georgia)

University of California-Irvine (California)

University of Akron (Ohio)

University of Utah (Utah)

Western Kentucky University (Kentucky)

College of St. Joseph (Vermont)

Bellevue University (Nebraska)

Embry Riddle Aeronautical University (AZ)

DigiPen Institute of Technology (Washington)

Harrisburg University (Pennsylvania)

King University (Tennessee)

Texas Wesleyan University (Texas)

St. Ambrose University (Iowa)

University of South Carolina Sumter (SC)

Kansas Wesleyan University (Kansas)

University of Jamestown (North Dakota)

Morningside College (Iowa)

Infographic

Why Are College Varsity Esports a Big Deal?

The NACE website quotes an article in the June 22, 2015 issue of ESPN The Magazine, which said that 27 million people watched the 2014 championship tournament for League of Legends.

DOTA 2 pulled 20 million viewers in 2014.

Those are impressive numbers without context.

They’re even more impressive when you consider the viewership for other major sporting events that year: 5 million watched the National Hockey League’s Stanley Cup Finals. The World Series had 13.8 million. The NBA Finals had 15.5 million.

Clearly, professional esports is already a big deal.

The growing popularity of college varsity esports is not just great for the future of professional esports and gaming in general (and make no mistake, it’s growing: the NCAA is already considering their role in the sport).

College varsity esports is another avenue in which colleges can attract students, celebrate the diversity of interests on campus, and invest money to benefit more of their student body.

With esports, a little investing goes a long way.

Esports training facilities are more affordable than regular sports training facilities. And, with the right sponsors, some programs don’t have to worry about supplying the gaming chairs, or high-end computers, or other gear.

And an esports training facility doesn’t need a new, state-of-the-art million-dollar building. Many schools recommission old rooms that aren’t seeing much use. They gut it, spruce it up, and fill it with gaming gear.

Boom, there’s your varsity esports training facility.

When you think about the kind of money that’s dumped into sports (even state taxpayer money, for things like stadiums), it’s impressive to think that they’re getting outwatched by esports. Part of this could be the ease of viewing, since big tournaments, like the League of Legends Worlds, are free to watch and based online.

All you need is internet access. That’s significantly easier than, say, finding free MLB World Series coverage online (hint: barring free trials to service providers, a free option does not exist).

It’s accessible, it’s already popular, and now advertisers and sponsors are dumping hundreds of million dollars into it. If colleges continue to get on board with varsity programs (they show no signs of slowing down), this will be a “thing” in no time.

Future Implications?

While many in positions of power are slow to accept the place esports have in this world, everything is moving in the right direction.

The reason for the slow-to-adopt mindset probably rests in the stigma of playing video games: A lazy human’s pastime. A waste of time. Nerdy. Child’s entertainment. Just kids playing games.

The people in positions of power don’t all understand what esports really are. They don’t see the value in it, or they don’t care to see the value in it, likely because of some preconceived notions or some bad intel.

If you think about it, every college sport can be distilled to “kids playing games,” as Phil Alexander, a Miami University professor who teaches game design and co-directs the varsity esports team at Miami, said in an interview with Rolling Stone.

In his interview, Alexander says he’d “be shocked if we don’t see major collegiate varsity leagues by 2020.”

More colleges are joining every month, even with the $2500 registration fee instituted by NACE.

There’s another element that Alexander mentions which is really fascinating, which Brian Crecente captures well in his article: “[Alexander] sees the connection between pro players and college reversed from traditional sports. In esports…most pro-gamers’ careers end at 27 or 28 and then they want to go back to school.”

This, as Alexander goes on to point out, would mean collegiate varsity esports could be a viable end-of-career option for professional esports competitors. They could get post-career scholarships, still have a place in esports, and get the education they bypassed to go pro in games in the first place.

It seems like a real win-win.

The growth of esports has everyone excited: even cities are getting involved.

Arlington, Texas, for example, is building a $10 million stadium.

They’re talking about a 100,000-square-foot space that “will be the largest and most flexible esports stadium in the country.”

And this esports center isn’t even a new construction: they’re “transforming previously underutilized space of the Arling Convention Center,” which “showcases the adaptive re-use potential of esports. This innovative transformation of space is also comparatively inexpensive and more efficient than new construction. ”

If you’re wondering about the dynamics of varsity esports, or you’re interested in becoming a varsity player yourself, this next section is for you (Keep in mind that the list of colleges with varsity esports programs grows almost daily).

Varsity Esports by The Numbers

[View Full Infographic]

Here are 20 colleges with varsity esports programs:

Miami University (of Ohio)

Miami University of Ohio is a school in Division I athletics. They were the first top-tier US university to launch a varsity eSports program, and it’s worked out well for them: Their varsity Overwatch team took first place in the NACE Overwatch Tournament for the 2017 season.

The varsity esports program formed after their popular student-run eSports club started asking the university for an official varsity program (if you’re in a successful esports club at your college, but don’t have a varsity team in place, it never hurts to start asking for one!).

Boise State University (Idaho)

Boise State University is another Division I school (and, while the athletic division of a school doesn’t matter for esports – yet – it doesn’t hurt to have the support of D1 programs behind the movement).

Boise State University is part of NACE, through which they compete against other colleges in organized tournaments. The varsity program is open to both part and full-time students, undergraduates, and graduates alike.

BSU also participates in tournaments from other organizations like Collegiate Star League, TESPA, uLOL and more.

A list of their current games lineup includes Overwatch, Hearthstone, Rocket League, League of Legends, and Heroes of the Storm.

Georgia Southern University (Georgia)

The Georgia Southern University (Division I) Eagles took second place in the NACE Overwatch championship, losing a nailbiter to Miami University in the 2017 season.

Their official Southern Collegiate Gaming website describes what they do in the varsity esports program as:

“Empowering: We empower gamers mentally physically and spiritually in order to prepare them for the real world.’

“Equipping: We equip our gamers with high-performance resources and tools to ensure their success and victory.”

“Challenging: We challenge our gamers to always be better than the day before by creating a strong competitive atmosphere built around teamwork.”

They have teams for a number of games: Overwatch, Rocket League, Super Smash Bros., PUBG, League of Legends, Call of Duty, and CS: GO. They also have a number of 1st and 2nd place finishes in various collegiate tournaments.

Georgia State University (Georgia)

Georgia State University (Division I) joined the world of varsity esports in the 17-18 academic year. They’re part of both NACE and the GEL (which stands for Georgia Esports League).

Georgia State University holds members of the varsity team “to a high academic standard and [they] must maintain eligibility at levels required for a HOPE scholarship.”

Their first season games included:

Brawlhalla (in the Georgia Esports League)

League of Legends (in the NACE League)

Smite (in the NACE League)

The university uses Twitch to live stream their tournament and competition participation. Georgia State University “esports efforts include student participation in broadcasting, production, and marketing of esports and tournaments, coaching, student management, and game development.”

University of California-Irvine (California)

UCI (Division I) was “the first public university to create an official esports program and is regarded as one of the best and most comprehensive in the world.”

The program officially started in 2016. That same year, they opened the UCI eSports Arena and started offering scholarships to their League of Legends players.

UCI promotes four “pillars” in their esports program:

Competition: They “recruit the best gamers in the world to compete for [their] teams in the top collegiate leagues in North America. [They] offer scholarships to players for both League of Legends and Overwatch.”

Academics & Research: They’re big on games-related research. As an example, they point to a study that showed how memory could be improved by playing Minecraft (and other 3D immersive games).

Community: UCI has a bunch of gaming clubs, and the club teams get access to jerseys, the arena, and even some travel expenses.

Entertainment: UCI puts some focus on streaming and hosting, with their shoutcasting/streaming station in the arena. They also host local tournaments for both recreational and competitive players.

University of Akron (Ohio)

The University of Akron (another division I school) is launching its varsity esports program in the fall of 2018.

They want to assemble teams to compete in games like Overwatch, CS:GO, League of Legends, Rocket League, and Hearthstone.

They’re offering scholarships for varsity gamers while encouraging gamers at all skill levels to tryout.

The program is “also looking for students in engineering, computer science, communications, health and wellness, and other fields to help build our eSports arenas, broadcast games, design materials, and assist with training and nutrition. All are welcome!”

We’re wondering about the optimal diet for varsity esports players–what maximizes concentration and boosts dexterity through the roof?

University of Utah (Utah)

When the University of Utah (Division I) was asked: “why esports at a university?” The U responded with “the answer is actually quite simple, the University of Utah does not back away or back down from interesting things that are happening in the world that have a real impact on people.”

The University of Utah was the first power five school to have a varsity esports team.

They offer partial scholarships to varsity players. Students who want to be varsity gamers at the U “must be enrolled as full-time students…maintain a nominal GPA…progress 20% of degree with each season…” and they’re only “eligible for 4 seasons of play within 5 years from first full-time enrollment.”

Western Kentucky University (Kentucky)

WKU (Division I) was the second public university to start a varsity team back in the fall of 2016.

Now, though, their future is looking uncertain. Because of Kentucky’s budget cuts for higher education, and a recently imposed NACE membership fee of $2500, the WKU varsity esports team is struggling to stay in the game.

They only have two teams and participate in two games: League of Legends and Overwatch. The WKU team participated in the NACE Overwatch tournament for 2017.

College of St. Joseph (Vermont)

The College of St. Joseph was the first New England school to offer a varsity esports program.

The program just opened a “brand-new state-of-the-art eSports arena.” The room features a big ol’ viewing screen to the benefit of spectators, as well as for strategy review for varsity teams.

CSJ is currently recruiting students for teams to compete in Fortnite, Rocket League, League of Legends, and Hearthstone. The teams compete in local online tournaments, and also open their practices to spectators.

Bellevue University (Nebraska)

The Bellevue University Bruins esports program started in the fall of 2017.

They spared no expense on equipping their team with top tier equipment: “Alienware desktops with the best processors, the best graphics cards, extremely good gaming monitors; everything we really need to see our program succeed.”

Bellevue University offers scholarships to varsity players, which, according to their promotional video, has already made a difference in one student’s ability to afford an education there.

Right now, the Bruins focus on League of Legends. They have a designated training space, the “Bruin Bunker,” where players can hone their LoL skills.

Embry Riddle Aeronautical University (AZ)

The Embry Riddle Aeronautical University Gold Wings esports team participates in the Collegiate Star League.

The program focuses on League of Legends. One of the Gold Wings’ cherished assets is their coach, Derek ‘Lohpally’ Abrams, who “analyzes game footage, observes practice sessions, and focuses in on what each player–and the team as a whole–can do better.”

Abrams “has played and coached E-Sports at a professional level prior to coming to Embry-Riddle.”

The Gold Wings have three teams in total, their primary team which competes at the division one level, and two teams that recruit new players and compete at lower levels.

DigiPen Institute of Technology (Washington)

Though the information is elusive, multiple sources point to DigiPen being registered with NACE and having an esports team.

DigiPen Institute of Technology is very welcoming of gamers, offering not just a great game dev program, but also encouraging students at the institute to play student-made games, and facilitating clubs that encourage the playing of games in general.

It’s worth keeping an eye on DigiPen to see how their varsity esports plans develop and unfold.

Harrisburg University (Pennsylvania)

Harrisburg University only has one varsity sport: esports.

They’re registered with NACE and are kicking off their inaugural season in the fall of 2018. The director of their program is Chad Smeltz, who has extensive esports coaching experience. Their head coach is Jeff Wang, who is world-ranked as a gamer.

Harrisburg University is offering full athletic scholarships to 15 students who earn a spot on the team.

The preliminary game roster includes Overwatch, Hearthstone, and League of Legends.

King University (Tennessee)

King University announced its varsity esports team and NACE membership in 2018.

King University has a proud history of picking up the slack on underserved sports: cycling, tumbling, women’s wrestling, and, now, esports.

The program is planning to compete in two games in their first season: League of Legends and Overwatch. They’re recruiting now and plan to compete in the 2018-19 season/academic year.

The university also plans to offer scholarships to varsity esports players.

Texas Wesleyan University (Texas)

Texas Wesleyan University (a Division II athletics school, for those keeping the score at home), launched several varsity esports teams.

They’re planning to compete at a varsity level in Overwatch, League of Legends, and Hearthstone.

TXWES is offering $2,000 esports scholarships that are performance-based and game history-based. They’ll have up to 12 available for varsity players.

They’ve joined three big esports leagues: NACE (first college in Texas to do so), University League of Legends, and TESPA.

St. Ambrose University (Iowa)

The St. Ambrose University Fighting Bees are kicking off their foray in varsity esports in the fall of 2018.

Players will have the opportunity to earn talent-based scholarships for their gaming skills in Overwatch or League of Legends, the two games SAU is focusing on for now. They plan to join NACE once their program is up and running.

SAU is another school that champions underrepresented sports: men’s and women’s bowling, and men’s and women’s swimming and diving, for example.

The program is still looking for a head coach.

University of South Carolina Sumter (SC)

Even though the University of South Carolina Sumter’s official esports page doesn’t have much to go on, the USC Sumter esports team is alive and well.

The program entered its 3rd year in 2017 when it participated in the NACE Overwatch tournament. That makes USC Sumter one of the first schools to establish a varsity esports team. They offer scholarships to players, have a dedicated facility for practicing and for playing.

In 2017 there were 30 students in the program, with the number increasing each year. The program competes in Overwatch, Hearthstone, and League of Legends, but is looking to add more games to that list over the next couple years.

Kansas Wesleyan University (Kansas)

The Kansas Wesleyan University Coyotes have been on the varsity esports scene since 2015. They compete in the Collegiate Star League via League of Legends.

The program also participates in Hearthstone, Rocket League, and Overwatch, and competed in the NACE Overwatch tournament in 2017. Smash Bros will be joining that list before long (if it hasn’t already).

University of Jamestown (North Dakota)

The University of Jamestown kicked off its varsity esports program in the fall of 2017. All competitions are broadcast through the UJ twitch channel.

The school is looking to fill an ambitious 25 person roster and offering up to $2000 in scholarships per varsity player. They’ve been actively recruiting from high school leagues around the country.

They participated in the NACE Overwatch tournament in the 2017 season.

Morningside College (Iowa)

The Morningside College varsity esports program kicked off with two games, Overwatch and League of Legends. They continue to entice players with up to $5,000 per year in scholarships based on talent.

The Mustangs made it to the quarterfinals in the NACE Overwatch tournament in 2017. They finished 3-3 in their first season of League of Legends, and 4-3 in Overwatch.

The program is looking to add more games to the list, including Rocket League, CS/:GO, and Heroes of the Storm.

Infographic

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20 Colleges With Varsity eSports Programs

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College sports aren’t just football, hockey, basketball, and baseball. Check out these 20 colleges that have varsity eSports programs

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American colleges and universities are failing in one of their most basic missions: to equip students with the tools they need for a career. Many students graduate ill-prepared to earn a living and pay off the debt they’ve accumulated getting their degrees—40% of those who start college don’t finish within six years. Additionally, students are often subject to indoctrination into socialist ideology. They face hostility toward opinions that don’t conform to the predominantly leftist thinking on campus.

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Should Video Games be Considered a Sport? 

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Should Video Games be Considered a Sport? 

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Quick, what are the first few things that come to mind when you hear the word "sport?"

Competition, wins, and losses

Athletic ability

Physical activity

Fans and entertainment; stadiums, fields, and arenas

Practice and dedication

College scholarships

Going a step further, you probably think of baseball, basketball, football, and the like. Some of you might say NASCAR and other forms of racing. Others might even debate things like poker and hot dog eating.

I mean, all of these things are covered by ESPN, right? It's only the biggest sports television and entertainment company in the world.

So, then, what about playing video games? Should holding a controller in your hand and hitting buttons on that controller to direct the movement of virtual characters on your TV, computer monitor, or mobile device be considered sport?

(Oh, and an important piece to note. I'm a huge baseball fan, playing it and basketball for most of my life through high school. If you would have asked me back then if video games were sports, I would have laughed heartily. Today, I'm a changed person, and the absolute skyrocketing surge of popularity in video games and eSports has helped drive such a shift in mindset.)

Should video games be considered a sport?

Yes, video games should be considered a sport. Rooted in competition, involving athletic ability, requiring practice and physical activity, taking place in stadiums, and cheered on by diehard fanatics, video games and the playing of them checks all of the required boxes.

Let's start by throwing the idea against some of those definitive words conjured up when thinking about the meaning of "sport"-competition, entertainment, athletic ability.

When you pit video games against those terms, take a look at how they match up.

1. Competition, wins, and losses

I'd consider this one of the easiest points to prove. The basic tenet of any sport is competition. A team or individual competes against another team or individual in hopes of achieving victory.

Competition is all around us...I mean, even Monopoly is competitive (to the point of turning friends into enemies and family members against each other!).

So, it's not a stretch at all to say video games are competitive. With any type of video game - but especially those with players going head to head with another player - you're going to have competition. Even if you're alone and playing a campaign against simulated competition in the form of a computer, you're still very much competing, right?

2. Athletic ability

What makes athletes like Deion Sanders and Bo Jackson so special? Both played professional football and baseball, and were quite good at both.

My point is, there are great athletes all around us. But, a large percentage of those athletes are only good at the sport in which they've found professional success. Put a professional basketball player on a baseball diamond and hilarity will probably ensue.

Then, when you consider the fact that each sport - and each position within a sport, even - requires a specific athletic ability, who is to say video game playing can't just be another set of a different type of athletic skill?

A quarterback has a tremendously different skill set than a wide receiver. Same goes for the skill of a pitcher in baseball versus that of a shortstop.

What athletic ability does a video game player have?

While playing video games doesn't require as many abilities as other sports, it does share a big one-coordination. Just like you need coordination to catch a 90 MPH baseball in a glove, or hit one with a bat, video game players need coordination to strike at the perfect time, synching the technique they use on their controller with whatever their eyes see unfolding in front of them.

Video gaming also shares another big ability with traditional sports-stamina. Quite frequently, head to head video game battles are a true test of a gamer simply trying to outlast their opponent. First one to blink (aka, get tired, worn down, etc.), loses.

And last, but certainly not least, what about responsiveness? It's an ability required of pretty much any fast-moving athlete, especially someone like a hockey goaltender. Successful video game players must also be able to quickly respond to a game's changing landscape, whether it's to counter a thrown punch from an opponent, or even getting their on-screen athlete in their favorite sports game to dodge a tackle or dribble past the other team.

Point being, an NFL lineman is considered an athlete thanks to their strength in blocking and tackling, but those abilities vary greatly from the speed and agility required of a running back.

While video game players must harness a very different type of athletic ability, it's an athletic ability nonetheless.

3. Physical activity

Many who don't consider video games to be sport probably haven't really endured a marathon gaming session. Their video game experiences have probably consisted of couches or lounge chairs and a game here or there when they're bored.

But for professional gamers, physical activity and the resulting strain is real. There is rapid button pushing and continuous joystick shifting. Is it as physically taxing as running up and down the soccer pitch for 90 minutes? Of course not. It's a shorter burst of activity, and contained to a much smaller space or "playing field," but again, it's physical activity nonetheless.

4. Fans and entertainment; Stadiums, fields, and arenas

In what is typically a scene reserved for something like a Golden State Warriors basketball game, it's common to have arenas packed to the gills, full of fans who are attending to show their support of their favorite gamers.

In fact, more than 173,000 attendees gathered to watch the 2017 World Championship held in Katowice, Poland...which was 100,000 more than the group that was in attendance for the Super Bowl that same year.

Then, consider the viewing audience at home-for the event referenced above, 46 million unique online viewers were looking on. It's also been said that on average, young gamers ages 18-25 spend 3 hours and 25 minutes online watching others play video games.

Think about that. What do you do during the week for nearly 3.5 hours? You probably watch a few hour-long TV shows, right? Or maybe you spend around 45 minutes each night reading before bed?

Last year in total, esports tournaments and live streams drew 258 million unique visitors.

5. Practice, dedication, and training

I've played video games. You've played video games. Because of that, it's hard to think that the activity we were taking part in was in fact sport. I mean, we've probably done so in our pajamas, on the couch, etc.

The key is that there are multiple levels of an activity in which one can engage; different tiers of skill and proficiency, and the level you and I were engaging in would probably be considered the lowest of levels.

I mean, you wouldn't draw one single picture and call yourself an artist, or sing one song and consider yourself a vocalist.

To become a professional gamer, one must practice and dedicate time, daily even, to their craft. The more skilled one becomes, the more like sports video games become.

And training doesn't mean simply playing more games; there is plenty of that, sure, but there is a lot more that goes into it. In fact, many eSports athletes endure physical and strength training to avoid common eSports injuries like carpal tunnel syndrome or tennis elbow. And of course training to improve coordination and the aforementioned responsiveness.

Proper nutrition and hydration must also be top of mind. Just as a cramp would be disastrous to any athlete mid-stride, a gamer with a cramped hand is basically useless.

6. College scholarships

You might have smirked and chuckled the first time you heard of a university fielding a competitive eSports team. I know I did.

But, that "can you believe that" attitude was quickly erased upon learning that not only are post-secondary institutions fielding teams, but they are awarding scholarships to fill those teams. It's one of the key eSports benefits.

In fact, there are 81 schools making up the National Association of Collegiate Esports (NACE), and all but two offer scholarships.

If asked to associate sports memories with major colleges, you might recall a pretty good University of Oklahoma football team and Heisman Trophy winner, Kyler Murray, this past season, or Boise State's epic 2007 Fiesta Bowl victory featuring a now famous Statue of Liberty play to seal the win.

There is also plenty of sports history from schools like New Mexico State, which has made the NCAA tournament in five of the last six years, and Wichita State, which is the college baseball's highest winning team for the past 31 seasons.

Well, believe it or not, these schools and other high-profile institutions also field eSports teams. And, based on industry growth and the staggering viewership numbers mentioned above, they could very well be writing college sports history books of their own.

So, is there still a question?

I know what you're thinking...if video games are considered sport, then what about mastering chess strategy or playing other similar games? Simply, chess fails against two of the 5 points above-athletic ability and physical activity (it's much more mental than anything, and the resulting "physical activity" is not a factor in the outcome of the match).

So, are video games a sport? Yes. Is it the only sport you can play while simultaneously devouring a pepperoni pizza? Perhaps. Although, I've been stuck in my fair share of baseball diamond outfields where a quick nap probably would have gone unnoticed.

Either way, the narrative is changing. For those of us who engage with video games as a hobby, they're fun and low key. For the highly-trained gamers and millions of viewers tuning in to watch, they're a true sport.

Have a child who wants to engage with video games in a different way, as a designer, creator, or developer? Check out our video game online courses and summer programs featuring eSports summer camps, and other STEM courses!

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Should Video Games be Considered a Sport? | eSports & Virtual Gaming

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Quick, what are the first few things that come to mind when you hear the word "sport?" Competition, wins, and losses Athletic ability Physical activity Fans and entertainment; stadiums, fields, and arenas Practice and dedication College scholarships Going a step further, you probably think of baseball, basketball, football, and the like.

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History of College Education - ProCon.org

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History of College Education - ProCon.org

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The American debate over whether a college education is worth it began when the colonists arrived from Europe and founded "New College" (later renamed Harvard University) in 1636. Today, there are around 20 million college students in the United States, and over 44 million borrowers owe a collective $1.5 trillion in total student debt.

People who argue that college is worth it contend that college graduates have higher employment rates, bigger salaries, and more work benefits than high school graduates. They say college graduates also have better interpersonal skills, live longer, have healthier children, and have proven their ability to achieve a major milestone.

People who argue that college is not worth it contend that the debt from college loans is too high and delays graduates from saving for retirement, buying a house, or getting married. They say many successful people never graduated from college and that many jobs, especially trades jobs, do not require college degrees.
College in America, 1600s - 1800s
Colonial America produced nine colleges that still operate: Harvard University (1636), the College of William & Mary (1693), Yale University (1701), Princeton University (1746), Columbia University (1754), Brown University (1764), Dartmouth College (1769), Rutgers University (1766), and the University of Pennsylvania (1740 or 1749). These universities were funded by the colony or England and usually catered to a specific religious denomination such as Congregational or Presbyterian (Puritan). Primary and secondary school systems were not yet established so "college students" were sometimes boys as young as fourteen or fifteen years old and were admitted to receive preparatory education with the assumption that they would matriculate to college-level courses.

Colonial colleges were mainly founded and attended by wealthy Puritans, and followed the models of British and Scottish universities, which focused on general education and moral character. The goal of the college was to produce Christian gentlemen who would inherit family businesses, remain within the Congregational or Presbyterian (Puritan) faith, and be responsible leaders in the new world. Colonial college tuition costs and the loss of an able-bodied man from the family farm or business made the prestige and social status conferred by college unattainable for most families. About 1% of white males aged 18-21 attended college and students frequently left college after their first or second year, with no "dropout" stigma. Out of 35 students, Yale conferred nine bachelor's degrees by 1711.Colonial colleges excluded women but sometimes had " Indian schools," to spread Puritanism in Native American communities for religious indoctrination purposes. The American Revolution (1775-1783) drained colleges of students who became soldiers and buildings that became barracks and of the funds from England resulting in the closing of many colleges postwar.

The late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries created a college-building boom, increasing the number of schools from 25 colleges in 1800 to 241 colleges in 1860; increasing the variety of schools to include seminaries, scientific schools, military service academies, and teaching schools; and increasing the programs of study to include medicine, law, military science, and agriculture. State universities came into prominence beginning with the University of North Carolina (1795) and the University of Georgia (1801). In the spring of 1833, Oberlin Collegiate Institute (now Oberlin College) admitted women to a "Ladies Course" program and in 1837 admitted four women to the baccalaureate program, three of whom graduated in 1841 with degrees.

The 1862 Morrill Land Grant Act gave federally controlled land to states to open "land grant" colleges, which were required to focus on "useful arts" like agriculture, mechanics, mining, and military instruction and thus often included "A&M" (Agricultural & Mechanical) in the names. The idea of a "useful" education also created schools like the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1851. Many craftsmen who relied upon apprenticeships were skeptical of college training and distrusted scholars and scientists. A college degree was still seen by many as a social marker rather than a marker of educational attainment.

By 1865 most Southern colleges ceased offering classes because the American Civil War caused significant physical damage to many colleges while others were made into hospitals and shelters for soldiers and many Southern students and faculty left college for the Confederate Army. In 1870, the number of colleges was 560 (up from just 9 colleges at the American Revolution).
College in the Early 1900s
The early 1900s saw institutions created to educate groups excluded by traditional colleges: women, blacks, immigrants, and Roman Catholics. Black colleges remained restricted to grade-school and agricultural- or industrial-focused instruction with little college-level education offered. Iowa State University was the first co-ed land grant college, though women remained segregated and were expected to study "domestic science" or similar topics. Colleges were built in the South to keep Southern sons "far from the dangerous notions circulating at a Harvard or a Yale," with high tuitions and a code of honor that included duels amongst students. "Hilltop colleges" in New England opened to cater to older working students training to be teachers or ministers. Colleges built on the emerging western frontier had small populations to support them and there were often less than a few hundred students who could attend the college. "Diploma mills" also popped up during this time, especially the "medical college," which frequently had no campus or faculty but would confer degrees in exchange for donations.

The goal of college attendance still was not completion of a bachelor's degree. Some students took two years of courses in order to earn an LI (license of instruction) certificate to teach public school but many did not complete the degree because, as explained by Roger L. Geiger, Distinguished Professor of Education at Pennsylvania State University, "there was nothing to be done with a bachelor'' degree that could not also be done without one."

World War I dropped enrollments on the east coast by 27-40% but only 10% of Stanford men left college for the war. In total, 540 colleges were made into training campuses for the Students' Army Training Corps to train 125,000 men. Around this time the American Medical Association began lobbying for medical schools to require some college science (if not a completed college degree) for admission into medical schools, law schools followed Harvard Law School's example to require baccalaureate degrees for admission, and seminaries were requiring at least a year of college.
US Colleges, WWII through the 1980s
After World War II colleges and universities moved toward advanced, selective programs and expanded the base of students admitted. Research universities, junior colleges (now called community colleges), and for-profit institutions thrived.

In the 1939-1940 school year, student enrollment was under 1.5 million nationally, but, by the 1949-1950 school year, student enrollment grew to 2.7 million. The 1944 GI Bill contributed to some of the enrollment gains and by the beginning of the 1945-1946 school year, 88,000 veterans were accepted into the program; by 1946, over one million were accepted; and by 1950, 14 million veterans were in the program. Women represented about 40% of enrollment in the 1939-1940 school year but that number dropped to 32% in 1950. Individual schools implemented honor programs, specialty seminars, study abroad, and smaller class sizes to attract more discerning students By 1960, national enrollment was at 3.6 million and at 7.9 million in 1970. Society became interested in the college lives of "Joe College" and "Betty Coed" and created the college ideal of graduating in four years, marrying the college sweetheart, and finding a good job.

The federal government created the Higher Education General Information Survey (HEGIS), later renamed the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), and collected data in the fall of 1968, the first time standardized data was collected about colleges and universities nationwide.

Transfer students were accommodated, classes were offered at military bases, and courses were offered at extension sites for non-traditional students while colleges were opening to diverse student populations. Title IX (1972) and affirmative action demanded inclusive admission practices for women and black students.
College Enrollment, Costs, and Purposes from 1990s to Present
The 1990s and 2000s saw a rise in enrollment and tuition costs, and a steadily lower unemployment rate for college graduates. College enrollment increased 11% between 1990 and 2000 and increased 37% from 2000 to 2010 to 21 million students. The average college tuition in the 1990-1991 school year was $10,620 and rose to $13,393 in 2000-2001. Between the 2000-2001 school year and the 2010-2011 school year, public college costs (tuition, room, and board) increased 42% to $18,133. The unemployment rate for workers with a bachelor's degree or higher in 1990 was 6.5% (compared to 24.9% for high school drop outs) and was 3.7% in 2000 (compared to 18.4% for high school drop outs). By 2010, the unemployment rate for college graduates increased to 5.5% while the rate for college dropouts was 17.3%

A 2011 Pew Research survey showed 50% of college presidents said college is meant to "mature and grow intellectually," while 48% said college should "provide skills, knowledge and training to help... [students] succeed in the working world."

According to the US Census Bureau, 33.4% of the adult US population had a bachelor's degree or higher as of Mar. 30, 2017 (up from 28% in 2006), with 20.8% holding bachelor's degrees, 9.3% with associates degrees, 1.5% with professional degrees, and 1.9% with doctorates. In 1940, when the US Census Bureau began collecting education data, only 4.6% of adults held bachelor's degrees.
College Education amid COVID-19
As a lot of colleges went online or to a hybrid online and in-person model during the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic, colleges overall saw a significant fall 2020 enrollment drop. Undergraduate enrollment fell 3.6% (about 560,000 students) from fall 2019. Community colleges were hit especially hard, with a drop of more than 10% (more than 544,000 students).

Doug Shapiro, PhD, Executive Research Director at the National Student Clearinghouse called the drops "completely unprecedented."

75% of households with at least one member attending college classes in fall 2020 changed higher education plans during the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic. Most often households took classes in a different format (39%), or canceled plans altogether (37%), according to Anthony P. Carnevale, PhD, Director and Research Professor, and Megan L. Fasules, PhD, Assistant Research Professor and Research Economist, both at the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce.

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History of College Education - ProCon.org

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The American debate over whether a college education is worth it began when the colonists arrived from Europe and founded "New College" (later renamed Harvard University) in 1636. Today, there are around 20 million college students in the United States, and over 44 million borrowers owe a collective $1.5 trillion in total student debt.

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Maine high school raises money to buy sport hijabs for its Muslim students

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Maine high school raises money to buy sport hijabs for its Muslim students

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Newsela | Maine high school raises money to buy sport hijabs for its Muslim students

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Video gaming has pro teams, star players, and millions of fans. Should it be considered a sport?

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History of Student Loans: The Free Tuition Movement

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History of Student Loans: The Free Tuition Movement

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There is near-universal alarm over the student debt crisis. The $1.56 trillion in loan debt owed by students at the end of 2018 will continue to grow as college costs continue to climb.

In response, a growing contingent has begun calling for free college tuition. The movement saw a substantial jump in support, particularly on the political left, after both Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton endorsed versions of a free-tuition plan during the 2016 presidential race. Sen. Sanders was particularly vocal in citing the fact that free tuition is not unprecedented in the United States or abroad.

He wasn't wrong, but the story of free tuition in the United States, at least, is a little more complicated than that. While some institutions were free or low cost in the past, there was never a national mandate. And, as critics of the free-tuition movement have charged, European countries that offered free tuition have encountered complications. Nonetheless, the movement persists and an increasing array of state programs offers some version of free tuition to in-state students.

Was Tuition Free in the Past?

Institutions of higher learning founded in the early days of the American experiment were sometimes tuition free, though they did charge for room and board. Subjects of study were usually limited to education and religion, however, and enrollment was relatively low.

There were early rumbles of a more wide-reaching tuition-free policy. In his 1778 " Bill for the More General Diffusion of Knowledge," Thomas Jefferson proposed not only free primary and secondary school education, but also free advanced education for high-performing students. However, that version of the bill failed to garner sufficient support.

Education reformer Horace Mann took up the campaign for tax-funded primary school education following his 1837 appointment as secretary of the Massachusetts Board of Education as part of what was known at the Common School Movement. While this did eventually lead to subsidized primary schools by the latter part of the 19th century, Mann's subsequent calls for state-funded universities did not gain much traction.

Some progress was made with the passage of the Morrill Act in 1862 under President Abraham Lincoln. This act instituted a system of what were called land grant colleges, most of which were low cost and some of which did offer free tuition.

Free Tuition at the State Level

Some states did attempt to realize free tuition at the university level, with varying levels of success.

The Indiana constitution of 1816 called for "... a general system of education, ascending in a regular gradation, from township schools to a state university, wherein tuition shall be gratis, and equally open to all." However, this was never realized at the university level and a later iteration of the constitution signed in 1851 omitted that line.

More successful were Florida, California, and Arizona.

Florida required that a certain number of students be admitted each year to its state institutions free of tuition under an 1869 law. Some seminaries and normal schools were also free of tuition. Following the 1905 consolidation of the state university system under the Buckman Act, no tuition was charged to state residents enrolled at the University of Florida or the Florida State College for Women.

The 1868 Organic Act in California stipulated "...that as soon as the income of the University shall permit, admission and tuition shall be free to all residents of the State." By 1921, a $25 incidental fee was charged. At its founding in 1891, the privately endowed Stanford University charged no tuition, a policy that persisted until 1920. Community colleges remained free until 1984-85, when fees per credit were first assessed.

The 1910 constitution of Arizona stated that education at state universities should "...be as nearly free as possible." A 1935 state Supreme Court case allowed for the assessment of fees. Though in 2003 the Supreme Court declined to address rising tuition costs, tuition in Arizona has remained relatively low.

By the 1970s, both Florida and California had begun charging tuition to in-state students.

In a notable example of a local free-tuition system, for much of its history the City University of New York did not charge students - though, for a period, only students with a certain GPA could avail themselves of the program. Free tuition at CUNY came to an end in 1976.
Increases in Tuition
The 1944 Servicemen's Readjustment Act, also called the G.I. Bill, allocated funds to pay for the education of returning servicemen. That bill, along with the National Defense Education Act of 1958, which sought to recruit greater numbers of students in the sciences and mathematics in order to compete with Russia, helped to facilitate massive increases in college enrollment.

Those numbers continued to climb in the 1960s, though by the 1970s had slowed (see page 66). Nonetheless, enrollment rates continued to rise incrementally until around 2011, which saw the beginning of a decline. Increasing enrollment rates were paralleled by commensurate increases in tuition, which had been on the rise since the Great Depression, during which schools struggled to find funds.

In the past 50 years, average tuition rates have nearly tripled.

The Contemporary Free-Tuition Movement

Observers of the dual tuition and debt crises have not been idle. In 2013, the Campaign for Free College Tuition (CFCT) was founded to advocate for free tuition nationwide.

The recent groundswell of support for the free-tuition movement has been traced to the America's College Promise proposal issued by President Barack Obama in January 2015. The proposal called for two free years of community college nationwide, expanding on the American Opportunity Tax Credit which was enacted by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. These sentiments were echoed in an April 2015 resolution introduced by Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren and other Democrats who called for debt-free education at public institutions.

The Million Student March in November 2015 included the issue in its platform.

The cry was taken up during the 2016 presidential election by first Bernie Sanders and then an initially hesitant Hillary Clinton. Sanders believed that free tuition for all could be financed by a Wall Street financial transaction tax. Clinton, who adjusted her debt-free tuition stance after Sanders dropped out, aimed to eliminate tuition at public universities for students coming from families that made under $125,000 by 2021 by reducing tax deductions for wealthy citizens.

Sanders pointed to the fact that many other countries do indeed offer free tuition. As of 2016, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Norway, Poland, the Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Sweden, and Turkey didn't charge tuition at public universities. Germany also dropped tuition charges in late 2014 after massive protests. Currently, two dozen countries offer some form of free college tuition.

Following the election of President Donald Trump and a Republican Congress, it was thought that free tuition was unlikely to progress. Sanders nonetheless introduced a version of the College for All Act in 2017.

The Campaign for Free College Tuition estimated that some two-thirds of Americans supported the notion.
State and Local Efforts
Ambitious national efforts aside, there have been some notable strides in pushing the free-tuition agenda on the state level, starting as early as 1990.

That year, Indiana rolled out its 21st Century Scholars Program, which sought to encourage college education starting in middle school by providing resources and ultimately, free in-state tuition to students falling in a certain income bracket.

The Kalamazoo Promise program inaugurated in 2005 took a unique approach to the issue. Private donors funded a program wherein all students attending the Kalamazoo Public School System would have their tuition paid for if they attended a public university in Michigan. The program was funded in perpetuity. In addition to the obvious benefits to students, the program was credited with bringing residents and businesses to the city.

The program inspired a range of other College Promise programs across the country. There are now more than 400 nationwide. The programs vary in their extent, with some only funding community college and others providing a full four years of college tuition. Some are need-based and some are merit-based. And the some require all other forms of aid to be used first (last dollar), while others don't (first dollar). Since 2014, some 36 states have considered various forms of the program.

Notable initiatives include:

The Tennessee Promise program, initiated in 2014, is a last-dollar program that allows students to attend in-state community and technology colleges tuition-free.

The Arkansas Future Grant program, initiated in 2016, funds two-year community college education for students in STEM fields provided that they agree to work in-state for three years following graduation. If they don't, the grant reverts to a loan.

The Oregon Promise program, initiated in 2016, is a last-dollar program that funds two years of in-state community college for students who meet income and GPA requirements.

The Excelsior Scholarship in New York state, initiated in 2017, is a last-dollar program that allows students to attend any public two- or four-year institution free of tuition. It was the first state to provide free tuition at public four-year colleges in addition to public two-year colleges. Students must work in-state for the number of years for which they received funding or the scholarship reverts to a loan.

Local programs have gained traction as well. California alone has 43 College Promise programs in various cities. Other major cities that have adopted College Promise programs include Pittsburgh (2007), Seattle (2013), Chicago (2014), Boston (2016), San Diego (2016), and Dallas (2018).
Pushback and Criticism
While free-tuition programs have generally met with bipartisan support, there have been some dissenters who point to flaws in the system.

Critics note, for one, that students frequently don't finish their degrees within the stipulated time periods, leaving them to fund their own education after the two or four year terms are up, or to drop out. Even those who do finish in time are still saddled with room and board and incidental costs. Free tuition also doesn't include free textbooks. Adult learners are excluded from many programs.

Skeptics also cite statistics from European countries with free tuition that indicate lower rates of graduation than in countries that require students to pay - the so-called "sunk-cost" effect.

They also point out that many students who fall below a certain income level already have their tuition waived or otherwise subsidized at most public institutions. Thus, low-income students do not receive much additional benefit beyond increased enrollment. Most of the financial benefit is realized by middle-income students.

Others worry that funding won't be able to keep up with demand, citing the example of the United Kingdom. Until 1998, tuition was free in the UK, but increasing college enrollment put unsustainable strain on the university system and the government ultimately had to cap enrollment.

Nonetheless, momentum continues to gather for the free-tuition movement and while national efforts may be temporarily stalled, it is reasonable to expect significant expansions on the state and local levels. Free tuition is a powerful marketing message.

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History of Student Loans: The Free Tuition Movement

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The free-tuition movement in the United States finds its roots in the Morrill Act of 1862, which instituted a system of low-cost land grant colleges. Although there was never a national mandate, the contemporary free-tuition movement has found some success at the state level and hundreds of College Promise programs have proliferated at the city level.

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For centuries, dress codes have been used to maintain specific social roles and hierarchies. But fashion and style have also traditionally served another purpose: to express new ideals of individual liberty, rationality and equality, according to new research by Stanford legal scholar Richard Thompson Ford.

Go to the web site to view the video.

Civil rights activists in 1960s America wore their "Sunday Best" at protests to demonstrate they were worthy of dignity and respect as they challenged the institutions that kept Black people at the bottom of the social hierarchy. Centuries earlier, during the Age of Enlightenment in Europe, a pared-down business suit symbolized a departure from the status-based opulence of previous aristocratic regimes. Wearing the same clothes as everyone else, regardless of one's social status, was a way of espousing the period's new values, such as sensibility, rationality and even equality, said Ford.

These are just two of the many examples Ford has chronicled in his new book, Dress Code: How the Laws of Fashion Made History (Simon & Schuster, 2021), in which he argues that people have used dress codes to assert political control and social hierarchies throughout history. Sartorial style can also be wielded to challenge those norms and offer new political ideals in their stead. For example, the Black Panther movement rejected the "Sunday Best" that their civil rights predecessors wore to establish a new kind of resistance.

"It's worth noting that the Black Panthers had a Minister of Culture, so they saw very clearly the importance of aesthetics in changing politics," Ford said. "That developed into the 'Black is beautiful movement' which focused quite explicitly on the political dimensions of racial aesthetics and changed dominant norms of beauty in order to incorporate and reflect the norms of the black community."

Here, Ford talks about some of this research with Stanford News Service. Ford is the George E. Osborne Professor of Law at Stanford Law School.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
In your research, you argue that running parallel to a history of fashion is a history of liberal individualism. Can you explain that further?
In the modern sense, fashion involves clothing that is highly expressive; it can be a sign of individual personality. This kind of clothing emerged around the same time as the ideal of individualism began to emerge in the late Middle Ages and early Renaissance. Clothing reflected new social and political ideals: the importance of the individual as opposed to the group-based statuses of aristocratic class and religious affinity. Fashion in this sense developed alongside other changes in the arts, philosophy and science: literature began to focus on individual psychology more than grand classical epics, prefiguring the transformation from epic to the novel. Philosophy and science put humans at the center of the cosmos, displacing a religious sensibility that subordinated human and earthly concerns to the divine and supernatural. Portraiture became expressive of individual personality. These changes in aesthetic sensibility eventually became part of liberal political ideology, that put the individual before the monarch or the church.

Fashion not only reflected these changes - it also may have helped to shape them by conditioning people to think of themselves first and foremost as unique individuals. In a sense, fashion lets people not only express their individuality but also experience it on their bodies.
Can you offer an example of how fashion reveals the politics of an era?
One example is the development of the business suit. As late as the early 1700s, the typical clothing for someone of high status in most of European society was opulent and adorned with things like brocade and jewels - this was true for men and women. This type of clothing signified status and aristocratic rank and a high place in society.

But as early as in the 17th century, things were beginning to change. In England, this involved the execution of King Charles I, who styled himself as an absolute monarch, and the rise of the Commonwealth. After the Commonwealth ended, the monarchy was restored but the old absolutist ambitions of the monarch didn't come back. Instead, what emerged was a new kind of aristocracy in which the aristocrats - the people with a high place in society - dressed in a more toned down, subtle and utilitarian fashion.

There was a transformation during this period, which the psychologist John Carl Flügel later described as "the great masculine renunciation." This was a renunciation of all of the opulence, jewels and brocade that defined the showy clothing of the past era. A new, pared-down aesthetic became the beginnings of the business suit which over time became a symbol of liberal individualism. At the time, people made the connection between the sparer, toned down suit and the ideals of human rights.

Another thing that the business suit accomplished was it created a kind of egalitarian uniform in which people of a variety of social statuses wore, more or less, the same clothing - this was new. Now, everyone from the most powerful heads of state to bank clerks wear business suits. That social leveling of attire symbolized and went along with - and even inspired and helped people to act out - the political ideal of formal equality before the law.
So that was for men. What about for women?
The story for women is longer and more complicated. During the same period [that saw the evolution of the business suit], menswear and womenswear diverged. As menswear got more streamlined with fewer extravagant details, womenswear got more opulent. In a sense, women almost compensated for the lack of opulent display by getting more of that for themselves. One might even say that men still engaged in opulent fashion vicariously through women.

Womenswear doesn't participate in an evolution toward egalitarian norms until much, much later. And indeed, one of the stories I tell in the book is the way that this emergence of liberal egalitarianism goes hand in hand, and in some ways, deepens gender hierarchies, that in terms of clothing and attire, lasted well into the 20th century.

To give one example, while European men abandoned draped attire, which was the attire (characteristic of the ancient world) in the 14th and 15th centuries, women remained draped below the waist until the early 20th century. In the early 1900s, a woman wearing trousers might be subject to arrest for public indecency. For a long time in history, adventurous women would mimic parts of masculine style to express or assert their right to enjoy masculine prerogatives, whether it was masculine freedoms or masculine assertion of power. So, a woman wearing some element of menswear was a provocation and adopted by women on the avant-garde.
How is fashion intertwined with activism?
Fashion has played an important role in social activism for centuries. Sometimes that role has been as explicit: a social activist fighting against the power structure. Other times, it is more subtle. In the late Middle Ages and early Renaissance people resisted what were called "sumptuary laws," which were designed to assign people in society a particular type of clothing that would express their social status.

They did so not so much as a direct political challenge to the power structure, but certainly as an indirect one. When a wealthy merchant or tradesperson adopted high-status attire, they weren't necessarily trying to usurp the position of the nobility or bring down social hierarchies, but it was a way of saying "We deserve the same degree of social prestige and respect as the aristocracy and nobility. We are asserting our own status in society." This was a new idea and one that turned out to be very challenging to the power structure and the status quo. Although those people may not have thought of themselves as activists, they were engaging in a form of activism.

During the racial justice movement in the 1950s and 1960s civil rights activists went to protest at lunch counters or to conduct public marches, there was a dress code. People were expected to wear their "Sunday Best" in order to demonstrate that they deserved dignity and respect. But importantly, it was also a direct challenge to a white supremacist power structure that endeavored to keep black people at the bottom of the social hierarchy. There were laws in the United States at times that required Black people and slaves to dress in clothing that was considered appropriate to their status - which was the lowest status. For Black people to dress in a manner that was elegant and refined was a challenge to that type of power structure and that's also part of what was going on with the Sunday best attire in the civil rights struggle.

Later, a new generation of civil rights activists rejected "Sunday Best" attire as the politics of respectability. They adopted new styles that were suited to a new style of activism. Black Panthers wore black leather jackets and turtlenecks, berets and sunglasses. It was quasi-military but also it was a new visual statement designed to express a different kind of resistance to the status quo and a different type of racial pride - one that didn't borrow from the symbols of the white bourgeoisie but instead constructed a new black aesthetic.
How do you see dress codes changing, given the new world we are currently living in?
These things can always be somewhat hard to predict, but one area where I'm fairly confident we're going to see changes in dress codes is around norms of gender. We're already seeing such dramatic changes in terms of the recognition of the transgender community and people who are gender non-binary. That's a remarkable challenge to a centuries-old set of conventions in which men's and women's clothing diverged and were considered to be symbolic opposites. I think that is going to be fascinating to watch develop and I'm not sure exactly whether it will develop into something of a more unisex style of clothing or whether it will simply be a remixing and reconfiguring of the gender binary.

Another interesting area is post pandemic and what happens to the norms of workplace attire in the era of the Zoom call. First, there was the idea of the "Zoom shirt" that hangs at the back of their chair and is put on right before the meeting and presumably, for the rest of the day they're wearing sweatpants, pajamas, or something like that because we're all stuck at home.

But interestingly, another thing that developed was a kind of subtle new dress code that involved, not the clothing itself, but what was behind you in the room and how one should style the background of their Zoom call in order to communicate messages. That is very much like a different kind of dress code but your kitchen, dining room or living room are part of that public persona.
What inspired this research?
I teach employment discrimination and civil rights law and a surprising number of legal disputes have involved people challenging a dress code of some kind. For instance, women challenging workplace dress codes that required high heels or makeup or people of color challenging dress codes that outlawed preferred hairstyles that are suitable to the texture of their hair, like braids or locks.

Another thing that was very striking to me about these complaints was the intensity with which people fought the dress codes. People were willing to lose their jobs disputing workplace dress code and meanwhile, employers were willing to lose a valued employee trying to impose such a dress code. I wanted to understand why people felt so strongly about clothing, fashion and self-presentation.

The second reason is more personal. I grew up interested in fashion based on the influence of my father who actually trained as a tailor. This was at a time when African Americans often learned both a profession and a trade - the idea was they would have a trade to fall back on in case racial exclusion kept them from the profession of their choice. He never actually worked as a tailor but he learned the craft and he understood the importance of high-quality clothing. He also deeply internalized the importance of self-presentation, which was especially important for a black man growing up during the era of Jim Crow and in the era just after our civil rights laws were passed, where overt racial prejudice was still common and racial stereotypes everywhere. I saw for him how important it was to present himself in a manner that was dignified, refined and reflected his own sense of self, but also what he needed in order to negotiate a still fairly hostile society.

Image attributions in the banner: Civil rights march on Washington, D.C. from the Library of Congress; Men In Tailored Clothes, England, 1920s from The New York Public Library; Posing Louis XIV, Sun King, XXL from Getty Images; Fashion photographs for Vogue magazine from the Library of Congress, Trousers dress from Paris from the Library of Congress, Free Huey rally, DeFremery Park 1968. Reies Tijerina speaking & Brown Beret security from Bob Fitch; Man teleworking wearing a shirt, tie and pajama pants from Getty Images; Actress wearing a costume with ruffled blouse and trousers, from the Jefferson R. Burdick Collection, Public Domain; A 1903 engraving of Joan of Arc by Albert Lynch featured in the Figaro Illustre magazine from WikiMedia Commons; Vanity fair on the avenue, from Library of Congress.

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What dress codes reveal about politics, social change | Stanford News

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According to Stanford legal scholar Richard Thompson Ford, dress codes are a Rosetta Stone to decode social norms and resistance of a time and place.

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As Esports Take Off, High School Leagues Get In The Game

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As Esports Take Off, High School Leagues Get In The Game

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Nowadays, if you're a teenager who's good at video games there's a lot more to be had than just a pot of virtual gold.

There's college scholarships, tournament money and high salary jobs.

Today, more than 170 colleges and universities participate. And there's money on the table - more than $16 million in college scholarships. Naturally, high schools have followed suit.

This year, 17 states and the District of Columbia are offering formal esports teams.

Kids perfect their skills alongside teammates with the help of a high school coach. They run drills, develop strategy, review game footage and compete against other teams across their state.

But most high schools don't house their esports teams under athletics. In Virginia, the league is considered an academic activity.

Scooter Norton is a senior and captain of Washington-Liberty's Rocket League Team. He and his teammates Calvin Forinash and Matthew Goodwin have known one another since they were in kindergarten and have been playing Rocket League together for three years.

"When this opportunity came around, I don't think there was any hesitation from us about whether we would do it. It was just a matter of whether our parents would let us," Forinash says.

All three said their parents have at times resisted their desire to play video games.

"My dad really kind of struggles to accept that I want to have this as an extracurricular activity," Goodwin says. "My mom has been pretty chill about it, but my dad still has a learning curve."

Goodwin is a dedicated soccer player and will be playing on his college team next year. He says that when talking to his dad, he tries to explain how the two activities aren't that different.

"We're playing soccer with cars and it's just on a screen," Goodwin says. "There isn't a big difference between the two except that one requires actual physical activity."

In some cases, the decision of high schools to begin offering competitive esports leagues as a school sponsored extracurricular has been enough to change parents' minds.

Scooter Norton's mother, Cynthia Perera says that while she and her husband always supported their children's athletics without question, esports were a source of conflict.

She pushed to limit Norton's time spent playing - and still monitors it - which led to many fights.

But since the Virginia High School League decided to offer this year's esports pilot she says her perspective has changed substantially.

"It makes a difference not just for the parents but also for the kids," says Perera. "It's something they're aiming for. There's goals here for school pride."

And Norton says he's noticed a difference too.

"We've taken a different approach now that we are playing in a league," says Norton. "We've started actually practicing rather than just getting on and playing for a couple of hours. We're starting to implement different types of drills, different things for us to focus on, that will help us improve as a team faster than just playing the game would."

Before, says Norton, they were playing to improve, but not with a set goal in mind. Now, with the league, their practices are more targeted and their goals are clear.

And despite the pressure of competition and the desire to win, all three players say their time spent playing Rocket League hasn't increased since the league started. If anything, they might play slightly less.

Miles Carey is an assistant principal at Washington-Liberty. He coaches the school's League of Legends Team and oversees the esports program at large.

"When the state says this is academically valid and we want to support it, I have to do a lot less explaining," says Carey.

Carey started the school's gaming club three years ago. Since then he's seen the benefits of allowing students to practice the games they're already playing in a structured environment.

"If a kid is playing basketball 10 hours a week in the park, why not give them a structured environment to play it," Carey says. "I think it is great for kids to take something they are already passionate about, make it a way to connect with the school and learn more from it."

Carey says when it comes to the benefits of playing esports there's a lot of overlap with traditional sports.

Students learn teamwork and communication. How to handle stress and overcome failure. They work to balance time spent playing their sport against other commitments.

Carey says his students are more comfortable with technology. Some of them have even learned how to build their own computers in pursuit of having the best gaming machine.

And while the majority of students who play esports at Washington-Liberty are involved in another school sponsored activity, a third of them are not.

The success of high school esports is dependent on the accessibility of necessary technology.

PlayVS, which launched in April 2018, provides and manages the technical platform that allows high schools in the United States to create esports teams and participate in leagues with neighboring schools.

It costs $64 per student, per league, per season. Sometimes this fee is paid by the student's parent or guardian, other times schools have enough money set aside to cover the cost themselves.

The software allows the teams to battle remotely. In the digital age, this may seem unsurprising, but in the early 2000s, to compete against one another, gamers had to physically wire their computers together. This meant dragging your computer to a local area network, or an LAN.

Today, LANs are still considered the purest form of esports competition, since players are in the same location, eliminating the possibility of lag due to distance. But, thanks to new software, like that provided by PlayVS, high school players can verse opponents from across the state in real time.

And by partnering with game publishers, PlayVS is able to pull data from matches and track player performance.

These tools are important to coaches, but also to recruiters, looking to attract talented esports players to top universities and colleges.

"There was an opportunity to actually engage them in a competition where the incentive could be something that's meaningful to them at that stage in their life, which a high school championship is within your state," says PlayVS CEO and founder Delane Parnell.

And while the platform does provide the necessary tools for students to get recruited by colleges and maybe, one day go pro, Parnell says when he created PlayVS, he was mostly thinking about the kids that simply play for fun.

"Less than 1 percent of kids will go pro," Parnell says. "We actually are focused on making sure that the 99 percent of kids who just care about video games and want to find community and want to be celebrated for a talent that they have are actually able to do so."

At Washington-Liberty, Rocket League player Calvin Forinash has a similar mindset.

"I don't think of any of us think that we're gonna go pro and I think it's good for us to realize that so that we don't accidentally put too much time into it and not end up getting anything out of it," he says. "We understand enough about what we can do with this that we are putting in a relatively healthy amount of time, to the point where we can still do other stuff, but still enjoy the game as well."

But even if they don't go pro, esports presents other professional opportunities.

Jason Chung, an assistant professor of Esports Management and executive director of Esports at the University of New Haven's College of Business, says that as the industry continues to grow there are plenty of other ways to be involved.

There's esports marketing, business management and game development. Players need physical therapists, trainers, coaches and team managers.

He says the professionalization of the industry has also helped erode negative gaming stereotypes. Esports has shown that gaming doesn't have to be solitary and instead can be incredibly communal.

It has also pushed back against the idea of all gamers as individuals who are physically unfit.

"I think in a certain way there has been some truth to the narrative, in terms of the stereotypes of gamers, as chugging Mountain Dew and eating Doritos in a basement. That was a stereotype for a reason," says Chung.

But, he says that is largely no longer the case.

"I think the thing that's changed now in the professional space is that they're realizing that just having screen time and training, is not sufficient," says Chung. "You need to do other things to make the athletes healthy all around."

While Chung believes that esports belong in high schools, he believes that politicians and administrators need to take a bigger role to regulate esports before it gets too big.

"I'd like to see is a little bit more leadership by state and local actors and hopefully with some federal coordination to really outline what principles and what sort of values they want to instill [through esports]," Chung says. "What are some of the physical fitness requirements you want to actually put in there? Because ultimately, whether it's a sport or a tech product or whatever it is, if we're going to have high school age kids play it, you want to have some sort of healthy mindset in there."

Parnell thinks that PlayVS's partnership with local high schools is a step in the right direction and helps prevent players from getting burned out too early or from developing "toxic behavior."

"I think what makes this more sustainable overall is that we're actually providing a structured environment for kids to play video games, which they would otherwise do unstructured," Parnell says. "We've implemented a coach, which is an adult in the room and that is super important."

This year Virginia is piloting their esports league. If enough students are interested and funds are available they'll offer it again next year, if not, then it's game over.

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As Esports Take Off, High School Leagues Get In The Game

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Nowadays, if you're a teenager who's good at video games there's a lot more to be had than just a pot of virtual gold. There's college scholarships, tournament money and high salary jobs. Today, more than 170 colleges and universities participate. And there's money on the table - more than $16 million in college scholarships.

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5 Myths About Athletic Scholarships, Debunked

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5 Myths About Athletic Scholarships, Debunked

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Appearance Discrimination: A Changing Landscape 

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Appearance Discrimination: A Changing Landscape 

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By James B. Taylor

Put simply, "appearance discrimination" means discrimination based on an individual's physical appearance. While a novel concept, this issue is becoming increasingly relevant in modern employment. There has undoubtedly been a growing trend toward the acceptance of formerly-taboo physical expression. Further, there has been a steadily-growing social acceptance of body diversity. For example, up to 30% of college graduates in the United States have tattoos. Likewise, up to 160 million Americans are considered "obese or overweight," a group including nearly a third of American adult men and women. Of course, there are dozens of other physical characteristics, whether voluntary or not on the part of the individual, that distinguish individuals' physical appearance, and which may place them outside of traditional business "norms" with respect to employee appearance. The question therefore persists: does an actionable claim exist for "appearance discrimination"?
Appearance Discrimination Under Federal Law
On the federal level, while there are numerous prohibited forms of discrimination in employment under various laws, there is no direct federal prohibition on "appearance discrimination" in employment, standing alone. However, the concept of "appearance discrimination" has been steadily gaining steam in the employment context over the past decade, with the EEOC indicating that a record number of "appearance discrimination"-related cases have been asserted against employers since 2010. Given the lack of a specific federal "appearance discrimination" law, claims involving such issues are typically couched in the context of prohibited race, sex, or disability discrimination. Over the past several decades, such cases decided under federal law generally appear to be moving toward a growing acceptance of "appearance discrimination"-type cases, specifically where the "appearance discrimination" can be tied to the employee's status as a member of a protected class.
Federal "Long-Hair" Caselaw of the 1970s
Beginning in the 1970s, federal caselaw established the legal baseline for "appearance discrimination"-type claims. After the enactment of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 ("Title VII"), 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000e et seq., courts saw a subsequent onslaught of cases brought in opposition to employers' grooming and dress policies. In these cases, the "appearance discrimination" aspects of such claims generally asserted that the appearance standard, dress code and/or grooming policy at issue has a prohibited discriminatory effect and/or is discriminatorily enforced with respect to the employee's protected status (whether that be race, national origin, sex, age, disability, etc.)

Many of the initial federal "appearance discrimination"-type of claims were asserted by male employees who wore long hair in violation of their employers' grooming standards. Other notable cases involved claims asserted by female flight attendants who violated their employers' body weight requirements. As expected, the long-haired male employees primarily relied on Title VII's protection against sex discrimination, arguing that, if an employer allows women to maintain long hair in the workplace, banning men from having long hair constitutes disparate treatment based on sex and is therefore unlawful under Title VII. Among these "long hair" cases, the most-cited decision came in the case of Willingham v. Macon Tel. Pub. Co., 507 F.2d 1084 (5th Cir. 1975). There, the plaintiff sued an employer based on the employer's refusal to hire him because he wore shoulder-length hair. Id. at 1087. Importantly, the plaintiff's claim in this case was expressly presented as a "sex-plus" claim - i.e. claims that involve the classification of employees by sex in addition to one other characteristic. Id. at 1088-89.

In Willingham, the employer's dress code required employees who came in contact with the public to be neatly dressed and groomed in accordance with the standards customarily accepted by the business community. Id. at 1087. After a review of the arguments, the Willingham court determined that the employer's discrimination against the plaintiff was solely based upon its grooming standards policy, and not the plaintiff's sex. Therefore, Title VII was not violated by the employer's actions. Id. at 1088. In rejecting the plaintiff's "sex-plus" discrimination argument, the court determined that the existence of a general sex stereotype may not necessarily constitute the "plus" aspect of a "sex-plus" claim. Id. at 1092. Instead, the court found that the "plus" must constitute an "immutable characteristic" of the employee - a characteristic that does not include how an individual wore his or her hair. Id. To the Willingham court, "distinctions in employment practices between men and women on the basis of something other than immutable or protected characteristics do not inhibit employment opportunity(ies)" in violation of federal law, as the law "sought only to give all persons equal access to the job market, not to limit an employer's right to exercise his informed judgment as to how best to run his shop."
New Federal Precedent Set by Flight Attendant Caselaw
As the 1970s progressed, the majority of federal courts followed the Willingham rationale and typically refused to find Title VII violations based on an employer's grooming and appearance policies, even where those policies may have had differing requirements based on an employee's sex. As referenced above, another wave of cases involving "appearance discrimination"-type claims came in the form of several suits challenging employers' appearance requirements for female flight attendants, requirements which often focused on the flight attendant's weight. An important decision amongst these cases was the decision of Gerdom v. Continental Airlines, Inc., 692 F.2d 602 (9th Cir. 1981), rev'd on merits upon reconsideration en banc, 648 F.2d 1223 (9th Cir. 1981), cert. denied, 460 U.S. 1074 (1983).

In the Gerdom case, an airline employer was sued by a female flight attendant based on the employer's appearance standards. The flight attendant in this case was terminated for exceeding her employer's maximum weight specifications relative to her height. Id. at 603. Under these standards, a flight attendant who was 5'2" could weigh no more than 114 pounds. Id. at 604. The airline employer's stated purpose for its weight program was "to create the public image of an airline which offered passengers service by thin, attractive women," whom airline executives referred to as the employer's "girls." Id. At the same time, the employer maintained a category of male employees, whose duties overlapped with those of the flight attendants (known as "directors of passenger service"), yet who were not subject to any form of weight restrictions. Id. Based on these facts, the Gerdom court ultimately broke from the trend of cases following Willingham, and ruled in favor of the flight attendants. Id. at 610. In reaching this conclusion the Gerdom court found that the airline's weight program for female flight attendants was facially discriminatory as it only applied to women. Id. at 608. Notably, the Gerdom court distinguished this case from others where a grooming policy had different rules for male and female employees but was applied evenhandedly and did not deprive either sex of employment opportunities. See Barker v. Taft Broadcasting Co., 549 F.2d 400 (6th Cir. 1977).

Since the time of Gerdom, cases decided under federal law have generally taken an increasingly expansive view of "appearance discrimination"-type claims, particularly where the facts involved show disparate treatment by an employer based on an employee's federally-protected status. This can be seen in recent EEOC guidance, where it has taken the position that obesity, particularly when combined with other health conditions, should be viewed as a disability subject to the ADA's protections against discrimination.
The Emergence of State and Local Laws Prohibiting "Appearance Discrimination"
A growing list of states, counties and municipalities have enacted protections that go beyond the federal laws regarding employment discrimination. Washington, D.C., for example, has enacted laws prohibiting all personal appearance discrimination. See e.g. Ivey v. District of Columbia, 949 A.2d 607, 615 (D.C. 2008) (distinguishing claim by overweight employee under federal law versus state law, which authorized appearance discrimination claims). Cities, such as Binghamton, New York; Santa Cruz, California; and San Francisco, California have also enacted ordinances which prohibit discrimination based on weight and height. Madison, Wisconsin and Urbana, Illinois have passed laws banning discrimination in employment based on a person's "physical appearance" and "personal appearance," respectively.

An example of the operation of these new laws can be seen in Madison, Wisconsin. In general, Madison's law, like many other local laws on this topic, operate much like federal discrimination laws in the sense that they may allow an employer to base employment decisions on physical experience where such is required by a legitimate business need or necessity. See City of Madison, Code of Ordinances Ch. 39; see also Sam's Club, Inc. v. Madison Equal Opportunity Comm'n, 2003 WI App. 188 (Wis. Ct. App. 2003) (enforcing employer's policy against facial jewelry in "appearance discrimination" claim under City of Madison ordinance where the employer showed it had a legitimate business reason for its policy).

Given this new and changing landscape, employers should review their personal appearance standards with an eye toward how these standards could be viewed under federal law. In addition, employers should also review applicable state or local law regarding these issues, as several states and cities now provide employees with additional protection from "appearance discrimination" in employment.

James B. Taylor, Attorney
Martenson Hasbrouck & Simon LLP
jtaylor@martensonlaw.com
www.martensonlaw.com

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By James B. Taylor Put simply, "appearance discrimination" means discrimination based on an individual's physical appearance. While a novel concept, this issue is becoming increasingly relevant in modern employment. There has undoubtedly been a growing trend toward the acceptance of formerly-taboo physical expression. Further, there has been a steadily-growing social acceptance of body diversity.

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How esports changed the game: From media laughingstock to media craze

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How esports changed the game: From media laughingstock to media craze

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How esports changed the game: From media laughingstock to media craze

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History of Higher Education in the United States

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History of Higher Education in the United States

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HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT, SYSTEM

HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT
John R. Thelin
Jason R. Edwards
Eric Moyen

SYSTEM
Joseph B. Berger
Maria Vita Calkins

HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT

At the start of the twenty-first century, higher education in the United States stands as a formidable enterprise. As an established "knowledge industry" it represents about 3 percent of the gross national product. Virtually every governor and legislature across the nation evokes colleges and universities as critical to a state's economic and cultural development. Its profile includes more than 4,000 accredited institutions that enroll over fifteen million students and confers in excess of two million degrees annually. Colleges and universities spend about $26 billion per year on research and development, of which $16 billion comes from federal agencies. The research universities' ability to attract expertise is recognized internationally.

This success story of growth and expansion began more than 300 years ago before the United States existed. Beginning in the seventeenth century, the idea of an American higher education grew to fruition throughout the ensuing centuries. At the same time, differences developed with each new era of collegiate growth, but the story has remained one of expanding access.

The Colonial Period

Imperial governments usually invested little in colonial colleges. The typical mercantile approach emphasized the exportation of agricultural products and raw materials from the provinces to the homeland. The British Empire, for instance, responded to Virginia's request for a seminary to save their souls, with "Souls?!? Damn your souls! Make tobacco." Despite such hostility, the American colonies generally enjoyed greater independence than the typical British territory. While a succession of kings and queens encouraged the cultivation and exportation of tobacco, rice, indigo, and cotton, colleges also flourished as an unlikely crop in America.

The colonists created institutions for higher education for several reasons. New England settlers included many alumni of the royally chartered British universities, Cambridge and Oxford, and therefore believed education was essential. In addition, the Puritans emphasized a learned clergy and an educated civil leadership. Their outlook generated Harvard College in 1636. Between Harvard's founding and the start of the American Revolution, the colonists chartered nine colleges and seminaries although only one in the South.

Religion provided an impetus for the creation of colonial colleges. As the First Great Awakening of the 1730s to 1770s initiated growth in a wider variety of Protestant churches, each denomination often desired its own seminary. Furthermore, each colony tended to favor a particular denomination and so the new colleges took on an importance for regional development as well. Presbyterians in New Jersey founded the College of New Jersey (later renamed Princeton). The College of William and Mary in Virginia maintained a strong Anglican orientation, reflecting that colony's settlement by landed gentry from England. The Baptists, who had been expelled from Massachusetts Bay Colony and settled in Rhode Island, established their own college but in an unusual move did not require religious tests for admission. Other dissenting religious groups, such as the Methodists and Quakers, became enthusiastic college builders after facing hostility in many colleges.

Small in size and limited in scope, colonial colleges rarely enrolled more than one hundred students and few completed their degrees. Yet the young men who attended these colonial colleges made historic and extraordinary contributions to both political thought and action. Also, colleges represented one of the few institutional ventures to receive royal and/or colonial government support and regulation during the eighteenth century. The college's multipurpose buildings were typically among the largest construction projects in the colony, matched only by a major church or a capitol.

Though colonial colleges were frontier institutions that expanded access to higher education, by contemporary standards the colonial period remained elite and exclusionary. Only white Christian males were allowed to matriculate. Women and African-Americans were denied participation by statute and custom, but colleges did serve Native Americans in a missionary capacity. The evangelism of the Protestant groups attracted donors, although in time the colonial colleges' devotion to such educational plans waned. In order to keep receiving financial support, however, the colleges argued that by educating young Christian men, missionaries would be available to preach Christianity to Native Americans.

Despite their limitations, the colonial colleges effectively educated a literate, articulate, and responsible American elite. Even though college education was not crucial for the professional and career advancement of sons of prosperous merchants and wealthy planters, the college alumni were disproportionately influential in politics and national affairs. Not only did they lead by action in revolutionary proclamations, but they followed through as military and political leaders. Due in part to a collegiate curriculum that drew from the advanced writings of Scottish and Enlightenment thinkers in political economy, the colonial college alumni designed a system of government destined to serve as a model for the world. The colonial colleges' legacy then was producing a generation of American leaders and thinkers whose combination of decisiveness and thoughtfulness literally turned the world "upside down."

Higher Education in the New United States

With the founding of the United States of America, governmental policies towards English-chartered colleges became unclear. Wary of centralized power, Americans maintained educational control close to home. Therefore, governance of colonial colleges became almost exclusively the jurisdiction of local and state governments. In actuality the schools enjoyed independence as the Supreme Court's famous Dartmouth decision in 1819 demonstrated that the new federal government would protect colleges from state intervention.

With the reputation of colleges remaining high, most state legislatures, particularly in the newer states west of the Allegheny and Appalachian mountain ranges, looked favorably on chartering colleges as long as the state did not have to provide financial support. Between 1800 and 1850, the United States experienced a "college building boom" in which more than two hundred degree-granting institutions were created. However, since most of these new colleges depended on student tuition payments and local donors, there was also a high closure rate and the schools that did survive typically struggled from year to year.

Although the classical languages and liberal studies of the bachelor of arts degree remained central to the character of American higher education in this era, several new fields gained a foothold in formal study. Engineering and science acquired a presence on the campus. Professional education for law and medicine usually also took place though in separate institutions. Nevertheless, few if any learned professions in the early nineteenth century required academic degrees or certification. Most states reserved the right to set requirements for professional practice, and these were for the most part meager.

Going to college early in the nineteenth century was not particularly expensive. The cost of potential lost opportunities presented a greater concern for students and parents. Employers seldom required college degrees, therefore college presidents faced the perpetual challenge of persuading young adults to delay pursuing their life's enterprises by spending four years on campus. Modest-income families decided whether or not a young man's potential contribution to family labor could be spared while he pursued higher education. The college experience and the college degree did confer prestige and often some professional advantages, but its perceived benefits did not always outweigh the costs.

The United States, for all its deserved acclaim of being a truly "new nation," remained faithful to many of the tenets of English common law. For example, in New England states, the small farms and principle of primogeniture forbade the division of a father's land among numerous sons, so families had to find useful work for those sons not inheriting land. Going to college provided an attractive alternative, especially in subsistence-farming regions. Affordable colleges in rural New England provided an important route to respect and employment in schools and churches. In fact, with the onset of the Second Great Awakening in the early nineteenth century, new denominations once again pushed for clergy educated in institutions dedicated to their particulars of faith. Their "missionary zeal" led to the founding of new schools and an increase in college attendance. In short, college became useful not just for the elite, but also for sons who had fewer prospects in the new nation. This development resulted in a host of small liberal arts colleges in the Northeast and later in Ohio, Kentucky, and Tennessee that served as an important incubator for a growing middle class.

Educational opportunities for young women followed a comparable pattern. Families often wondered how a young single woman could be self-supporting or contribute to the family welfare. A growing national demand for trained teachers due to the "common-school movement" of the 1830s provided one answer. Women could achieve financial independence and respectability within a rather rigid social structure by attending a normal school or female seminary that provided them with an education for employment as teachers in the ever-expanding nation.

The mid-nineteenth century. Variety and growth characterized college building during the mid-nineteenth century. In addition to the conspicuous church-related liberal arts colleges, various groups founded a range of other special interest institutions for advanced study. These included agricultural colleges, proprietary medical schools, freestanding law schools, engineering schools, and scientific colleges. Private philanthropy indicated a growing American interest in founding new institutions concentrated on advanced scientific, technical, and engineering education. Illustrative of this realm was the generous support for such colleges as Rensselaer, Drexel, Cooper Union, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

One of the biggest shifts was the federal government becoming directly involved in higher education, which developed during the Civil War when southern congressmen who opposed the legislation were absent. The Morrill Act of 1862 set in motion an elaborate program whereby states received profits from the sale of an allotted portion of western lands if used to establish programs of agricultural, mechanical, and military sciences, along with liberal arts. The so-called land-grant act thereby stimulated numerous creative proposals and projects. In some cases, states attached their new engineering or agricultural programs to historic colleges. In others, they opted to create new state colleges. Between 1887 and 1914, the land-grant colleges gained support and collective political strength and expanded the definition and scope of university curricula. Legislation such as the Hatch Act and the "Second Morrill Act" of 1890 continued the expansion of federal involvement in education by bringing federal funding and projects to the new land-grant campuses.

Amidst this flurry of federal legislation, African Americans also received attention though the treatment tended to have mixed results. On the one hand, the Morrill Act of 1890 provided funding for African-American education, which led to the creation of Negro colleges in seventeen southern states-a substantial gain in educational opportunities. On the other hand, the guidelines meant that the U.S. government accepted and endorsed state and local practices of racial segregation. By increasing their role in funding higher education, the federal government helped shift the focus of many American colleges.

Higher education's gilded age: 1870 to 1910. Between 1870 and 1910 nearly all institutions of higher education enjoyed a surge in appeal both to prospective students and to benefactors. Some historians have called this period the "Age of the University." Although accurate, the image remains incomplete. The university ideal certainly took root and blossomed during this period, but the historic undergraduate college also enjoyed growth, support, and popularity. Because of an unprecedented era of commercial and industrial expansion, a new period of philanthropy made possible the founding of well-endowed universities. One enduring sign of this growth came in 1900 when the presidents of fourteen institutions created the Association of American Universities. Its charter members included Johns Hopkins, Columbia, Harvard, Cornell, Yale, Clark, Catholic University, Princeton, Stanford, and the Universities of Chicago, Pennsylvania, California, Michigan, and Wisconsin. Gradually, over the next decades, relatively young state universities in the Midwest, along with private institutions such as Brown, Northwestern, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Vanderbilt, would also gain recognition and "university" status for their acceptance into the Association of American Universities.

The creation of the Association of American Universities reinvigorated an ongoing and intense debate over the proper definition and role of a modern American university. Nevertheless, without any official consensus, some general patterns of practice and aspiration stood out. The new modern university emphasized graduate programs, including the study for and conferral of the doctor of philosophy degree or Ph.D. In fact, the proliferation of varied degree programs connected with professions illustrated a new era in higher education. Many undergraduate programs in agriculture, engineering, business, education, and home economics, along with military training, challenged the old definition of collegiate studies. Medicine, law, and theology, three traditional professions, developed varying relationships with universities and academic standards.

A lack of national academic standards, especially among secondary schools, colleges, and universities, gave rise to the entrance of private agencies into the higher education arena. Such organizations as the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and the Rockefeller General Education Board adjudicated ratings among American universities. The foundation directors used a combination of coercion and incentives to prompt universities, including professional schools, to adhere to reasonable criteria of admissions, instruction, and certification. On balance, the foundations probably acknowledged and promoted those universities that were already reasonably strong and sound, and raised the floor for others.

Much to the chagrin of "serious scholars," students shaped the undergraduate world according to their own preferences. It was in the elaborate extracurricular experiences of intercollegiate sports, campus newspapers, collegiate drama, literary societies, alumni groups, and fraternities that students reveled. Student (and public) enthusiasm for these activities grew as the popular media glamorized the social activities rather than scholarly pursuits.

Although the new structure and ethos of the "university" gained attention for its innovation, equally important was the support for and interest in smaller liberal arts colleges. This rising tide for colleges included an extended boom for the founding of women's colleges. Mount Holyoke Seminary in western Massachusetts transformed itself into a bachelor's degree-granting institution. Other prominent women's colleges founded in this era were Smith, Wellesley, Radcliffe, Pembroke, Barnard, and Bryn Mawr. Women also gained access via new coeducational institutions such as the University of Chicago, Stanford University, and many state colleges and universities in the Midwest and the West.

Higher education between the world wars. Between 1914 and 1918 the American campus displayed some flexibility to accommodate special programs for the domestic effort during World War I. It included special training programs for military personnel and sporadic but important instances of faculty research leading to direct inventions and innovations in warfare. Projects such as future Harvard president James B. Conant's efforts to develop mustard gas foreshadowed even greater cooperation between the universities and federal government during World War II.

College enrollments and public enthusiasm surged after World War I. One indicator of this popularity was the proliferation of huge football stadiums-most of which were named "Memorial Field." Crowds exceeding 50,000 at campus games became standard at many universities. Although popular since the 1890s, intercollegiate athletics soared in commercial appeal during the 1920s. The absence of any substantive national voluntary self-regulation led the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching to publish a highly visible expose of college sports' excesses in 1929. Some university officials denied the report's findings, but the Carnegie Study was timely and accurate. The abuses in college sports underscored what Abraham Flexner of the Carnegie Foundation identified as the root source of problems in American higher education: a lack of consensus on clarity of mission and purpose. Unfortunately for Flexner and his colleagues, too many colleges and their constituencies were well served by the amorphous, unregulated nature of American higher education. What was intended as a marketplace of ideas became simply a marketplace, in which students were consumers and sports was the best-seller.

The onset of the Great Depression illustrated an interesting phenomenon: college enrollments increased during times of national financial hardship. While institutions reduced budgets, many worked to sustain American colleges in lean years. Some universities also demonstrated resourcefulness in seeking out business and industrial projects for their faculty in such fields as engineering and physics. These initiatives by such schools as Stanford, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and California Institute of Technology laid the groundwork for external projects sponsored by both the private sector and the federal government that would come to fruition in the 1940s.

Higher education's golden age: 1945 to 1970. Between 1941 and 1945 American colleges and universities participated directly and effectively in a complex national war effort. This track record in times of duress brought long-term rewards and readjustments after the war. In 1947, the President's Commission on Higher Education in a Democracy concluded that federal funding of research should continue even in peacetime. In response to the "problem" of returning military personnel to the domestic economy and as a measure of gratitude, Congress passed the Servicemen's Readjustment Act (1944), popularly known as the "G.I. Bill." For at least a temporary period, this generous and flexible financial aid program enabled an unprecedented number of veterans to attend colleges, universities, and an array of "postsecondary" institutions. This legislation also gave energy to civil rights cases linked with educational access.

In addition to federal funding, growing states with enthusiastic governors and legislatures sought ways to work with their state's educational leaders to accommodate an impending enrollment boom. The rising birth rate and increased migration into selected states, along with a deliberate extension of college admissions, caused this dramatic growth. California led the way in statewide coordination with its Master Plan of 1960. This program aimed at accommodating mass access to affordable higher education by channeling students into tiered institutions.

Among the most conspicuous transformations was the emergence of a network of public junior colleges. Founded in the early 1900s, junior colleges experienced expansion in California during the 1930s. After World War II these institutions carried out two critical functions in mass postsecondary education. First, they developed a "transfer function" in which students could enter colleges or universities after two years of course work at the junior college. They also offered advanced, terminal degree instruction and certification in a range of professional and occupational fields. By the 1960s, the addition of a third function-readily accessible, low-priced continuing education for adults-led to a change in the name from junior college to community college.

The federal government participated in the expansion of sponsored research and development education during the 1950s and 1960s. Drawing from former MIT President Vannevar Bush's 1945 monograph, Science: The Endless Frontier, Congress and a succession of U.S. presidents endorsed federal sponsorship of high-level, peer-reviewed national research projects. Federal agencies that became most involved were those requiring applied technical research, specifically defense and agriculture. The behavioral sciences gradually adopted this model for large-scale psychological testing, and then various health care programs also sought funding. Agencies such as the National Institute of Health possessed a limited scope and a miniscule budget in the late 1940s, but acquired an increasing presence over the next four decades. In 1963, Clark Kerr's work The Uses of the University summarized this culmination of government patronage in research and development. According to Kerr, about fifty to one hundred institutions had positioned themselves to be "Federal Grant Universities": powerful incubators of advanced scholarship in the sciences possessing the ability to inspire confidence and funding in their research grant applications.

Both public and private universities benefited from governmental concerns about "cold war" defense and competition with the Soviet Union. Fears resulting from an extended definition of "national defense" led to funding for advanced studies in foreign languages, anthropology, and political science as well as the "hard" sciences of physics and chemistry. The transfer of these national programs to higher education institutions increased both the founding of new campuses and the construction of new buildings on older campuses. According to one study in 1986, about 75 percent of American campus buildings were constructed between 1960 and 1985, suggesting that the symbol for higher education during the cold war ought to be the building crane.

Enrollment also surged during the cold war era. Just prior to World War II the state universities with the largest enrollments-namely, the Ohio State University and the University of California at Berkeley-surged far ahead of other institutions with enrollments of around 19,000. Many major state universities prior to World War II had enrollments between 3,000 and 6,000. By 1970, however, the Ohio State University's main campus at Columbus enrolled more than 50,000-comparable to the University of Minnesota. The University of California had expanded its Berkeley campus enrollment to 26,000.

Some states responded to increasing enrollments with complex, multicampus systems. The University of California, for example, had ten campuses, with a total enrollment exceeding 150,000. At the same time, the network of California state colleges formed its own system, eventually enrolling about two hundred thousand students as well. In addition, California's community colleges further expanded the accessibility to higher education by forming more than one hundred campuses. In New York, education officials and legislators created an expanded system of more than sixty campuses, the State University of New York (SUNY). While individual states pursued some variation of this theme, public community college systems enjoyed the greatest gains in student enrollments and campus expansion. Especially in such populous states as California, Texas, and Florida, the community college systems served a larger and expanding portion of the state's population. Although relative enrollment in private (independent) colleges decreased from approximately 50 percent of college students in 1950 to about 30 percent, this change did not preclude substantial numerical growth. Rather, the construction of new institutions in the public sector was exceptionally brisk.

Prior to the 1970s, the federal government did not venture much into substantial student financial aid programs. Rather, state and local policies produced low tuition rates at public institutions. However, with the passage of the Education Amendments of 1972, the federal government increasingly promoted college access, affordability, and choice. The showcase of this government interest was a commitment to need-based, portable student financial aid. The Pell Grant, officially known as the Basic Educational Opportunity Grant (BEOG), provided entitlements to enrolled college students who demonstrated financial need. These initiatives fueled dramatic enrollment growth. Though initially popular, by 1978 the emphasis on student grants shifted increasingly to providing low-interest student loans.

Expanded access and growing national investment in the higher education infrastructure increased the need for administration and planning both inside and outside the campus. Hence, higher education in the United States underwent a "managerial revolution" in its decision-making and attempts at coordination. On another level this led to the proliferation of an increasingly complex academic bureaucracy. On a second level, it gave rise to a reliance on a prodigious testing industry. Although the College Entrance Examination Board (CEEB) had been in existence since the turn of the century, it gained great influence after World War II with the development and diffusion of the Educational Testing Service's Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT). The capacity of the SAT to make determinations about college admissions and projections on college academic performance coexisted with doubts and controversies about the equity and validity of such high stakes tests. The SAT expanded the nationwide search for academic talent, and enabled the historic institutions of New England and the Atlantic Coast to draw a large percentage of students from public high schools (rather than primarily from nearby private prep schools), while attracting students from a wide geographic base. Despite the promise of standardized exams, by the 1960s there would be intense debates over the ability of the SAT and other such tests to identify genuine aptitude without bias toward socioeconomic class or educational experiences.

Questions of social justice and the clash of national laws with local practices came to the fore in the decade following Brown v. the Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas (1954) decision. In numerous states where public universities were segregated by race, policies were challenged. The southern campus came to be a real and symbolic focus of civil rights in American life.

Tensions and transitions: 1970 to 1985. Although American campuses expanded in the late 1950s and 1960s, many students did not feel they were well served. Crowding, lack of dormitories, and reliance on large lecture halls created the "impersonality of the multiversity." This malaise over the relative lack of attention to undergraduate education, combined with political activism over free speech, the antiwar protests, and issues of civil rights and social justice, spawned unrest on many American campuses between 1968 and 1972. Whether at such conspicuous universities as Berkeley, Columbia, or Michigan, or at quieter campuses, a generation of campus presidents and deans were unprepared to deal with widespread student dissatisfaction. Furthermore, the nation was unprepared for the tragedies that occurred at Kent State and Jackson State in 1970.

What governors and state legislators perceived as administrative failure to keep a campus house in order ultimately led to a loss of public and government confidence in colleges and universities. This change in attitude, combined with a stressed national economy, signaled for the first time in decades a tapering in public support for higher education. Double-digit inflation and an energy crisis, combined with warnings of a decline in college matriculation, left most American colleges and universities in a troubled situation between 1975 and the early 1980s. Postsecondary institutions in the 1970s enrolled an increasingly diverse student body in areas of race, gender, and ethnicity. Less clear, however, was the question of whether the educational experiences within those institutional structures were effective and equitable, as American higher education faced criticisms for charges of tracking lower income students into particular subsets of institutions and courses of study.

The end of the twentieth century. A fifteen-year period beginning in 1985 was a financial roller coaster for higher education in the United States despite the underlying growth of the enterprise. By the mid-1980s virtually every gubernatorial candidate ran as an "education governor," testimony to the hope that states placed in their colleges and universities to stimulate economic development. Ambitious presidents seized the opportunity to "buy the best," whether it pertained to recruiting faculty, bright students, intense doctoral candidates, or, regrettably, even athletes. This period of opportunity, however, mortgaged institutions' futures-a situation that became clear to accountants and boards soon after declines in the stock market and state revenues. Between 1990 and 1993 overextension and uncertainty loomed.

Illustrative of the partial gains in equity and meritocracy was the changing profile of females in higher education, especially in graduate and professional students. Whereas in 1970 relatively few women pursued doctorates or degrees in law or medicine, by 2000 women constituted close to half the students entering law school and about forty percent of first-year medical students. Women even constituted a majority of the Ph.D. recipients in biology, literature, and the humanities. At the same time, however, they were substantially underrepresented in such graduate fields as engineering and the physical sciences.

Connecting past to present. One theme that pervades higher education in the United States in the second half of the twentieth century is that of a "managerial revolution." In response to the expanding definition of higher education, the ability to navigate institutions became a preoccupation. It extended to include the development of professional expertise in fund-raising, as colleges and universities acquired voracious appetites for resources while extending their mission into new fields and even into new roles. Higher education in the United States has succeeded in running its own operations while also considering new roles and constituencies. Its strength has ironically been its major source of weakness. In other words, the aspiration and ability of the American postsecondary institutions to accommodate some approximation of universal access has been its foremost characteristic. Institutions' shortfalls in completely achieving that aspiration have been the major source of criticism and debate within American higher education. It is the perpetual American dilemma of how achieve both equality and excellence.

Grappling with the questions of educational equality and access has taken on increased urgency for two reasons. First, the widespread embrace of higher education as a means to legitimacy, literacy, and respectability strikes a deep chord in all sectors of American society. Secondly, since higher education has acquired the strength and stability of being a "mature industry," it must then compete with numerous activities for a share of the public purse and private donations. Maintaining and bolstering widespread trust in postsecondary education will be the central determinant in present and future discussions about ways in which Americans support higher education.

The higher education system of the United States is not so much a formal system as it is an informal configuration of varied institutions. The development of the American system has been unique when compared with other national postsecondary educational systems around the world. Unlike most other countries, where higher education systems have largely developed outward from a central, government-supported university, the United States has never had such an institution. Instead, the evolution of the U.S. system has been shaped by many different influences, including state and local needs, demographics, religion, and changing social contexts. As a result, postsecondary institutions in the United States mirror the multifaceted complexities of the broader society in which they are embedded and the diversity of the people they serve. Moreover, American higher education is quite disorderly in structure and function in contrast to many national postsecondary systems and even in sharp contrast to the rationally organized American compulsory primary and secondary education system. Postsecondary institutions and the students they serve are diverse and not easily categorized. This disorder is characterized by a variety of individual institutional goals and missions, types of degrees offered, finance and governance structures, and even curricula, course contents, and instructional methodologies.

In order to understand how this informal and loosely structured "system" of diverse institutions serves the wide-ranging needs of American society, it is necessary to identify some of the main features that define the major types of institutions found in American higher education. In 1983 Robert Birnbaum noted that institutional diversity can be defined across several categories of institutional features. The most useful of these categories include defining differences in terms of the following dimensions of institutional diversity: systemic, structural, constituent, and reputational.

Systemic Diversity

Systemic diversity refers to differences in types of institutions with regard to their size and scope of mission. Starting in the 1970s, there have been many attempts to develop classification systems for categorizing postsecondary institutions in this manner. The best-known and most well-established classification system was developed by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and has come to be known as the "Carnegie Classification." Originally developed by Clark Kerr in 1970, this classification system was designed to serve the research analysis needs of the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education. The commission "sought to identify categories of colleges and universities that would be relatively homogeneous with respect to the functions of the institutions as well as with respect to characteristics of students and faculty members" (Carnegie Commission on Higher Education, p. v). The Carnegie Classification was originally published in 1973 and has been updated several times, most recently in 2000. It is the framework most often used in describing institutional diversity in the United States and is relied upon by researchers and educational leaders to ensure appropriate comparisons between and among colleges and universities.

The current classification divides institutions into six main categories: doctoral/research institutions, master's colleges and universities, baccalaureate colleges, associate's colleges, specialized institutions, and tribal colleges. Within most categories are subcategories. Doctoral/research institutions can be either extensive or intensive and offer a wide range of undergraduate degrees as well as master's and doctoral-level graduate degrees. Extensive doctoral/research institutions award more doctorates in a wider range of fields than do intensive institutions. Master's colleges and universities fall into one of two categories (master's I or II) and typically offer a wide range of undergraduate programs as well as graduate education through the master's degree. Category I master's institutions award more master's degrees in a wider range of disciplines than do their category II peers. Baccalaureate colleges primarily focus on undergraduate education and are divided into three categories: baccalaureate colleges-liberal arts, baccalaureate colleges-general, and baccalaureate/associate's colleges. Liberal arts colleges award at least half of their degrees in liberal arts fields, whereas general colleges award less than half of their degrees in liberal arts fields. Baccalaureate/associate's colleges award both associate and baccalaureate degrees. Colleges and universities identified as specialized institutions in the Carnegie Classification may award degrees ranging from bachelor's to the doctorate, but they award the majority of those degrees in a single field. There are several subcategories of specialized institutions, including theological seminaries and other specialized faith-related institutions, medical schools and centers, other health profession schools, schools of engineering and technology, schools of business and management, fine arts schools, schools of law, teachers colleges, military institutes, and other types of specialized institutions. Tribal colleges are generally tribally controlled and located on reservations.

While the Carnegie classification system is often used in making qualitative distinctions among institutions, the commission denies that this is the classification's purpose. In his foreword to the 1987 edition of the classification, Ernest Boyer emphasized that the classification "is not intended to establish a hierarchy among learning institutions. Rather, the aim is to group institutions according to their shared characteristics, and we oppose the use of the classification as a way of making qualitative distinctions among the separate sectors" (Carnegie Foundation, p. 2). Nevertheless, the process of "institutional drift," in which colleges strive to climb the hierarchy, is well documented in the literature. For example, junior colleges become baccalaureate-granting institutions by grafting another two years onto their programs, while doctoral/research-intensive universities increase funded research activities as they aspire to doctoral/research-extensive status. In the early twenty-first century, the Carnegie Foundation was in the process of reassessing the classification system, rethinking how to characterize similarities and differences among institutions, and allowing multiple classifications of institutions. This work was expected to be concluded in 2005.

While the Carnegie Foundation's system is the most widely used typology in educational research, other classification schemes exist and are usually used for other purposes, such as providing information to prospective students and their families. For example, U.S. News and World Report classifies colleges and universities in several typologies. Institutions are divided into categories by whether they tend to serve a national or a regional population and then are rank-sorted into four "tiers." Schools are also ranked according to best departments for a particular major and best financial value.

Although such categorization schemes are useful in a system that includes tremendous institutional variety, such simplification hides the true complexity of the higher education system of the United States. For example, an institution categorized as a "research university" may also have its roots in land-grant legislation, or may be single-sex or religiously affiliated. Other key hidden aspects of institutional identity include the institution's historical roots-whether it began as a land-grant college, historically black college or university, Hispanic-serving college, tribal college, or religiously affiliated institution. Additionally, there are less apparent dimensions of institutional difference, such as ratios between part-time and full-time students or residential versus commuter students. Athletic division membership is an important facet of institutional identity, as is location (region, urban, rural, suburban). Hence, it is important to pay attention to other aspects of institutional diversity in order to truly understand the nature of the diverse system of American higher education.

Structural Diversity

Structural diversity focuses on the ways in which institutions are organized and controlled. Structural diversity is most often defined in terms of type of institutional control-public or private. Publicly controlled institutions are funded primarily by the government (usually by state governments) and are typically part of a larger state system. Private institutions are primarily funded by nongovernment sources and tend to be independent with their own private governing boards. There are many more private institutions in the United States than there are public colleges and universities, although public higher education has grown significantly since the 1960s.

While there is no national system of higher education, all states have developed some type of public postsecondary educational system. There are a number of ways in which these systems are structured and organized. Public colleges and universities differ both in the ways in which they are governed and in the ways in which they are coordinated as part of a larger state system. All states assign responsibility for operating public colleges and universities to governing boards, and there are three main types of governing board structures: consolidated governance systems, segmental systems, and single-institution boards. Consolidated boards are responsible for all public postsecondary institutions in a particular state, although in some states this may apply only to the four-year institutions. Segmental systems have different governing boards for different types of campuses; in some states this may mean that public research universities are governed by one board, comprehensive state colleges by another board, and community colleges by yet another board. States that use single-institution boards grant governance autonomy to each public campus by allowing each to have its own board. Public boards vary in the degree to which they have formal governance authority and the extent to which they merely coordinate activities across the state's public postsecondary educational sector without any substantive decision-making powers.

Public institutions within these systems tend to fall into one of three major categories: universities, state colleges, and community colleges. Public universities typically grant a full range of graduate degrees (master's and doctoral), tend to have a strong research emphasis, and typically have large student enrollments. State colleges are typically smaller, may serve a particular region of a state, and usually offer both bachelor's and master's degrees. Community colleges are two-year colleges that provide associate degrees, preparation for transfer to four-year institutions, vocational and technical education and training, and large numbers of continuing education offerings. Some public institutions have been identified as land-grant institutions. Land-grant institutions were first established by the Morrill Act of 1862, which provided federal funds for establishing universities that (1) were open to all types of students (including women, minorities, and low-income students), (2) offered degrees in practical and applied fields such as engineering and agriculture, and (3) shared knowledge with citizens throughout their state.

Private institutions are less easily characterized than are their public counterparts. Private institutions cover the full range of missions and structures found in American higher education. The most prestigious and highly selective institutions, whether they be Ivy League research universities or smaller liberal arts colleges, are private; but so too are the least well-known institutions. In fact, Alexander Astin and Calvin Lee noted in 1972 that there are literally hundreds of small colleges scattered across the United States that can be thought of as "the invisible colleges." These are small, private institutions with limited resources. Some are affiliated with a particular religion; others began life as private junior colleges. One of the key distinctions among private colleges is whether they are religiously affiliated or not. Religious affiliation occurs in many forms. A religious denomination or order directly controls some institutions, whereas others have only nominal relationships with religious bodies or sponsors. There are also increasing numbers of proprietary institutions that tend to award specialized degrees or that engage in alternative modes of educational delivery, such as distance learning.

Constituent Diversity

Institutions also vary by the core constituencies they serve, particularly with regard to the particular types of students served. This type of constituent institutional diversity is manifested in many forms, but some of the most prominent institutions that serve particular types of students are those colleges and universities that provide education primarily for student groups that have been traditionally underserved by the majority of postsecondary institutions. These institutions include historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs), Hispanic-serving institutions (HSIs), tribal colleges, and women's institutions.

HBCUs primarily, although not exclusively, exist to provide postsecondary institutions that primarily serve African-American students. There are currently 109 HBCUs, almost half of which are public. They are concentrated in the southern region of the nation, with a few institutions located in the Northeast and Midwest. HBCUs enroll fewer than 20 percent of African-American undergraduates, yet produce one-third of all African-American bachelor's degrees. HSIs are institutions in which at least one-quarter of the undergraduates are Hispanic. Rapidly growing as a group, there are well more than 100 such institutions in the early twenty-first century. Tribal colleges tend to be controlled by Native American tribes. There are currently twenty of these institutions in the United States. Women's colleges are primarily private and provide postsecondary educational environments that cater specifically to female students. Although there were hundreds of these institutions at one time, that number has dwindled to approximately seventy-five. There are also a handful of male-only institutions scattered across the country. All of these institutions reflect the diversity found in American society and provide the informal system of American higher education with a means of better serving the diverse groups of individuals that constitute a multicultural society. The existence of such diverse institutions has been noted as a particular strength of the American higher education system.

Reputational Diversity

Another key feature of American higher education is reputational diversity. It has been noted that higher education institutions in the United States are extremely stratified. In 1956 David Riesman offered the classic characterization of the importance of hierarchy and stratification in American higher education when he described the system of higher education as a "snakelike" procession in which the tail (composed of institutions lower in the hierarchy) and the body (representing institutions in the middle of the hierarchy) of the snake continually try to move up and catch the head (those institutions at the top of the hierarchy that serve as a model for other institutions to follow). Reputation appears to depend on a complex set of factors, including undergraduate selectivity and peer evaluations of graduate programs.

Advantages of the U.S. System

While the lack of systemwide structure creates a somewhat incoherent system of higher education in the United States where widespread coordination is virtually impossible, there are many advantages to this noncentralized approach to a national higher education system. The large degree of institutional diversity that has arisen from the decentralized nature of American higher education has generated benefits on three levels: institutional, societal, and systemic. At the institutional level, arguments center on serving students' needs. Diversity in this sense would include variety of student body, institutional size, programs offered, and academic standards. Higher education does not exist in isolation, however. Birnbaum stated that "higher education is intimately connected to, and therefore interacts with, other societal systems" (p. 116). Aside from education and research, institutions of higher education have also long served various political, economic, and social functions. Societal arguments for diversity thus center on issues of social mobility and political interests. From a systems theory perspective, higher education is viewed as an "open system," characterized by diverse inputs and outputs. For example, if colleges and universities in the United States admit students with high levels of racial diversity (input), then the impact on society (output) will be very different from what it would be if the U.S. college student population were more homogeneous. Additionally, diversity in higher education is important because "differentiation of component units ... leads to stability that protects the system itself" (Birnbaum, p. 121). Such systems are able to sense and respond to environmental pressures more quickly and effectively simply because they encompass such extensive variety. In sum, the diverse system of postsecondary institutions in America reflects the diverse composition and needs of the society it serves.

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Higher Education in the United States - HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT, SYSTEM

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HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT, SYSTEM HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENTJohn R. ThelinJason R. EdwardsEric Moyen SYSTEMJoseph B. BergerMaria Vita Calkins At the start of the twenty-first century, higher education in the United States stands as a formidable enterprise. As an established "knowledge industry" it represents about 3 percent of the gross national product.

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Lookism: beauty still trumps brains in too many workplaces

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Lookism: beauty still trumps brains in too many workplaces

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Universities position themselves as places where brains matter. It seems strange then that students at a US university would rate attractive academics to be better teachers. This was the finding of a recent paper from the University of Memphis, which concluded that female academics suffered most from this.

It raises an uncomfortable proposition, that beauty trumps brains even in 21st century workplaces. It would certainly be supported by veteran female broadcasters such as radio presenter Libby Purves, who recently complained about the way the BBC dispenses with women of a certain age.

Another survey, this time in the UK, gave a deeper sense of the problem. It reported that employers were asking female employees to dress "sexier" and wear make-up during video meetings.

Published by law firm Slater and Gordon over the summer, and based on a poll of 2,000 office-based staff working from home during lockdown, the report found that 35% of women had experienced at least one sexist demand from their employer, usually relating to how they dressed for video meetings. Women also reported being asked to wear more makeup, do something to their hair or dress more provocatively. Reasons offered by their bosses were that it would "help win business" and be "pleasing to a client".

It seems as though the shift to more virtual working has not eradicated what Danielle Parsons, an employment lawyer at Slater and Gordon, described as "archaic behaviour" which "has no place in the modern working world". When employees' performance is judged on the basis of their physical appearance, potentially shaping their pay and prospects in work, it is known as lookism. It's not illegal, but arguably it should be.

Beauty and the boss

The Slater and Gordon survey findings affirm that many trends that we describe in our recent book, Aesthetic Labour, are widespread and continuing despite remote working. Our book reports over 20 years of research and thinking about this problem. Although our research started by focusing on frontline work in hospitality and retail, the same issue has expanded into a diverse range of roles including academics, traffic wardens, recruitment consultants, interpreters, TV news anchors and circus acrobats.

Companies think that paying greater attention to employees' appearance will make them more competitive, while public sector organisations think it will make them more liked. As a result, they are all becoming ever more prescriptive in telling employees how they should look, dress and talk.

It happens both to men and women, though more often to women, and is often tied in more broadly with sexualising them at work. For example, while Slater and Gordon found that one-third of men and women had "put up with" comments about their appearance during video calls, women were much likelier to face degrading requests to appear sexier.

When we analysed ten years of employees' complaints about lookism to the Equal Opportunities Commission in Australia, we found that the proportion from men was rising across sectors but that two-thirds of complaints were still from women. Interestingly, the University of Memphis study found no correlation for male academics between how their looks were perceived and how their performance was rated.

Society's obsession

Of course, workplaces cannot be divorced from society in general, and within the book we chart the increasing obsession with appearance. This aestheticisation of individuals is partly driven by the ever-growing reach and importance of the beauty industry and a huge rise in cosmetic - now increasingly labelled aesthetic - surgery.

These trends are perhaps understandable given that those deemed to be "attractive" benefit from a "beauty premium" whereby they are more likely to get a job, more likely to get better pay and more likely to be promoted. Being deemed unattractive or lacking the right dress sense can be reasons to be denied a job, but they are not illegal.

Some researchers have described an emerging aesthetic economy. Clearly this raises concerns about unfair discrimination, but without the legal protection afforded to, say, disabled people.

Not only has this trend continued during the pandemic, it might even have been compounded. With the first genuine signs of rising unemployment reported this month, research already suggests a 14-fold increase in the number of applicants for some job roles. For example, one restaurant in Manchester had over 1,000 applicants for a receptionist position, while the upmarket pub chain All Bar One reported over 500 applicants for a single bar staff role in Liverpool.

Employers are now clearly spoilt for choice when it comes to filling available positions, and those perceived to be better looking will likely have a better chance. We know from research by the University of Strathclyde's Tom Baum and his colleagues that the hospitality industry was precarious and exploitative enough even before COVID.

It all suggests that lookism is not going away. If we are to avoid the archaic practices of the old normal permeating the new normal, it is time to rethink what we expect from the workplace of the future. One obvious change that could happen is making discrimination on the basis of looks illegal. That would ensure that everyone, regardless of their appearance, has equal opportunity in the world of work to come.

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Lookism: beauty still trumps brains in too many workplaces

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Universities position themselves as places where brains matter. It seems strange then that students at a US university would rate attractive academics to be better teachers. This was the finding of a recent paper from the University of Memphis, which concluded that female academics suffered most from this.

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Esports: Inside the relentless training of professional gaming stars

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Esports: Inside the relentless training of professional gaming stars

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Esports: Inside the relentless training of professional gaming stars

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At Notre Dame, We Believe 'Student' Should Come First in 'Student-Athlete'

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At Notre Dame, We Believe 'Student' Should Come First in 'Student-Athlete'

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Opinion | At Notre Dame, We Believe ‘Student’ Should Come First in ‘Student-Athlete’ (Published 2021)

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Education has to be the top priority, says University of Notre Dame president John I. Jenkins.

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Modeling agency signs teen after he was denied job at Six Flags Over Texas over his hair

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Modeling agency signs teen after he was denied job at Six Flags Over Texas over his hair

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FORT WORTH, Texas (KTRK) -- A 17-year-old was denied a summer job at Six Flags Over Texas because of his hair.

Kerion Washington of Fort Worth, Texas, showed up to his job interview at Six Flags in March but was denied the job because of his dreadlocks.

"I went to fill out the paperwork for the job, and then I was taken into a group interview," Kerion said. "After the interview, they pulled me to the side and told me that dreads were not allowed."

Kerion's mom, Karis Washington, said that she spoke to the HR supervisor, and they gave her son the opportunity to come back when he didn't have dreads or an "extreme hairstyle."

"They gave me a card and told me to come back when I made the decision to cut my hair," Kerion said.

Karis told ABC13 Eyewitness News that she read over the grooming policy, which reportedly did not state that dreads were not allowed.

"I was shocked because it was my first time ever hearing that. I know I've seen people with dreads working at Six Flags before," Karis said.

Karis posted about the incident on her social media accounts, which instantly went viral.

"My main reason for posting was to tell my son's experience with his first job interview," Karis said. "It just took off from there."

Soon after, the post caught the attention of Corrie Caster, head of development and scout for IMG Models LA and IMG Worldwide.

Caster then referred Kerion and Karis to Jones Model Management, a development and placement modeling agency in Austin.

"We've already went to Austin to take a few pictures," Kerion said.

The teen, who's a junior in high school, says after graduation he plans to continue his modeling career or become a professional athlete.

"If this modeling career takes me super far, I'm going to stick with modeling," Kerion said.

Kerion and his mom were also flown to New York to share his story on the "Strahan and Sara" show.

"It all happened so fast," Karis said." They called us about 12 p.m. on Thursday and we were on a plane that night headed to New York."

The family says even after all of the publicity, Six Flags Texas has not reached out to them about the issue.

"Not every company is going to accept your hairstyle, but don't let it stop you from trying to get a job," Karis said.

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Modeling agency signs teen after he was denied job at Six Flags Over Texas over his hair

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FORT WORTH, Texas (KTRK) -- A 17-year-old was denied a summer job at Six Flags Over Texas because of his hair. Kerion Washington of Fort Worth, Texas, showed up to his job interview at Six Flags in March but was denied the job because of his dreadlocks.

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How did using Native American themed mascots and names become a thing?

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With the NCAA backed into a corner, the age of paying college athletes is officially upon us

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With the NCAA backed into a corner, the age of paying college athletes is officially upon us

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College athletics, beyond just the NCAA, has been backed into a corner surrounded by barbed wire. There are few paths out. At this point, seemingly no amount of litigation or committees or legislation can deny what is inevitably coming down the tracks like a runaway train.

In some way, shape or form, athletes in the revenue-producing sports will have to be paid. Not just name, image and likeness rights or cost of attendance money, we're talking some sort of partnership with the schools for which they put their bodies on the line.

Short of Congressional intervention -- a Hail Mary at this point -- that's the only tenet remaining from a collegiate model that has melted away over the years like a Life Saver left out in the rain.

For many, there is little left of the innocence that drew a certain generation to the games in the first place. What has been positioned as a decisive moment this week at the NCAA Convention really serves only as background music.

What matters more are the parallel tracks carrying NIL, the transfer portal, player empowerment, a multibillion-dollar entertainment/athletic complex and a yawning lack of leadership at the top.

No rewriting of the NCAA Constitution is going to change that narrative in the short term. College athletics has not only lost a large part of whatever legal leverage it might hold to stave off pay-for-play, it has lost its way entirely.

"I do think we're probably 2-3 years away from having a different relationship with our student-athletes," said respected North Carolina athletic director Bubba Cunningham, who is entering his 27th year in athletic administration. "It won't necessarily be the student and the university. It may be employee-employer."

That means a fundamental shift in how the games are administered and consumed.

If players are paid by their schools, will that turn off fans? It hasn't so far.

Alabama quarterback Bryce Young's NIL valuation is currently third nationally at $1.8 million per year. While he's not paid directly by the school, he's still capable of becoming a multimillionaire while in college. Young won the Heisman Trophy in 2021 and is generally viewed as a football and personal success story. In other words, his earnings haven't made a difference in his on-field success. He's a winner.

"If he made $2 million, everybody in that locker room would be incredibly happy knowing he deserves everything," Cincinnati coach Luke Fickell said of his star quarterback, Desmond Ridder. "Teammates would not bat an eyelash. ... They respect guys who put in the work."

College athletics is coming around to the concept because, increasingly, there is nowhere left to go. The NCAA could have begun loosening its view of compensation the moment Ed O'Bannon protested about having his image on a video game without pay. In September 2019, NCAA president Mark Emmert was still calling NIL "an existential threat".

"It would not surprise me if, 18 months from now, being employees is the only way to save this thing," said one FBS AD intimately involved in the ongoing deregulation of the NCAA.

DeMaurice Smith, executive director of the NFL Players Association, crystalized the issues last month during the Learfield Intercollegiate Athletics Forum in Las Vegas.

"Colleges and universities deciding to set up [a labor relationship with players], there's nothing at all that prevents anybody from doing it," he said. "... Why wouldn't we want to be in a world where we're dictating our own destiny?"

Veteran Oklahoma professor and reform activist Gerald Gurney just retired from a 41-year career in teaching and athletics administration. "Compensating players is not going to stop whether it's over the table or under the table," he told CBS Sports. "We're going to move forward in some fashion or another of paying players."

Bottom line in this third decade of the 21st century: Those who spent their careers building and nurturing college athletics no longer control it. That was assured in a dizzying series of developments in 2021 that forced college athletics into a corner and strung it with that barbed wire.

In Alston v. NCAA, the Supreme Court last June put the NCAA on notice by portraying athletes as employees that were being unfairly treated. That cut out a large foundation of how the NCAA operated when Justice Brent Kavanaugh wrote: "Nowhere else in America can businesses get away with agreeing not to pay their workers a fair market rate on the theory that their product is defined by not paying their workers a fair market rate. ... The NCAA is not above the law."

NIL formally debuted July 1, basically unchecked, due to lack of foresight by the NCAA.

The three-year old transfer portal became the dominant element in roster management, and arguably, recruiting as well.

There is no going back to what the NCAA used to be. The association was forced to allow NIL to move forward in its current form because, in the end, it was too slow to evolve. It is now relying on -- actually, it's begging -- Congress for a national law regulating NIL. In the current political climate, that's unlikely to come anytime soon.

"We're going to end up with something that's a whole lot worse than a blanket set of NIL," Tulane AD Troy Dannen told CBS Sports.

The transfer portal was adopted because the NCAA couldn't defend how undergraduate athletes in 14 sports could transfer without restriction while those in so-called revenue-generating sports (football, men's and women's basketball, baseball, hockey) and had to sit out a year in waiting. That was a lawsuit waiting to come down, especially with the average non-athletic student able to transfer at will.

"You hear a lot now about, 'Hey, we've got to back off. We've got to put some windows in the [transfer] portal. It's not going backwards," Dannen said. "The transfer environment is not going to become less restrictive. We missed an opportunity to evolve."

You want to claw back some of that lost leverage? Experts suggest that next step could come as a partnership of sorts between the athletes and their schools. Collective bargaining -- whether athletes are paid or not -- may be the first step.

"We have graduate assistants, we have teaching assistants, we have [teaching] fellows," Cunningham said. "Universities have positions that are quasi-employees. Maybe the student-athlete will be considered something short of a full employee [with a] term sheet and benefits."

Example: Let's say players as a group -- through negotiation via representation -- agree to stay at school for a two-year minimum. In return, they could receive better long-term healthcare. There is already speculation that, if and when the College Football Playoff expands, there will be pressure on the CFP to fund post-eligibility health insurance from the windfall of a new media rights deal.

"We're going to unionize football," a dour Pittsburgh coach Pat Narduzzi predicted this week. "Take 20 guys [in recruiting] out of high school. Only 10 are any good. We're going to cut the other 10? If you want to start talking money, we're going to start cutting players. It's going to become a business."

A large swath of coaches, administrators and fans would suggest college athletics at its highest level has long been a business. Players are already cut -- just not in the NFL way -- when schools change coaches who "run off" players they don't want.

That's one reason the transfer portal evolved. Four years ago, coaches were able to dictate where a player could transfer. Now, the clout has shifted almost totally in favor of the athlete who, once in the portal, can entertain offers.

Casey Schwab, CEO of Altius Sports Partners, helps develop NIL opportunities for college athletes. He told Sportico last month that athletes will gain employee status this year in at least one of three ways: federal or state law, litigation, or through the National Labor Relations Board ruling.

"I do agree that controlling your own destiny [is preferred to] not allowing legislators, judges or lawyers [to] dictate where this lands," Schwab said. "At the very least, if it's not the right option now, ADs need to be thinking about it. Commissioners need to be thinking about it."

Unionization and the collective bargaining that would go with it has already been tested. The concept was rejected by the NLRB at Northwestern in 2015. However, a former University of Minnesota regent last year filed an unfair labor practice to the NLRB in support of reclassifying athletes as employees.

That came after NLRB general counsel Jennifer Abruzzo issued a guidance memo that could eventually lead to unionization by college athletes. Abruzzo's is a political appointment, meaning the case might have a better chance of leading to unionization backed by a pro-labor administration in Washington, D.C.

Those who counter with the reminder of a free education in the form of a scholarship have allowed the narrative to escape them. Gurney has long said there is difference between getting a degree and getting an education.

"I think, at one point, the athlete is going to have to be given a choice between going to school and getting a real education or don't bother them with this eligibility nonsense," said Michael Hsu, that Minnesota regent. "To pretend they are really students is flagrant. It's a fraud."

The lasting impression -- at least for some lawyers -- is that athlete income is still being capped by NCAA restrictions. Perhaps the only way out is for the schools to become partners with the athletes.

"You know what this is coming down to, don't you?" one college athletics consultant asked. "It's coming down to two things: collective bargaining or Congress."

Partnering with players may be the best option available as the corner college athletics has backed itself into looks more like a strait jacket. An NIL bill isn't likely to emerge from a divided Congress representing a divided country anytime soon. Unions won't work in some states because of right-to-work laws.

So, why not explore revenue-sharing and group licensing agreements? Those are currently against NCAA rules, but a meaningful version of the NCAA may not exist in a few months. Now that a new constitution is set to be ratified, there is a significant business of deregulation.

To rely on Congress to oversee and regulate athletics seems lazy. Several sources shared a be-careful-what-you-wish-for warning regarding potential federal intervention.

"If Congress is going to get involved, they're going to take away nonprofit status from [schools] that are giving $10 million salaries," one FBS AD said. "There is no nonprofit in the world that would be allowed to be a nonprofit with $10 million at the top of their food chain."

Basically, get ready for "anything goes".

The NCAA Transition Committee will manage the details. It is chaired by SEC commissioner Greg Sankey and Ohio AD Julie Cromer. Scholarship limits could go up if only because the Power Five can afford it. The influence of NCAA enforcement could fade as conferences take more control.

FBS membership is up for discussion. By Aug. 1 when the new constitution is supposed to take effect, there might not be 130 schools at the top level. ACC commissioner Jim Phillips pointed last week to this as one reason his conference is presently opposed to expanding the CFP to 12 teams.

The transition committee's responsibility is significant. College athletics will continue to deregulate. NIL and the transfer portal came about precisely because the NCAA was too restrictive.

"The transfer portal is cliché," Sankey said. "The transfer portal is raising your hand and saying, 'I'm over here.' There's a lot of people that never come out. There are a lot of people looking for the next opportunity that doesn't materialize."

And that's perhaps not going to change without mediation, a partnership, collective bargaining and/or a union. Maybe a combination of them all.

If football and basketball players are paid directly, that will run straight into Title IX concerns. Title IX is the 1973 federal law that mandates equal opportunities for an underrepresented gender at institutions that receive federal money. That discriminated gender has mostly referred to women. Simply put, the market value of Young and a women's cross-country athlete are different.

By the letter of the law, each should get an equal salary.

The Knight Commission suggested solution in December 2020: The FBS would break away as a separate entity and be funded by the CFP. The NCAA would be left with what it does best, running a heck of a basketball tournament each March.

That would address a long-standing frustration among other divisions that the FBS -- especially the Power Five conferences -- has a weighted NCAA voting advantage, particularly on revenue distribution. That despite the NCAA not sponsoring a championship at the FBS level.

"If you pull football out and govern it separately, basketball will be right behind it in 15 seconds and the NCAA will go away," Dannen said. "I'm scared to death of that particular model."

Whatever happens, some thin thread that links the entire enterprise to education must be maintained. College athletics can't be just one giant Disney corporate investment.

One concept being floated is allowing athletes to get academic credit for playing their sports. Why not? Regular students get credit for studying abroad in their chosen major.

Once again, the NCAA has lost the moral high ground. It thumbed its nose at academic integrity four years ago in the North Carolina case. The NCAA has watched standardized test scores previously needed for admission fade away. Penalties for underachieving in the Academic Progress Rate have unfairly targeted historically Black colleges and universities.

"The young kids taking your tickets are sports administration majors," Cunningham said. "They're getting credit for working the game. The athletic trainer down on the field, they're getting credit because they're an athletic trainer. The band is getting credit because they're in music and on the field at halftime. The video people are getting credit because they're working for the ACC Network. The only person not getting credit is the kid playing the game."

A lot of this would be an admission that the traditional collegiate model doesn't work in an era of litigation and ... common sense.

NIL benefits have gotten so unregulated that many of the outlandish benefits provided to SMU players 45 years ago in the death penalty case would be allowed in 2021. Slush fund? Allowed if you consider current "collectives" of donors pooling their NIL money to lure players. Free cars? Quarterback Spencer Rattler had two of them last season at Oklahoma.

"The Spencer Rattlers always had two cars [in the past]. It was in a different way," Dannen said.

That different way was described recently by College Football Hall of Fame running back Eric Dickerson, an SMU superstar in the 1980s.

"You're a youth athlete, 19-years-old, and a guy comes to you and says, 'Here's $20,000.' You don't say, 'Oh no, I can't take that money,'" Dickerson told CBS Sports.

"What they did to my school is bullshit. They would never have done that to Alabama. They would never have done that Texas. They would have never done that to Oklahoma."

Many would argue the business side has been growing for decades. The amount of unregulated money that bubbled up after conference rights fees increased dramatically following the landmark NCAA v. Board of Regents case in 1984.

That decision deregulated college football, creating a pot of previously unavailable money resulting from monster media rights agreements. In turn, that caused realignment as conferences scrambled to get the best brands (schools) under their tent. It was no shock that high-powered lawyers and their accompanying 30% fees began to shape the new landscape.

That uneven terrain has been used by the ACC as a reason to stall College Football Playoff expansion. The 69-year-old league isn't a standalone in defending the academic component as athletic departments more closely resemble Fortune 500 businesses. But it's worth noting the reaction by critics when the ACC stood its ground for foundational concepts such at player safety and academics.

The new NCAA Constitution to be ratified this week is another example of the association being backed into that corner. The same document that was once used to effectively shutter Penn State football amid the Jerry Sandusky scandal promises to become a much sleeker, less-intrusive document.

With sleeker comes its own set of problems. The current environment cannot endure. Perhaps a new landscape where the sun never sets on the paid athlete is the future.

If the NCAA is the membership, as Emmert continues to remind us, then the membership is pissed. The transfer portal has been described over and over as the Wild, Wild West. NIL took effect without much oversight. Healthcare is lagging considering the NCAA is on record as saying it has "no legal duty to protect student-athletes".

There's a way to regulate it: Form a partnership with the players who fill the stadiums and generate the revenue.

"We just have to figure it out," Cunningham said. "... How do you stop it? We're not going to stop it. All we have to do is figure out how to finance it."

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With the NCAA backed into a corner, the age of paying college athletes is officially upon us

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College athletics, beyond just the NCAA, has been backed into a corner surrounded by barbed wire. There are few paths out. At this point, seemingly no amount of litigation or committees or legislation can deny what is inevitably coming down the tracks like a runaway train.

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Technological Influence on Society Texts

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Technological Influence on Society Texts

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Federal Discrimination Laws in the Workplace

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Federal Discrimination Laws in the Workplace

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Federal laws protect U.S. workers from various forms of employment discrimination and harassment. These federal discrimination laws apply to all phases of employment, from the job listing and interview process to termination. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) enforces these laws by investigating employee complaints. The following provides a general overview of federal discrimination laws, organized by type, with links to detailed resources.

Check out FindLaw's extensive Employment Discrimination section, including Filing Discrimination Charges with the EEOC, for additional information.

Racial Discrimination

The federal anti-discrimination law entitled Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (or just "Title VII") prohibits qualifying employers from discriminating on the basis of race, skin color, or characteristics associated with a given race. This law also covers harassment of employees by managers or other employees on the basis of their race or skin color. Employment practices that are applied equally to everyone can still be discriminatory if they have a negative impact on a given racial group.

For more information, see the following FindLaw resources:

Sex Discrimination

Similarly, Title VII prohibits employment discrimination on the basis of sex, including gender, gender identity, and sexual orientation. This also covers unfair treatment based on an individual's association with a gender-based organization. Examples of gender discrimination may include a refusal to hire women, lack of advancement opportunities based on sex or sexual orientation, or firing someone because they are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or queer.

For more in-depth information, read:

Age Discrimination

The Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) protects many workers ages 40 and up from unfair treatment. For instance, employers generally may not pass up an older, more qualified employee for a promotion in favor of a younger, less-qualified one.

For more information, check out FindLaw's resources on:

Religious Discrimination

Discrimination against employees on the basis of their religious beliefs is also prohibited in many cases by Title VII. These protections extend to individuals who do not belong to an organized religious group, but who still have strong moral or ethical beliefs. As with other types of discrimination, this also protects employees who are treated differently for merely associating with someone belonging to a given religious group.

For more information, visit:

Pregnancy Discrimination

Another federal law known as the Pregnancy Discrimination Act (PDA) prohibits discriminatory treatment based on pregnancy, childbirth, or other conditions related to pregnancy or childbirth. For instance, a woman generally may not be passed up for a promotion because of her pregnancy if she is the most qualified for the promotion. Additionally, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and the Family and Medical Leave Act protect an employee's rights to reasonable accommodations and/or leave associated with pregnancy and childbirth.

For more detailed, in-depth information please see:

Disability Discrimination

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) forbids discrimination against, and protects the opportunities of, individuals with disabilities (or those perceived to have an impairment). The ADA also requires employers to make reasonable accommodations for workers who have a disability, such as disabled workplace access or other options that don't place an unreasonable burden on the company or other employees.

For more detailed, in-depth information please see:

Equal Pay & Wage Discrimination

The Equal Pay Act prohibits employment discrimination on the basis of gender, requiring that men and women in the same workplace be paid equally for equal work. The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act increased the amount of time women have to file claims. Additionally, Title VII; the ADEA; and the ADA also require equal pay regardless of race, religion, or other protected characteristics.

For more information:

Sexual Harassment

Sexual harassment includes unwelcome sexual advances, offensive sexual comments, and non-sexual but offensive remarks about someone's gender. Title VII prohibits sexual harassment, which is considered a form of gender discrimination. Also banned is "quid pro quo" harassment (which translates to "something for something"), involving a promise of employment-related benefits in exchange for acceptance of the harasser's advances or conduct.

For more information:

National Origin Discrimination

Title VII prohibits employment discrimination on the basis of one's country or region of origin, ethnicity, or other characteristics that may be associated with a given nationality. This includes the mere appearance of having a certain ethnic background. Additionally, the Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) makes it illegal to discriminate on the basis of one's citizenship or immigration status.

For more information:

Genetic Information Discrimination

Genetic testing is a newer area of the law and triggers protections under Title II of the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA). GINA prohibits the use of genetic information when making any employment-related decisions. For instance, a company may not terminate someone because a blood test reveals a strong likelihood that they will develop terminal cancer. In addition to information related to genetic tests, GINA also applies to family medical history and whether an employee (or job applicant) has requested genetic testing.

See Genetic Information Discrimination for more details.

Learn More About Federal Workplace Discrimination Laws: Call a Lawyer

Discrimination in the workplace can come in many forms - race, gender, maternal status. What is important to know is that there are laws in place to help citizens should they be the victim of job discrimination. If you want to know more, contact an employment discrimination lawyer in your area today.

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Federal Discrimination Laws in the Workplace: The Basics - FindLaw

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Federal laws protect U.S. workers from various forms of employment discrimination and harassment. These federal discrimination laws apply to all phases of employment, from the job listing and interview process to termination. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) enforces these laws by investigating employee complaints.

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The History of Esports: How it Started, and Where We Are Now

Competitive, organized video gaming has evolved from a five-man event for a Rolling Stone subscription to tournaments with tens of millions of dollars in prizes (and as many viewers).

For instance, Dota 2's The International 2019 invited the top players in the world to a tournament with a crowdfunded prize pool of $34.3 million, according to The Verge. Less than a year before that tournament, CNBC reported that the "League of Legends" World Championship finals in South Korea hit nearly 100 million unique viewers. As a reference point, the previous year's Super Bowl had just more than 98 million viewers.

How did the industry get so popular in such a relatively short amount of time? Here's a quick look at the major events and trends in the history of esports.

When Did Esports Start? (1972 to 1989)

The first-ever video game competition took place at Stanford University in 1972. Five students competed in an "Intergalactic Spacewar Olympics," and the winner received a year's subscription for Rolling Stone.

Spacewar was the first commercially available arcade game, and over the years, others followed in its footsteps until Space Invaders dominated the market. It's important to note that for these early arcade games, players were trying to get the highest score possible; later on, head-to-head gaming arrived. At any rate, the trend of getting high scores led to the earliest large-scale game competition in 1980, when more than 10,000 entrants attempted to set a high score for Space Invaders.

At the same time, Walter Day was traveling around the country to record high scores on different arcade games. In 1982, he founded Twin Cities, an organization that tracks those scores and publishes results to Guinness World Records.

In this early period of esports history, mainstream audiences were also introduced to arcade game competitions on TV shows like "Starcade" in 1983-84. Others would follow, including events aired on shows like ABC's "That's Incredible" and BBC's "First Class."

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The Impact of Fighting and First-Person Shooter Games (1990 to 1999)

The history of esports took on another dimension in the '90s. One highlight was the first edition of the Nintendo World Championships held in 1990, which spanned 29 cities across the United States. It's a critical point in esports history - in fact, according to Polygon, one of the original NES cartridges used in the tournament's world championship sold on eBay in 2014 for more than $100,000.

During this timeframe, a significant part of the growth of esports over the years came from fighting and first-person shooter games. In 1991, Street Fighter II revolutionized competitive gaming by relying on face-to-face action instead of high scores. The first-person shooter genre made a similar impact with Doom's four-player deathmatch mode in 1993. It paved the way for online multiplayer games like Halo, Call of Duty, and Overwatch.

In 1997, about 2,000 entrants competed in Quake's Red Annihilation online tournament. It was one of the world's first "true" esports events, complete with teams across the United States and spectators that watched the final competitions online.

Massive Growth in Esports (2000 to 2010)

Televised esports took the industry by storm in the 2000s. Spearheaded by the growth of events in South Korea, several other countries followed suit in the history of esports with their own programming.

South Korea: Ongamenet and MBCGame, two former 24-hour cable channels, featured competitions for games like StarCraft and Warcraft III.

Germany: GIGA Television featured esports events until it ceased operations in 2009.

France: Game One showed - and still focuses on - video gaming events and related programming.

United Kingdom: XLEAGUE.TV covered competitive video gaming from 2007 to 2009 with games like Counter-Strike: Source and Halo 3.

United States: ESPN ran a show called Madden Nation (for Madden NFL) from 2005 to 2008 while CBS aired coverage of the 2007 World Series of Video Games tournament. The former G4 television channel was dedicated to video game coverage before expanding its scope to technology and general entertainment.

Several other trends contributed to the overall drastic growth of esports. From real-time strategy games to increases in viewership, prize money (and partnerships), dedicated tournaments, and professional leagues, the industry advanced significantly during this period in the history of esports.

One iconic moment happened at the Evolution Championship Series 2004. The "Evo Moment 37" was a jaw-dropping comeback involving the parry of 15 consecutive hits with one pixel of vitality (health) in Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike. It's heralded as arguably the most important moment in video gaming history.

The Emergence of Twitch (2011 to Present)

The online streaming service Twitch launched in 2011. Right away, it had 3.2 million unique visitors per month, according to CNBC, and a year later, that number grew to 20 million.

In its early days, Twitch focused exclusively on esports and gaming. Games like League of Legends took center stage for fans wanting to watch major competitions online. In 2014, Amazon acquired Twitch, and the platform has remained a juggernaut for streaming esports events.

From these viewership patterns and community-generated prize pools, some of the largest payouts in esports history have happened in the last few years. From 2015 through 2019, Dota 2's hallmark event, The International, consecutively topped itself in having the largest prize pools in esports history, from $18.4 million in 2015 to $34.3 million in 2019. According to ESPN, "Fans have been able to contribute to the pot through purchases of the Dota 2 battle pass, where 25% of the cost is sent directly to the TI prize pool." This interactive model has helped the event gain significant momentum.

Esports growth has been dramatic. In a relatively short amount of time, competitive gaming has transformed from small and minor events to worldwide tournaments with organizations, prizes, viewers, and structures that rival more traditional sports. Want to take part in this growing industry? You can with the University of New Haven's online M.S. in Esports Business - the first esports business master's program in North America, and the first online program of its kind worldwide.

Through academic partnerships with top esports companies like HyperX and Twitch, you'll gain interdisciplinary skills for the dynamic esports sector. The University of New Haven's Pompea College of Business is accredited by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB), a distinction that places us among the top five percent of business programs across the globe.

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History of Esports | The University of New Haven Online

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Competitive, organized video gaming has evolved from a five-man event for a Rolling Stone subscription to tournaments with tens of millions of dollars in prizes (and as many viewers). For instance, Dota 2's The International 2019 invited the top players in the world to a tournament with a crowdfunded prize pool of $34.3 million, according to The Verge.

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Supreme Court NCAA ruling and the new future of paying college athletes

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Supreme Court NCAA ruling and the new future of paying college athletes

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The smart home devices that homeowners are installing in their homes for security or to keep an eye on their pets may do more than provide peace of mind: They can cut your insurance rates.

Smart home devices may be able to cut premiums by 10% to 15%, said Pat Howard, senior editor at Policygenius who also is an insurance agent. That could mean a savings of $100 or more a year for many homeowners, partially offsetting the cost of the devices.

"Protected devices make your home safer," he said. "Insurance companies will offer credits and discounts."

There is no hard and fast rule on how much a homeowner can save.

It depends on an assortment of factors such as the insurance company, the types of devices the homeowner is using, current credits and discounts the homeowner is current getting, and the state where the policyholder lives. Not all companies offer discounts and not all devices are eligible for discounts.

"They're not widespread, but they are becoming more and more common," he said of the smart home discounts.

Columbus-based Nationwide, for example, has a policy that can offer up to a 10% discount that is applied to home, water and theft perils in most states. Policyholders also can get a 50% discount off of some kits from Notion, which makes smart home monitoring systems that homeowners can install.

Insurers recognize there is value in teaming up with companies that make these devices that can prevent losses, said Sarah Jacobs, Nationwide's vice president of personal lines product development.

"If we can save money on claims, we can pass that along to consumers," she said.

Nearly two-third of homeowners own at least one smart home device, but many don't realize that the devices can cut their insurance premiums, according to a Nationwide survey of 1,500 homeowners last August.

A survey by Policygenius, an online insurance marketplace, in 2020 found that 40.4% of homeowners didn't realize that installing a security system in their home could cut their premiums.

Video doorbells, home security cameras and smart thermostats are the most popular items, the Nationwide survey showed. Other devices monitor water leaks, smoke and carbon dioxide alarms, and doors and windows.

Nationwide partnered with Notion in 2020 to offer technology that home owners can use can do such things as watch the home for open doors and windows, smoke and carbon dioxide alarms, and water leaks with a cell phone.

State Farm, the state's largest homeowner insurer, says it provides for fire, smoke or burglar alarms or any other home monitoring system. It does not offer discounts for water leak detection system

Smart home devices can catch water leaks

While customers are aware of video doorbells and other home security devices, there's not as much focus on devices that can prevent what is among the costliest of insurance claims: water leaks.

The Nationwide survey found only 7% of homeowners use smart sensors that monitor for water leaks. Just 27% say they know about sensors that monitor water flow and leaks, and 24% are aware of sensors that can shut off the water in case of leaks.

Water is the third-leading cause of homeowner insurance claims, with an average of $11,098 per claim, according to the Insurance Information Institute, an industry group.

Nationwide says the water sensors can reduce premiums by 4%, a savings of $50 to $55 per year for many policyholders, Jacobs said.

"People think security is the most important," Jacobs said. "From a claims perspective, it is eight times more likely to have a water loss in your home."

Over time, the savings can offset the cost of the sensors, she said, though many homeowners get smart home devices for peace of mind.

The cellphone that warned of a gushing hot water tank

Michelle Hancock, 53, of Monroe, Washington, near Seattle, was on her way to a five-day camping trip when "My cell phone started freaking out," she said of the alerts she was getting from the app on her phone. "It's telling me there is water in the house."

Hancock installed the Notion system in her house in 2018. The system consists of a series of sensors - each about the size of an Oreo cookie - that she placed around pipes and her hot water tank.

She was able to call her daughter who went to Hancock's home, found water spewing from the hot water tank and shut off the water.

Without the alarm on her phone, Hancock wouldn't have known what happened to her water tank until she returned home days later.

That leak would have caused at least thousands of dollars of damage in her 1,200-square-foot basement and put generations of family photos at risk.

"People don't understand water. It's very insidious," she said.

Hancock, who owns an insurance agency, put the devices in place to begin with as a way to keep her pets safe. She had not considered the possibility that the devices could save money on her premiums.

She said a client had a house fire that killed the client's pets.

"It resonated with me very quickly. On my gosh, no one would know," she said.

If there was an alert on her phone that a smoke detector had gone off, she could hurry home or have a neighbor check or call the fire department.

The Notion system doesn't detect smoke, but it does hear the smoke alarm and will activate the app on her phone, she said.

"If you can prevent these losses, it affects things on a far grander scale," she said.

In the case of water, a homeowner may not notice if a toilet, faucet or a washing machine is leaking. The devices also can detect a big drop or increase in temperature in the house, a possible sign of a busted furnace that could cause pipes to freeze and burst.

She also has installed similar sensors from Roost and has a Ring Doorbell that activates her phone when someone comes to the door.

"I could not be a huger fans of these devices," she said. "I just wish we would get them in the hands of more people."

How to get discounts on home insurance

Research has shown many homeowners don't fully understand how homeowner insurance works and what drives rates, said Howard, the senior editor at Policygenius. They also tend to stick with the same company.

Howard warned that there can be nuances when it comes to the devices and their eligibility for discounts.

Insurance companies distinguish between a house with a video doorbell, for example, compared with full security system with central monitoring when it comes to discounts, he said.

There also might be better ways to save money, such as raising the deductible, bundling home and auto policies, or shopping for a new policy, something that Howard recommends that homeowners do every year.

"Homeowner insurance tends to be a set and forget it kind of thing," he said.

So before buying any smart home device, homeowners should check first with their insurer to see if the company offers any discounts for installing them or has a partnership with a device company such as Notion that could offer products at a reduced price. Insurers also may be able to provide advice on what products work best, he said.

"You don't want to be investing in something that doesn't do what you want it to do," he said.

Regardless of obtaining a discount or not, the devices will grow in popularity with homeowners, he said.

"People love locking the front door from the Bahamas or adjusting the thermostat," he said
mawilliams@dispatch.com @BizMarkWilliams

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Smart home devices can do more than protect your home - they also can save money

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The smart home devices that homeowners are installing in their homes for security or to keep an eye on their pets may do more than provide peace of mind: They can cut your insurance rates. Smart home devices may be able to cut premiums by 10% to 15%, said Pat Howard, senior editor at Policygenius who also is an insurance agent.

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No One Wants to Admit They’re Ugly, Which Makes It Hard to Fight Beauty Bias

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No One Wants to Admit They’re Ugly, Which Makes It Hard to Fight Beauty Bias

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No One Wants to Admit They’re Ugly, Which Makes It Hard to Fight Beauty Bias

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Nobody wants to join the ugly lobby, but that might be what we need to battle “lookism”

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History Of Athletics In U.s. Colleges And Universities

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History Of Athletics In U.s. Colleges And Universities

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History Of Athletics In U.s. Colleges And Universities

Intercollegiate athletics in the United States has come to be regarded as higher education's "peculiar institution." This somewhat critical characterization results from the fact that although intercollegiate athletics is seldom listed as part of the central mission of a college or university, athletics have come to command inordinate visibility, resources, influence, and attention both inside and outside many campuses. Analyzing, explaining, and dealing with this disparity between official philosophy and actual practice presents a complex analytic task. To truly understand the present situation requires a reconstruction of college athletics' unique historical evolution.

Visitors to an American campus cannot help but be struck by the physical presence of the intercollegiate athletics enterprise. In the twenty-first century, it is not unusual for a major university campus to contain both a football stadium that seats 70,000 spectators and a basketball arena that accommodates audiences of 20,000. In the year 2000 many universities had annual operating budgets for athletics ranging between $30 million and $60 million. The success and pervasiveness of college sports described was not inevitable, but is the result of particular innovations and episodes over the past 150 years.

The Violent Birth of Intercollegiate Sports

Prior to 1850 intercollegiate sports played a marginal role in collegiate life. If there was a need for physical activity in the student regimen, college presidents and deans thought manual labor in the form of farming or clearing boulders from college lands fit the bill perfectly. Though admittedly both economical and expedient, students, not surprisingly, remained unconvinced that this was the type of physical release that their souls craved. Instead, collegiate student bodies increasingly devised their own elaborate (and often brutal) intramural contests known as "class rushes." These "rushes" usually involved some variation of football, which actually provided a pretext for a ritualistic and violent hazing of the incoming freshman by the sophomore class.

College officials struggled to curb these violent student traditions, but intramural sports persisted within the campus and eventually took a decisive turn toward sanctioned and refereed events in which a team representing one institution competed against its counterpart from another. Despite the increase in organization, administrators initially were not eager, generally speaking, to embrace such contests that they viewed as inappropriate distractions from serious scholarly work. Indicative of the administrative outrage at such elaborate contests was the telegram that the president of Cornell sent to officials at the University of Michigan in 1873 when he learned that student teams from the two institutions were planning to meet in Cleveland for a football game: "I will not permit thirty men to travel four hundred miles merely to agitate a bag of wind" (Rudolph, p. 374-375).

Whether or not Cornell's president won this particular battle, he and college presidents elsewhere lost the war of curbing intercollegiate athletic contests. With or without administrative blessings, college students formed athletic associations that included mechanisms for raising money, charging fees, sponsoring events, and selling tickets. And, by the 1890s, at many colleges, alumni groups joined with the student organizations to create formidable programs over which the college presidents and faculty exercised relatively little control.

Though college athletics would quickly be dominated by certain sports and by powerful institutions, the outstanding feature of college athletics in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was its pervasiveness and diversity across American institutions. Although the oldest and largest institutions-Harvard and Yale-quickly gained the most attention in newspaper coverage and provided the largest athletic budgets, numerous other campuses made significant contributions as well. For instance, Springfield College in western Massachusetts, originally known as the International YMCA Training School, was where James Naismith invented basketball in 1891. Nearby, Amherst College initiated varsity baseball and incorporated calisthenics and physical fitness into the collegiate curriculum. By 1900 the popularity of collegiate sports was reflected by its adoption in even all-girls schools. Wellesley College, for example, acquired renown for having developed a distinctively female approach to such sports as crew, basketball, and physical fitness. Other examples of innovations in American college sports before the turn of the twentieth century include:

First intercollegiate crew regatta (Harvard vs. Yale): 1852

First intercollegiate baseball game (Williams vs. Amherst): 1859

First intercollegiate football association (Harvard-Yale-Princeton): 1872

First intercollegiate track and field association (Intercollegiate Association of Amateur Athletics of America, or IC4A): 1875

First intercollegiate tennis match: 1883

First intercollegiate ice hockey game (Harvard vs. Brown): 1895

First intercollegiate gymnastics competition: 1899

The Maturing of a Collegiate Way of Life

As American higher education itself was largely nurtured in the Northeast, likewise in sports, this region also led the way in developing the intercollegiate sports that now seem so familiar. Heading into a new century, Yale dominated football and also came to be known as the "cradle of coaches" as it spread the Yale football gospel of strategy and sportsmanship across the nation. By 1910 Harvard obtained the national championship in football and asserted itself in numerous other sports. Harvard would also set the pace in terms of spectator facilities with the construction, in 1904, of Soldiers' Field-considered the finest, largest example of reinforced concrete architecture in the period. This regional predilection for architectural and spectator expansion continued when the Yale Bowl opened in 1914 with a grand design and a seating capacity of more than 70,000.

Although the eastern seaboard colleges initiated college sports, their models and lessons soon were emulated in regions across the country. In the mid-nineteenth century, faculty representatives from Midwestern universities formed the Western Conference-a formal group popularly known then and now as the Big Ten Conference. Within that conference, the universities of Michigan and Chicago set the pace with spectator appeal and winning teams.

The young University of Chicago was especially important as a leader in the structure and control of a high powered varsity sports program. Whereas many presidents had resisted and resented the ascent of intercollegiate athletics, the University of Chicago's administration embraced college sports. Chicago's young, brash president, William Rainey Harper, saw the athletic contests as an opportunity to connect the campus to the greater community and thereby generate goodwill, revenue, and attention for his model institution. The creation of a large stadium combined with a mass marketing effort that succeeded in generating popular appeal and large ticket sales. Harper found the ideal partner to help him carry out his brave new vision of commercialized collegiate athletics in Amos Alonzo Stagg. As coach and athletic director, Stagg, a Yale graduate and storied football hero, oversaw the University of Chicago's athletic department for forty years.

The importance of Stagg's tenure in athletics at Chicago lies in the fact that he (with the president and board's support) created a structure that gave substantial autonomy and influence to the athletic department within the normally complex and Byzantine university administrative structure. Though holding faculty status, Stagg's program budget was exempted from conventional bureaucratic procedures. He reported directly to the president and the board of trustees, with no oversight from academic deans or faculty budget committees. In addition, Stagg generated extra income for himself and his program by being allowed to use the university facilities to sponsor promotional events, host state high school track meets, and hold instructional camps. Such a situation made Stagg and his department the envy of other athletic leaders who in turn pushed their own institutions to adopt similar procedures in order to create the winning programs that alumni and donors demanded.

New England colleges also played a crucial role in the evolution of administration and control of college sports. Harvard's hiring of Bill Reid as a well-paid, full-time football coach in 1901 represented a major escalation of professionalizing college coaches. After Reid's hiring, coaches across the country realized that if they won they too could demand the high salary and substantial benefits enjoyed by Harvard's head coach. During his long tenure at Yale as athletic director, Walter Camp seemingly perfected the financial and political control of an entire athletic program with little accountability to students, faculty, or academic administration. Camp also used his Yale position as the base from which to create an enterprising network of syndicated newspaper columns, annual guides, endorsements, and other lucrative, influential college sports publications.

The turn of the century did not mark simply heady days for the burgeoning athletic programs. Many students and some alumni resented that the emerging organizational scheme tended to give inordinate and enduring support to a few selected spectator (and hence revenue-generating) sports-namely, football-with relatively few resources being dedicated to numerous other varsity squads. Additionally, the power and popularity of intercollegiate athletics led directly to conspicuous abuse. Even at this early juncture, a lack of regulation and fair play both on and off the field left college athletics indelibly marked by corruption and a reputation that has plagued "big-time" college sports to this day. More significantly, as the games "professionalized," brutality often increased. At times, it seemed that the days of Roman crowds chanting for gladiatorial blood were returning.

At the turn of the century, the situation had deteriorated to the point that President Theodore Roosevelt summoned university presidents to the White House with an ultimatum that they eliminate brutality from the playing field or risk federal intervention. The violence did decrease, and the development of better protective equipment also aided in safeguarding the athletes, but the problems were far from solved. No standards were set in areas such as eligibility and scholarships, thereby blurring the line of definition for supposedly amateur contests between students. In an attempt to bring order to these increasingly popular competitions, the National Collegiate Athletic Association was formed in the early 1900s. This could only be considered a Pyrrhic victory, however, for the historic East Coast universities, which had the strongest athletic programs in the country, refused to cooperate and boycotted the organizational meeting with institutions from the Midwest and West. Consequently, intercollegiate athletics lacked any semblance of meaningful nation-wide coordination over the next half century.

Athletics Out West

As Frederick Jackson Turner postulated for the entire nation: Though born and raised in the East, Americans and their institutions are ultimately defined and refined in the West. Collegiate athletics certainly followed Turner's thesis as the rise of spectator and student interest in college sports spread to the Pacific Coast. Between World War I and World War II the geographical balance of power in dominance of college sports shifted. The June 1937 issue of Life magazine devoted to "going to college in America" included a feature article titled, "Sports Records Move West." The emergence of top caliber intercollegiate teams in the Midwest and on the Pacific Coast "left Eastern collegians clinging to a steadily dwindling share of athletic supremacy." This led the editors to observe that: "In the past two decades, athletic reputation has largely moved West and South" ( Life, p. 72-73).

Increasingly, college sports became a symbolic litmus test of regional and/or ethnic esteem and assimilation. For example, in the 1920s in South Bend, Indiana, the University of Notre Dame gained national visibility by becoming a rallying point for American Catholic pride and affiliation. Its victories over established East Coast football teams and national symbols such as West Point provided American Catholics with a sense of accomplishment and belonging. This trend continued well into the 1960s, for example, when African Americans used sports to break color barriers, particularly in southern universities. The national basketball championship won by Texas Western in 1966 with an all-black starting five-over the perennially powerful University of Kentucky and its all-white squad-marked an important shift in recruitment and acceptance of black players.

Various regions of the country have also rallied around school sports programs. Since 1926 the annual intersectional contests between Notre Dame and the University of Southern California regularly attracted crowds of over 100,000, whether played in Los Angeles or Chicago, and provided victorious regions the enjoyment of martial bragging rights without the sacrifice of actual military battle. Starting in 1946 the annual New Year's Day Rose Bowl Game matched the champion of the Midwest's Big Ten Conference against the championship team from the Pacific Coast Conference-and thus provided victorious regions the enjoyment of martial bragging rights without the sacrifice of actual military battle. Tiny schools and forgotten regions could gain instant, if fleeting, national attention by successfully competing with national powers, such as when unheralded Centre College of Kentucky gained national headlines in the 1920s for spirited play-and an eventual victory-over Harvard's football squad in 1921. Finally, as with anything that has mass appeal, politicians endeared themselves to the electorate by associating with and supporting local schools. Perhaps the grandest example of such activities occurred when Huey Long, the indefatigable governor of Louisiana, pronounced in 1928 that Louisiana State University was the "People's University," and called on the people of the state to share in its wealth of championship teams and its magnificent football stadium.

From Chaos to Concern

Colleges and universities paid a dear price for the popularity of intercollegiate athletics. The strong, pervasive, and enduring appeal of varsity teams, combined with the quest by alumni, local boosters, and college officials for championship squads, meant that even by the 1920s the activities associated with recruiting and compensating college student athletes were largely unregulated chaos. This was most dramatically exposed in 1929 when the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching released its comprehensive study American College Athletics, written by Howard Savage. According to this report, meaningful reform in American collegiate sports could take place only if campus presidents replaced the "downtown crowd," comprising a city's businessmen, alumni boosters, and commercial interests, as the source of leadership and responsibility. The initial response of university presidents was outrage and denial, but when the Carnegie Foundation stood by its allegations and released more documentation, academic leaders showed some public signs of interest in reform. Shoring up conferences by adding regulations and a commissioner was one gesture. Ironically, conference reforms were often counterproductive because they merely gave official approval to such practices as training tables that provided college players with free meals daily, along with subsidies for athletes, and alliances with booster clubs that previously had been cited as the problems of unregulated college sports.

Immediately after World War II, the unresolved excesses of intercollegiate athletics gained unprecedented publicity. Returning armed-service veterans swelled the ranks of varsity athletics squads. Many presidents and athletic directors placed no restrictions on the number of athletic scholarships allowed, and some football squads included three hundred players for opening practice, with more than one hundred athletes on scholarship. Excesses were accompanied by illegalities. Between 1948 and 1952 exposés and successful prosecutions of student-athletes, coaches, and alumni boosters involved in point-shaving schemes and gambling cartels led to congressional hearings and a call for nationwide oversight by academic leaders. When organizations led by college presidents, such as the American Council on Education, failed to present a coherent plan, regulatory power was given to the National Collegiate Athletics Association-an organization whose primary charge had previously been to simply promote championship tournaments. Meanwhile, at the conference level, presidents and faculty delegates attempted to introduce standards of student conduct and eligibility into policies and practices. If New England colleges had been pioneers in the creation and expansion of college sports in the first half of the century, after World War II they again assumed a leadership role in the reform and removal of excess. Most noticeable were the codes and restraints demonstrated by the "Little Three"-Amherst, Williams, and Wesleyan. In 1956 the formal creation of the Ivy Group (League) provided a model of presidential and faculty oversight of college sports.

The economics of intercollegiate athletics was slowly but persistently altered in the 1950s due to the simultaneous appearance of two phenomena: (1) professional sports teams in football and basketball, and (2) the availability of radio and television for live broadcasts of sporting events. All college teams, ranging from the established powerful university squads to the small college teams, feared that the popularity of the National Football League and the National Basketball Association would cause declining attendance at college games. Small college squads faced a second threat: national and regional broadcasts of a few selected "big-time" college games prompted many long-time fans to stay at home rather than buy a stadium ticket on Saturday afternoons. The result was a shake-out in college sports programs over two decades in which a substantial number of institutions opted, or were financially forced, to drop football.

College Sports in the Age of Aquarius

In the late 1960s shifting cultural values forced widespread changes in sports policies and emphases. As other athletes demanded equality, granting athletic scholarships ceased to be confined to a handful of traditional revenue sports-namely, football and basketball. By 1970 athletic grants-in-aid were increasingly prevalent for such sports as track, soccer, lacrosse, hockey, wrestling, baseball, and swimming. Expanding the excellence and the number of squads tended to swell athletic department operating expenses, but the small fan base of these sports failed to cover the increased costs. Consequently, institutes of higher learning faced growing philosophical and economic problems within their athletic programs. The financial brinkmanship would be subjected to even greater-and unexpected-stress in the 1970s.

Much more vocally and powerfully than "minor" sports athletes, females increasingly sought equal treatment from institutions in regards to athletics. Their actions would lead to a dramatic change in intercollegiate sports: the inclusion of women as bona fide participants in varsity athletics. The Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW), created in the 1950s, led the way in increasing financial support of female athletic programs and scholarships for women. This too placed institutions and athletic departments in dire financial straits, for female sports did not generate enough fan interest to be self-supporting. This largely became a moot point in 1972, however, due to the landmark Title IX legislation that prohibited, with some exceptions, discrimination by gender in provision of educational programs. Consequently, college athletics in many ways moved from the playing fields to the court rooms as individuals challenged institutional compliance with this federal mandate. Between 1972 and 1990 colleges and courts groped for a clear interpretation of precisely what was intended and required in terms of social justice and institutional compliance for women as student-athletes. In 1997 the Supreme Court upheld lower court rulings requiring Brown University to comply with Title IX guidelines on proportionality.

Originally, a school could demonstrate compliance in athletics in one of four ways: have a proportional number of male and female participants; have a proportional relationship between female athletes and female students; demonstrate increasing opportunity for females to participate in athletics; or show that female participation in athletics matched their interest and ability to participate. However, most subsequent court rulings have demanded that the most stringent of the four tests be met, insisting that schools have a proportional number of participants in men's and women's athletics and thereby a proportional number of scholarships for each gender. This rigorous interpretation of directives for compliance with Title IX legislation has proven difficult for institutions due to the disparity of income and male and female sports generate. For instance, many athletic departments rely on football to fund their entire operating budgets, but fielding a football team requires providing scholarships for more than sixty male students. Therefore, under Title IX directives, more than sixty female students must also be given athletic scholarships, which then requires athletic departments to create enough female sports to field sixty participants with the knowledge that these activities will not garner enough fan support to pay for their existence. Consequently, athletic directors nationwide have eliminated many non-revenue male sports, with the claim that athletics programs can no longer afford to fund them. The corollary is that athletic directors have viable alternatives to eliminating men's teams such as wrestling and swimming. The net result of these conflicting interpretations is that many intercollegiate athletics programs are held in suspense on their character and composition. Though difficult, failure to comply with Title IX directives can bring harsh and far-reaching repercussions; therefore academic leaders and athletic directors continue to review their intercollegiate athletic enterprise to ensure that women are equally represented.

Competing in a Brave New Century of Sport

The most conspicuous example of the problems of success and popularity that faced intercollegiate athletics in the late twentieth century can be seen in the 1991 and 2001 reform reports of the Knight Foundation Commission on the Future of Intercollegiate Athletics. The absence of a government agency, combined with the limits of such voluntary associations as the National Collegiate Athletic Association to bring integrity to the governance of college sports, has prompted foundations to take the lead in promoting public discussion of the issues and problems. In 1991 the Knight Foundation panel, dominated by university presidents along with some executives and legislators, proposed that strong presidential involvement was the key to protecting the interests of student-athletes. A decade later, the emphasis was on cost containment as the essential ingredient in curbing the commercialism of intercollegiate sports. Whether or not such reforms have a widespread and enduring influence, intercollegiate athletics persist, for better or worse (or both), as a distinctive part of American higher education.

By the 1990s discussions about student-athletes had shifted from the question, "Are college athletics being paid?" to the proposition, "How much should college athletes be paid?" Such debates followed logically from research by economists who concluded that the National Collegiate Athletic Association had become a highly lucrative cartel, and that athletes participating in big-time programs were, in essence, often being exploited by their institutions and associations as "unpaid professionals." Furthermore, coaches in high profile sports enhanced their stature as celebrities rather than as educators, complete with endorsements and special contracts to supplement their base salaries. To increase the seriousness of these concerns, athletic programs at all institutions, including the most conspicuous ones, faced a paradox of prosperity: despite unprecedented revenues, most teams and programs were not financially self-supporting. Even at the Division IA level of NCAA competition, future funding of intercollegiate athletics faced a situation of dubious fiscal fitness.

The conventional wisdom was that overemphasis on intercollegiate athletics was most prevalent in the relatively small number of big-time programs at large universities. Yet significant, systematic research sponsored by the Mellon Foundation in 2000 suggested otherwise. William G. Bowen and James Shulman's study, The Game of Life: College Sports and Educational Values, complicated the profile with their finding that even at-or, perhaps, especially at-academically selective and relatively small-sized colleges and universities, the demands on student-athletes' time were substantial. Furthermore, at these institutions, usually regarded as apart from athletic excess, commitment to strong varsity sports programs tended to exert inordinate influence on such decisions as admissions and allocation of campus resources. Academic and public concern over the proper place of athletics in American colleges and universities remained problematic at most institutions at the start of the twenty-first century.

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College Athletics - History Of Athletics In U.s. Colleges And Universities

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History Of Athletics In U.s. Colleges And Universities Intercollegiate athletics in the United States has come to be regarded as higher education's "peculiar institution." This somewhat critical characterization results from the fact that although intercollegiate athletics is seldom listed as part of the central mission of a college or university, athletics have come to command inordinate visibility, resources, influence, and attention both inside and outside many campuses.

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Almost $100K per year: Highest-paying jobs you can get without a college degree

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Almost $100K per year: Highest-paying jobs you can get without a college degree

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College is often touted as the pathway to a brighter financial future. But this is not always the case. The cost of tuition, books, lodgingand more can be expensive, and it drives many into tens of thousands of dollars in debt. While college grads certainly earn higher wages on average, some make relatively little. These are the college majors that pay off the least.

On the other hand, there are jobs that require little to no secondary education yet pay very well. The median annual wage for all jobs in the United States is $38,640. There are a handful of jobs that require only a high school diploma or an equivalent education that pay more than double that.

24/7 Wall St. reviewed data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics to determine the highest paying jobs you can get without a college degree.

While salary is always a major factor when choosing a job or career field, there are other considerations that need to be taken into account - like whether the job will still be in demand in the future. Some low-skill jobs are already being phased out by automation, but by 2026, employment is projected to decline for only three of the 20 highest paying jobs you can get without a college degree, according to the BLS. Only two of the 20 jobs listed here, however, are projected to have employment growth beyond the projected overall U.S. job growth rate of 7.4% by 2026.

There are many jobs that keep society running - by providing power, security, transportation, and many other valuable services. Such jobs can command higher pay without requiring a degree and account for many of the jobs on this list.

Though these jobs pay well, they certainly have drawbacks. Many of the careers on this list are in the transportation sector, which often requires employees to work long and irregular hours. Other jobs on this list can be dangerous, particularly those in law enforcement. These are the most dangerous jobs in America.
Online gambling: 20. Signal and track switch repairers Now available around the clock in this state
* Median annual wage: $70,490

* Total employment: 7,730

* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): +1.3%
19. Petroleum pump system operators, refinery operators and gaugers
About 5% of American workers commute using transit, according to CityLab estimates. This often means taking the train. Everyone who regularly travels by rail knows that tracks and switches malfunction often. Signal and track switch repairers are tasked with diagnosing and addressing the issues in these systems and fixing them to keep travelers safe and on time. Most signal repairers make more than $70,000 per year, nearly double the U.S. median annual wage of $38,640. This job typically requires just a high school diploma and no prior work experience for applicants.

* Median annual wage: $70,860

* Total employment: 38,930

* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): +2.8%
18. Electrical power-line installers and repairers
Petroleum pump system operators, refinery operators, and gaugers help to set up oil wells and ensure that they continue pumping. As part of the generally higher-paying oil and natural gas industry, these workers are well compensated. Most earn over $70,000 per year. As renewable energy becomes more common, oil and gas industry jobs may be drying up. Total employment for pump system operators is only projected to grow by 2.8% by 2026 - well below the 7.4% growth projected across all jobs in the same time frame.

* Median annual wage: $70,910

* Total employment: 114,800

* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): +13.9%
17. Gas plant operators
With electricity powering cell phone chargers, TVs, and computers, our power grids are more important than ever. The power line installer field is expected to be one of the fastest growing in the country. There are projected to be 13.9% more installers and repairer jobs in 2026 than there were in 2016 - nearly double the projected overall U.S. job growth. As of May 2018, there are already over 100,000 power line installers and repairers.

* Median annual wage: $71,070

* Total employment: 14,620

* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): +0.0%
16. Ship engineers
Gas plant operators ensure that natural gas plants safely store and distribute gas. Though this job does not require a college degree or work experience, it can take a long time to become familiar with all the equipment used in a gas plant so operators typically need long-term on-the-job training to become proficient. The BLS projects no growth in the profession from 2016 to 2026.

* Median annual wage: $71,130

* Total employment: 8,740

* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): +6.5%
She received a postcard sent in 1993: 15. First-line supervisors of non-retail sales workers Now, she found the sender
Though ship engineer jobs do not require a four-year college degree, running and maintaining all the engines, boilers, and machinery on board a ship is a difficult skill set to acquire. Licensing exams for engineers typically require several years of maritime experience in lieu of education. As with many jobs that require significant expertise, ship engineers are well paid. Most earn more than $71,000 annually.

* Median annual wage: $73,390

* Total employment: 247,570
14. Transportation inspectors
* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): +4.9%

First-line supervisors of non-retail sales workers have one of the more common jobs in the country, with nearly a quarter-million Americans in this line of work. Also known as branch managers or sales managers, these people supervise sales workers and work with corporate officials to boost sales figures. These managers are typically expected to have some related work experience.

* Median annual wage: $73,780

* Total employment: 29,990
13. Transit and railroad police
* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): +5.9%

Transportation inspectors are tasked with monitoring the goods that travel, either by truck, rail, or other means, and ensure the loads comply with all local, state, and federal laws. Transportation inspectors earn a median annual wage of $73,780, more than $35,000 beyond the median annual wage of all jobs. Career prospects in this field appear stable, with a projected 5.9% total growth in employment expected by 2026.

* Median annual wage: $74,030

* Total employment: 4,470
12. Gaming managers
* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): +6.3%

Transit and railroad police is one of several police and law enforcement careers that pays over $70,000 per year without requiring a college degree in most cases. These law enforcement officers protect transit equipment as well as transit employees and passengers. This is one of just 13 jobs that do not require a college education in which most workers earn over $74,000.

* Median annual wage: $74,700

* Total employment: 4,300
11. Postmasters and mail superintendents
* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): +2.5%

Gaming managers, also known as pit bosses, monitor casinos and other areas where legal gambling takes place. These managers are tasked with ensuring that players and employees follow all of the casino rules, and that all payouts are correct. These employees often work irregular hours, and they have one of the highest hourly wages of any position at an average of $40.99, higher than all but four other jobs that do not require a college degree.

* Median annual wage: $75,970

* Total employment: 13,770
10. First-line supervisors of fire fighting and prevention workers
* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): -20.9%

Like other positions with managerial duties, postmasters and mail superintendents are well compensated. The median annual wage for this job is nearly $76,000. But with the advent of email and other online communications, physical letters are much less common than they used to be. By 2026, the BLS expects there will be 20.9% fewer postmasters than there were in 2016, one of the largest projected declines of any career field.

* Median annual wage: $76,330

* Total employment: 65,920
9. Power plant operators
* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): +7.2%

Being a firefighter is a dangerous job, and firefighters' first-line supervisors coordinate fire fighting activities, including putting out blazes as quickly and safely as possible. This high-stress position is relatively well paid, as most people in this field earn over $76,000 per year. Though no college degree is required, applicants are expected to have certifications, on-the-job training, and experience in the field.

* Median annual wage: $79,610

* Total employment: 33,920
8. Elevator installers and repairers
* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): +1.3%

Though power plant operators are not generally required to have a four-year college degree, anyone interested to work in this job is most likely expected to have years of training on the job in order to be competent. Employment growth in the field is projected to grow at a relatively slow pace of 1.3% from 2016 to 2026. Though people will continue to need electricity, advancements in technology would allow for more efficient and automated devices may stifle growth.

* Median annual wage: $79,780

* Total employment: 26,830
7. Electrical and electronics repairers, powerhouse, substation and relay
* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): +12.1%

The U.S. population is growing, but the U.S. landmass is not. The solution is to build more tall buildings to house people and their places of business instead of single-family homes. Elevator installers are needed to ensure people can get up and down in tall buildings, while repairers are needed to maintain the elevators. Elevator jobs are projected to grow 12.1% from 2016 to 2026, far surpassing the 7.4% projected growth rate of the overall U.S. labor pool.

* Median annual wage: $80,200

* Total employment: 22,980
6. Detectives and criminal investigators
* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): +3.7%

Electrical and electronics repair is one of seven jobs that do not require a four-year college degree but still pays over $80,000 in most cases. This job is of vital importance, as these workers monitor power generating stations to ensure they are running smoothly and fix any issues that arise. This field generally requires some on-the-job training and related work experience.

* Median annual wage: $81,920

* Total employment: 103,450
Used in dozens of foods: 5. Commercial pilots EPA green lights use of pesticide linked to brain damage in children
* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): +4.5%

Though a college education is not typically required for detectives and criminal investigators, they must first train at a police academy and work their way up through the ranks of their department. There are over 100,000 investigators and detectives in the United States, most of whom make more than $80,000 per year.

* Median annual wage: $82,240
4. Power distributors and dispatchers
* Total employment: 37,870

* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): +3.8%

Flying a plane requires expertise and experience. Commercial pilots must be certified before they can take to the skies. Most commercial pilots make over $82,000 per year, but some earn much more. The position's average (as opposed to median) annual wage is $96,530 - the second highest average among all jobs that do not require a college education.

* Median annual wage: $86,410
3. First-line supervisors of police and detectives
* Total employment: 11,620

* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): -2.5%

Power distributors coordinate and regulate the energy generated from electricity or steam sources. Powering the country is an important job, and these workers are well compensated, with most pulling in over $86,000 a year. As power plants and devices both become more efficient, automated, and advanced, the number of distributors and dispatchers needed to manage and regulate power distribution will likely shrink. The BLS projects the number of total power distributors and dispatchers will decline 2.5% by 2026 from 2016.

* Median annual wage: $89,030
2. Nuclear power reactor operators
* Total employment: 116,660

* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): +6.6%

First-line supervisors of police and detectives are commonly known as sergeants or captains in the police department. Like the detectives they supervise, these law enforcement professionals do not need a college degree, but they have to complete the police academy training and gain experience solving crimes on the job. Most of these supervisors make over $89,000 annually, well more than double the median annual wage for all jobs.

* Median annual wage: $94,350
Cleaning house: 1. Transportation, storage and distribution managers Philadelphia to fire 13 police officers after series of discriminatory Facebook posts
* Total employment: 6,280

* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): -10.2%

Nuclear power reactor operators are not required to have an advanced physics or engineering degrees - or any degree for that matter. They are, however, required to obtain certification that they are competent. Most people in this career earn over $94,000 per year, but the jobs are becoming much less common. About half of Americans oppose nuclear power usage in the United States, and about 10% of reactor operator jobs that existed in 2016 are projected to be gone by 2026.

* Median annual wage: $94,730

* Total employment: 124,810
24/7 Wall Street is a USA TODAY content partner offering financial news and commentary. Its content is produced independently of USA TODAY.
* Employment growth projection (2016-2026): +6.7%

Of all the jobs that one can reasonably expect to get without a college degree, transportation, storage, and distribution managers are generally paid the best. These managers, often employed by trucking companies, ensure their employer's goods are shipped and stored in the fastest, cheapest, and most efficient way. The median annual wage for this job is $94,730, as compared to the $38,640 median wage for all jobs. Nearly 125,000 Americans work in this field, and the BLS projects a 6.7% job growth from 2016 to 2026 in this field, nearly in line with projected growth for all jobs of 7.4%.

Methodology

To identify the highest paying jobs that do not require a college degree, 24/7 Wall St. reviewed annual median wage estimates for all occupations from the Occupational Employment Statistics Survey conducted by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics of the Department of Labor. Wage data are from the May 2018 survey. The typical education needed to enter the 20 occupations listed - high school diploma or equivalent, no formal education credential, postsecondary non-degree award, and some college but no degree - came from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics' Employment Projections program. Full- and part-time occupations are counted across all employment types, including federal, state, and local governments, as well as all private establishments. The Employment Projections program includes self-employed workers. The OES excludes self-employed workers.

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Almost $100K per year: Highest-paying jobs you can get without a college degree

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College is often touted as the pathway to a brighter financial future. But this is not always the case. The cost of tuition, books, lodgingand more can be expensive, and it drives many into tens of thousands of dollars in debt. While college grads certainly earn higher wages on average, some make relatively little.

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CEO of , the only AI cybersecurity solution currently deployed on 1B connected devices. Acclaimed by World Economic Forum, Gartner.
Smart cities might sound like the far future, but they are not. A simple glance at our surroundings proves that things that were fiction just a few years ago are now a reality. The devices in our life communicate with one another and receive commands remotely, creating the Internet of Things (IoT), which seems to finally be on track to becoming fast and reliable enough for large-scale adoption in cities with 5G technology. McKinsey & Company projects IoT's market value at $11.1 trillion by 2025.

In the meantime, the number of smart homes is expected to surpass the 300 million mark by 2023. I bring smart homes into this because they are a good testbed for smart technologies and connected services before introducing them on a large scale. As the CEO of a company that develops multi-layered security solutions to protect devices in smart homes, we have seen how widespread smart devices really are in American households.
What Smart Home Technologies Do At Home
Pioneering smart cities are bound to run into some of the same issues that we get in smart homes, just on a larger scale. And when we are talking about entire cities, it is better to be safe than sorry.
* Energy Conservation
Smart solutions are becoming more available. In the '90s, it took Bill Gates seven years to build his smart home, but now most people can get it done in less than a month. Talking about every single solution is beyond the scope of this article, but we are seeing three valuable elements that connected devices bring to the consumer market:
* Dynamic Routines And Resource Use
Energy efficiency is a key concern, and smart lighting systems have eco-friendly features such as adjusting their brightness based on daylight availability or the presence of someone in the room. While this is a great thing for people at home, smart city technologies could build on it to have dynamic lighting that powers down whenever there are no people or moving vehicles in the vicinity.
* Removing Guesswork
Anything from beds to dishwashers or toasters can be smart, letting you automate most chores or routines. A smart toaster can turn itself on exactly five minutes after you leave the smart shower to give you enough time to get dressed and ready for breakfast. Municipal services are no different, and we might see them placing sensors and digital road signs to direct traffic through uncongested streets as soon as there are signs of increased traffic flow.
The Things That Could Possibly Go Wrong
Does your cat's litter box need cleaning? Thousands of people do not waste time asking that question because they use self-cleaning litter boxes that wash down, disinfect, dry and fill up all by themselves. Removing guesswork saves time. At scale, smart rubbish bins and containers could optimize one of the most expensive municipal services by removing the guesswork and long data gathering periods needed to optimize trash collection schedules.

For all the wonderful things connected IoT devices can do, they also create dependencies, which can be extremely volatile at a city scale. Malicious attacks and device security are still issues. IoT devices are often not powerful enough to run any anti-malware solution, and connecting these devices to the internet directly can make other devices on the home network vulnerable. This means that every part of a connected system must be secured.

One approach for IoT cybersecurity is protection at the gateway (router), which can help prevent direct access to vulnerable devices. Many manufacturers are locking down devices and routing their connectivity through the cloud, and while it is better than leaving ports open on the device, it can create new challenges.

A good example is the recent Google power outage where Google Home stopped functioning altogether. As one user tweeted, "I'm sitting here in the dark in my toddler's room because the light is controlled by @Google Home. Rethinking...a lot right now." And it was not an isolated incident.

A power outage at Amazon's web infrastructure left many smart homes unable to function. Roombas stopped cleaning; smart doorbells stopped alerting owners when someone approached the door.

These incidents are an understandable part of innovation, which always has advantages and disadvantages. But as we jump toward more connectivity in the coming years, we have to consider the technological gaps that might endanger entire cities if we do not have a backup plan.

Putting Thought Into The Smart Cities Of Today

Smart cities offer opportunities to use pervasive computing for the benefit of local communities. They can play a vital role in dealing with the challenges of urbanization, energy distribution, health, public safety and sustainability. Toronto, San Francisco and Tel Aviv are already experimenting with modern technologies, bringing better connectivity to citizens and making them a bigger part of the municipal decisions.

To propel smart city adoption, companies in this space should focus on two key areas: protection from malicious remote access and creating fallbacks for cloud dependencies. In our experience, network-level or gateway security has been a reliable solution for preventing remote access. Security companies also need to cooperate with internet service providers and OEMs to provide security at scale for every connected device.

There is no real reason smart city technologies should fall flat due to public concerns if they take their lessons from what is happening in the smart home sector.

Forbes Business Council is the foremost growth and networking organization for business owners and leaders. Do I qualify?

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Council Post: Evaluating Smart Home Challenges To Improve Future Smart Cities

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CEO of , the only AI cybersecurity solution currently deployed on 1B connected devices. Acclaimed by World Economic Forum, Gartner. Smart cities might sound like the far future, but they are not. A simple glance at our surroundings proves that things that were fiction just a few years ago are now a reality.

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Our mental health is largely shaped by the circumstances in which we are born, grow, and age in, and, in turn, these circumstances are often heavily influenced by the commercial environment in which we live. ¹

In this context, the actions of corporations and the strategies they adopt to promote their products or services, have a significant impact on our health. It is therefore important that the power of corporations is subject to appropriate checks and balances to ensure that their behaviours align more closely with the public good. ² This is particularly important to the concept of mental health security - the protection from threats to our mental health.

Health security is understood in a collective way - reducing the vulnerability of communities to harms to health - and an individual way - access to safe and effective products, services and technologies. ³ In other words, we cannot expect that public education alone will be enough to improve people's health, unless we also take steps to protect them from harmful factors over which they have no personal control.

One industry that is growing at a significant rate year-on-year is the global app industry, with an estimated worth of $6.3 trillion by 2021. ⁴ A significant subset of this industry includes imageediting apps, which people can download from application stores (App Store, Google Play), to edit their photos. Many of these apps are free to download but encourage in-app purchases for users to unlock extra features.

We consider it vital that we take action to understand how these apps influence people's body image and their mental health. It is an industry that is growing largely unchecked, in a space where the potential to negatively impact people's lives is significant.

Taking Action

Based on this accumulating evidence, we propose the following actions:

1. Body positivity and kindness activists, interested organisations and individuals should engage with the #EverydayLookism campaign. Negative comments about other people's bodies matter. When we shame bodies, we shame people. These are lookist comments. We no longer put up with sexist comments, we don't need to keep putting up with lookist comments. Sharing your lookism stories shows how common lookism is, calls it out, and says it's not ok. Visit the website to find out more and use #EverydayLookism and #BeBodyKind on social media.

2. Google Play and App Store should update their guidelines for developers to explicitly include 'mental health' in the range of harms that are unacceptable. We recognise there will be issues regarding liability. However, guidance on the definition of mental health can take this into account and this can be co-produced with the Mental Health Foundation and other experts. We recommend that at a minimum the guidelines are updated to clearly state that apps should not promote images that are outright lookist, shaming, or triggering of past trauma or eating disorders.

3. Google Play and App Store should make it mandatory that all body and face image-editing apps are rated as PEGI 12/16 and 13+ respectively, to ensure that children and young people who are below the legal age for having a social media account (13 years old) are not using these apps. All in-app purchases for additional features should be restricted to people over the age of 18, to ensure predatory promotion is restricted. Currently, only a handful of these apps are restricted in this way, and most have no age restrictions, thus often allowing children as young as five to download and use them.

4. Research should focus on understanding the features of image-editing apps that are most harmful to body satisfaction and mental health. Research can take an ethical perspective in defining more clearly the line which determines which image-editing apps or features are acceptable and which are unacceptable because of the high risk they pose to mental health.

5. Researchers and experts who design services should consider developing new social media literacy training for children and young people. All training and other programmes should employ a coproduction approach, involving children and young people in their development as well as parents and carers. There appears to be relatively little in the applied research that looks at parents in relation to body image and modelling positive behaviours. Given that parents have a significant influence on the way in which children view their bodies, parents need to be included more in the discussion about image-editing apps.

6. Everyone should be more aware that if they see an advert in a magazine, on television or online that they think presents an unhealthy body image as aspirational, they can complain to the Advertising Standards Authority. This includes online or other predatory advertising in relation to image-editing apps. Advertisements that promote these apps to more vulnerable groups, for instance young people belonging to BAME communities, warrant greater scrutiny and investigation.

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Our mental health is largely shaped by the circumstances in which we are born, grow, and age in, and, in turn, these circumstances are often heavily influenced by the commercial environment in which we live. 1 In this context, the actions of corporations and the strategies they adopt to promote their products or services, have a significant impact on our health.