Austin American Statesman

This quote from Kirk Bohls was in the DN:

"BYU remains a possibility, but its use of older, more mature athletes because of two-year mission trips, its refusal to play on Sundays and its lack of an impeccable academic pedigree make it a harder sell,"



I'm sorry, but when I compare BYU to the institutions in the Big XII, I have a really hard time with this statement. BYU would probably be the best academic institution in the conference.

IowaCougar wrote:
This quote from Kirk Bohls was in the DN:

"BYU remains a possibility, but its use of older, more mature athletes because of two-year mission trips, its refusal to play on Sundays and its lack of an impeccable academic pedigree make it a harder sell,"



I'm sorry, but when I compare BYU to the institutions in the Big XII, I have a really hard time with this statement. BYU would probably be the best academic institution in the conference.

I'd say that TWO of the THREE insinuations are baseless and ignorant. The two that I bolded.

Yes, because as we all know, academic pedigree is a key ingredient for an athletic conference. :roll: *cough* SEC *cough*

BYU is one of the best undergraduate programs in the country. BYU is pretty good re masters degree programs. MBA is one of the best, Accounting even higher, for example. Law School is top notch.



But lets be realistic. PHD programs are limited by comparison to PAC and most Big 12 or Big 10. We do not have a Medical School. These do not fit our mission.



Add in religious bias and these become the politically correct excuses along with Sunday play to exclude us.



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Where did that academic comment come from? Is that his foolish way of confusing that we're not a research institution and we require professors to teach? I could see if he said that as he would be stating a fact, but to make it sound like there is something wrong with our academic pedigree is like saying that flies don't land on crap.

I think he's going off of the ridiculous NCAA statistic of athletes who graduate within 5 or 6 years of enrolling, which BYU does poorly in because of the fact that we send our kids on 2 year mission 'trips.'

Well, the dude writes for the Statesman. They're about on par with the Tribune for me - maybe worse.

That article is not worth the paper it was written on. Not even worth responding to.

The argument against BYU's academics stems from what has been said above. You have to understand how universities generally see themselves. Those of the academic mindset get off on how many times they get published and research, etc. It's not about actually educating people (which BYU and other "teaching" universities take pride in).



The ultimate goal for the "research" universities is to produce PhD's and have their university's name attached to all of these articles. For the most part, academics don't live in the real world.

I'm guessing it also has to do with the "academic freedom" issue.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academic_freedom_at_Brigham_Young_University" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

You guys are getting pretty brassed about him not being informed about BYU's academics, but did you bother to educate yourselves on the BigXII's academics before you called him out?



As a first example, UT is a pretty damn fine academic institution:



17 - BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

1 - Accounting

3 - Information Systems

7 - Entrepreneurship

7 - Part-time MBA

12 - Marketing

14 - Production/Operations

15 - International

18 - Executive MBA

21 - Finance

20 - Supply Chain Logistics

20 - Management



COMMUNICATION

9 - Audiology (Ranked in 2009)

9 - Speech-language/Pathology (Ranked in 2009)



2 - EDUCATION

4 - Administration/Supervision

5 - Special Education

11 - Educational Psychology

12 - Curriculum/Instruction

14 - Secondary Teacher Education

18 - Higher Education Administration

18 - Elementary Education

23 - Rehabilitation Counseling



8 - ENGINEERING

1 - Petroleum (Ranked in 2009)

3 - Civil (Ranked in 2010)

4 - Environmental/Environmental Health (Ranked in 2010)

6 - Chemical (Ranked in 2010)

9 - Electrical/Electronic Communications (Ranked in 2010)

10 - Computer Engineering

10 - Aerospace/Aeronatical/Astronautical (Ranked in 2010)

11 - Mechanical (Ranked in 2010)

16 - Biomedical/Bioengineering (Ranked in 2010)

17 - Industrial/Manufacturing (Ranked in 2010)

19 - Materials (Ranked in 2010)



15 - FINE ARTS, MASTER OF (Ranked in 2008)

11 - Printmaking (Ranked in 2008)

18 - Sculpture (Ranked in 2008)

22 - Painting/Drawing (Ranked in 2008)



14 - LAW

10 - Tax Law

20 - Healthcare Law



LIBERAL ARTS

13 - Psychology

11 - Social Psychology (Ranked in 2009)

16 - Clinical Psychology (Ranked in 2009)

14 - Sociology (Ranked in 2009)

4 - Sociology of Population (Ranked in 2009)

16 - Social Stratification (Ranked in 2009)

17 - English (Ranked in 2009)

17 - History (Ranked in 2009)

1 - Latin American History (Ranked in 2009)

14 - Modern U.S. History (Ranked in 2009)

21 - Political Science (Ranked in 2009)

25 - Economics (Ranked in 2009)



8 - LIBRARY AND INFORMATION SCIENCE (Ranked in 2009)

1 - Archives and Preservation (Ranked in 2009)

3 - Law Librarianship (Ranked in 2009)

11 - Information Systems (Ranked in 2009)

13 - Digital Librarianship (Ranked in 2009)

16 - School Library Media (Ranked in 2009)



NATURAL SCIENCES

26 - Biological Sciences (Ranked in 2010)

6 - Ecology/Evolutionary Biology (Ranked in 2010)

8 - Computer Sciences (Ranked in 2010)

5 - Artificial Intelligence (Ranked in 2010)

5 - Programming Language (Ranked in 2010)

8 - Systems (Ranked in 2010)

10 - Theory (Ranked in 2010)

12 - Chemistry (Ranked in 2010)

5 - Analytical (Ranked in 2010)

10 - Theoretical (Ranked in 2010)

12 - Physical (Ranked in 2010)

14 - Organic (Ranked in 2010)

9 - Earth Sciences (Ranked in 2010)

3 - Geology (Ranked in 2010)

6 - Geophysics and Seismology (Ranked in 2010)

14 - Physics

5 - Plasma (Ranked in 2010)

13 - Elementary Particle/Fields/String Theory (Ranked in 2010)

14 - Mathematics (Ranked in 2010)

8 - Topology (Ranked in 2010)

9 - Applied Mathematic s(Ranked in 2010)

11 - Analysis (Ranked in 2010)

12 - Geometry (Ranked in 2010)

18 - Algebra/Number Theory/Algebraic Geometry (Ranked in 2010)

32 - NURSING

4 - PHARMACY (Ranked in 2008)

14 - PUBLIC AFFAIRS (Ranked in 2008)

6 - SOCIAL WORK (Ranked in 2008)





You'll notice that only seven of those categories are ranked outside of the top 20 in the nation. OU and Baylor aren't that far behind either.

stuckinbig10country wrote:
The ultimate goal for the "research" universities is to produce PhD's and have their university's name attached to all of these articles. For the most part, academics don't live in the real world.

It isn't even that complicated. The ultimately goal is MONEY. Publications are only important if they produce grants, and grants are important because of "indirect" costs, which the University absorbs.

Not sure if you meant me, Sno, but to clarify what I've said, I'm well aware that UT is a better school in most ways than BYU. It just seems silly to me that people on the outside try to make the argument that good academics are what make a good athletic conference, with the SEC as my primary counter example.

Ole Miss coach, and the dude in Austin are preemptively discrediting BYU to cover their bases if things don't go well over the next two weeks. Complaining about the mission thing equals "I might loose and it might be embarrassing". Kind of like when a democrat talks about increasing revenue it really means new taxes.

Just so you guys know, most Texas fans can't stand Kirk Bohls either.

"If they kick us, they only kick us upstairs." B.Young

At one level this comment is so blatantly uninformed that it smacks of bias and almost bigotry. Reasonable people (not of BYU fandom) see it more clearly the more blatant it becomes.