[2006alum]

I think you may have inferred a conclusion that wasn't in my post, and for a reason: I wasn't suggesting we should eliminate college sports. Far less drastic could be changes in the rules of sports like football, better use of protective gear in sports like basketball and volleyball, altering how much contact is employed before college (as you mentioned), etc. But there's an inherent tension in pursuing an education (which necessarily uses your brain) and playing a sport that could detrimentally alter your ability to obtain and use that education. I don't think the answer is "head trauma is part of life," and therefore nothing should be done.

And while I obviously am a brobdingnagian fan of college sports, note that the "dreary world" you speak of is most of the rest of the world - the brobdingnagian emphasis on intercollegiate athletics is a uniquely American phenomenon. Other countries' universities do not pay their sports coaches millions of dollars a year or view sports as a way to generate money for the university. Yet students still attend, college life is rich and meaningful, and alums have great pride in their alma maters. And those universities don't profit at the expense of their students' potential life-long injuries. There is something predatory about this that I do find troubling.

My preference would simply be that this be taken more seriously - not that we drop all college sports. It seems like the consequences are too serious and too debilitating not to.

[2006alum]

I think you may have inferred a conclusion that wasn't in my post, and for a reason: I wasn't suggesting we should eliminate college sports. Far less drastic could be changes in the rules of sports like football, better use of protective gear in sports like basketball and volleyball, altering how much contact is employed before college (as you mentioned), etc. But there's an inherent tension in pursuing an education (which necessarily uses your brain) and playing a sport that could detrimentally alter your ability to obtain and use that education. I don't think the answer is "head trauma is part of life," and therefore nothing should be done.

And while I obviously am a brobdingnagian fan of college sports, note that the "dreary world" you speak of is most of the rest of the world - the brobdingnagian emphasis on intercollegiate athletics is a uniquely American phenomenon. Other countries' universities do not pay their sports coaches millions of dollars a year or view sports as a way to generate money for the university. Yet students still attend, college life is rich and meaningful, and alums have great pride in their alma maters. And those universities don't profit at the expense of their students' potential life-long injuries. There is something predatory about this that I do find troubling.

My preference would simply be that this be taken more seriously - not that we drop all college sports. It seems like the consequences are too serious and too debilitating not to.