I think there are a lot of contributing factors generally. One of the primary factors are some guys, who as public education students were no taught how to study, or weren't motivated to study. They were motivated to be athletes and as good as that as they could be. Some were immature. And because they weren't great students but were often great athletes, that's where they positive feedback came from and became their primary focus.
Sometimes, college opens their eyes. The whole experience of meeting well educated people, and deciding to seek that. The great thing about being an OU athlete and especially an OU football player, is that you not only have access to great academic support, you are required to use that support if you're classroom performance isn't wonderful.
The fact is that a lot of the barely made it in, guys, don't make it. A lot of times it's their lack of effort. But not always. Bob runs a few off, if they just blow off going to class. They get second chances. They get early AM stadium steps. They get game and team suspensions. We've lost guys recently that just wouldn't take care of their business. Those who give effort get more chances. Those who behave acceptably get more chances.
I don't know how much it happens at OU, but some places, papers get written for them. Tests, especially online, get taken for them. But that's not only athletes doing things that way. I have a relative that get a degree at A&M, who took their final five classes online, and got test taking help online.
I have a customer, whose child was a really good student. Not an athlete. Their child was at Alabama when the tornado and storm damage wiped out the final five or six weeks of the semester and the entire university took the last six weeks online. TV classes and other such devices. I was headed over to that house to work, and the lady told me to come early and get my work done upstairs first, because he offspring was taking a final exam upstairs. So I needed to be gone before the test started.
When I got there, their child was upstairs with four friends, waiting around to take the test together.Let's assume it was a group project, even though it likely wasn't. There was going to be some help going on. This is not the way we took finals in the 70s. Not usually anyway.
The point is that there are all sorts of ways to cheat. But you're going to have to get some real work done to get a for real degree. I'm guessing that when Pitino is having staff hire strippers to have sex with players and recruits, that cheating in other areas, are maybe a little more likely. And in basketball, if they are really elite players, then they're not likely to hang around more than a year or two anyway. Schools are inventive enough to find enough classes with passable tests, even for the "slow learner" to keep them eligible for two or four semesters, even if they make "No progress toward a degree."
But what often happens is that the guy when he's 21 or younger, doesn't really see the value of anything but football, even if he is actually capable of getting a degree. But if he is, and doesn't take advantage of the educational opportunity, he will realize it later on, and he will return to get his degree. And often, if he hadn't had the required tutoring that got him progressed enough to be over halfway there, while a student, that wouldn't have happened.
So even if they don't maximize their opportunity in the short term, they still will in the future.
