[Row80Critic]

No, I don’t think that there is a bias for Olympic sports; I think the makeup of “country club” sports is different than the revenue sports, for a few reasons.  First and foremost, most of the non-revenue sports have a much weaker path to a professional career, especially for collegiate athletes.  For football the NFL draft selects almost exclusively from collegiate athletes; the NBA draft selects mostly from collegiate athletes plus some foreign players.  Thus, for many players, football and basketball is a means to an end (playing professionally).  The value of a Stanford education is not clear under those circumstances.  Most other sports don’t require college, so those who most value playing professionally will skip college athletics entirely.  Moreover, for many country club athletes, the athletics is a means to get into a prestigious education.  Many of those athletes go into sports in order to improve their chances at getting into Stanford, not vice versa.  Finally, for better or worse, the demographics of who plays certain sports is different, and sports like tennis, golf, soccer, etc. tend to attract the very upper middle class demographic who most values an elite education, and who has the resources to improve their chances of getting it (stuff like tutoring, college counselors, etc.). Now that latter one might be a good reason to “bend” admissions further for sports like football, but it does explain why it is easier to admit elite volleyball and tennis players than it is to admit elite football players.

BC

Can't disagree with any of that, all true.  However, I'd argue it's also a convenient truth -- a neatly packaged set of arguments for maintaining a status quo that accepts well-healed kids with curated resumes and the right image, and rejects extraordinarily talented kids because they lack the same.

[Row80Critic]

No, I don’t think that there is a bias for Olympic sports; I think the makeup of “country club” sports is different than the revenue sports, for a few reasons.  First and foremost, most of the non-revenue sports have a much weaker path to a professional career, especially for collegiate athletes.  For football the NFL draft selects almost exclusively from collegiate athletes; the NBA draft selects mostly from collegiate athletes plus some foreign players.  Thus, for many players, football and basketball is a means to an end (playing professionally).  The value of a Stanford education is not clear under those circumstances.  Most other sports don’t require college, so those who most value playing professionally will skip college athletics entirely.  Moreover, for many country club athletes, the athletics is a means to get into a prestigious education.  Many of those athletes go into sports in order to improve their chances at getting into Stanford, not vice versa.  Finally, for better or worse, the demographics of who plays certain sports is different, and sports like tennis, golf, soccer, etc. tend to attract the very upper middle class demographic who most values an elite education, and who has the resources to improve their chances of getting it (stuff like tutoring, college counselors, etc.). Now that latter one might be a good reason to “bend” admissions further for sports like football, but it does explain why it is easier to admit elite volleyball and tennis players than it is to admit elite football players.

BC

Can't disagree with any of that, all true.  However, I'd argue it's also a convenient truth -- a neatly packaged set of arguments for maintaining a status quo that accepts well-healed kids with curated resumes and the right image, and rejects extraordinarily talented kids because they lack the same.