[82lsju]

This points out the inherent ambiguity involved in compiling these lists and why it's inevitable that various lists will be inconsistent. Consider Eric Heiden:

Competed internationally in speed skating from 1976-1980, retiring after his brilliant 5 gold medals (and 5 world records) at Lake Placid. During this time he was an undergrad at University of Wisconsin. After the Olympics he transferred to UCSD, and then he transferred to Stanford and graduated in 1984, at which point he started competing as a professional cyclist.

I'm proud that he's a fellow alumnus and great representative of the university, but it's a stretch to consider him a Stanford student-athlete in the context of the Olympics since he was at Wisconsin during the time that he was training and competing in speed skating. The counter argument is that he is indeed an alumnus (2x) and an Olympian, which opens the door for even more tenuous candidates such as Kerri Strug or even Al Oerter.

Bottom line is that different schools are going to use different criteria (and I assume that they will err on the side of inflating their numbers) and that third party articles are likely to be inconsistent due to the ambiguity of cases such as Heiden.

Personally I don't think Heiden should count towards Stanford's Olympic medal count, but if other schools are counting their numbers loosely then I understand that it's frustrating to feel short-changed when the numbers are compared, therefore tempting to use the same loose standards in compiling these lists.

looking at the list at gostandford.com list of summer olympic medal winners, Kerri Strug and Al Oerter are not listed as medal recipients so maybe Eric Heiden in not included in my assumed 37 winter medals.

[82lsju]

This points out the inherent ambiguity involved in compiling these lists and why it's inevitable that various lists will be inconsistent. Consider Eric Heiden:

Competed internationally in speed skating from 1976-1980, retiring after his brilliant 5 gold medals (and 5 world records) at Lake Placid. During this time he was an undergrad at University of Wisconsin. After the Olympics he transferred to UCSD, and then he transferred to Stanford and graduated in 1984, at which point he started competing as a professional cyclist.

I'm proud that he's a fellow alumnus and great representative of the university, but it's a stretch to consider him a Stanford student-athlete in the context of the Olympics since he was at Wisconsin during the time that he was training and competing in speed skating. The counter argument is that he is indeed an alumnus (2x) and an Olympian, which opens the door for even more tenuous candidates such as Kerri Strug or even Al Oerter.

Bottom line is that different schools are going to use different criteria (and I assume that they will err on the side of inflating their numbers) and that third party articles are likely to be inconsistent due to the ambiguity of cases such as Heiden.

Personally I don't think Heiden should count towards Stanford's Olympic medal count, but if other schools are counting their numbers loosely then I understand that it's frustrating to feel short-changed when the numbers are compared, therefore tempting to use the same loose standards in compiling these lists.

looking at the list at gostandford.com list of summer olympic medal winners, Kerri Strug and Al Oerter are not listed as medal recipients so maybe Eric Heiden in not included in my assumed 37 winter medals.