UConn Professor Joseph Cooper Looking for Answers for Student-Athletes
The discussion of how student-athletes are treated by schools, particularly in the Division 1 sports which generate the revenues that fund a university’s entire athletic department, has reached a boiling point across the past few years.
Dr. Joseph Cooper, a UConn professor, will be sharing findings from his research on this topic and talking about his new book, From Exploitation Back to Empowerment: Black Male Holistic (Under)Development Through Sport and (Mis)Education, at an on-campus event Monday evening that is open for anyone to attend.
The disparate paths of college athletics, and the inequalities that result, are stark and important to explore.
The NCAA Tournament’s Final Four is played in a cavernous football stadium while college football has moved games from its traditional Saturday position to just about every night of the week, all over pursuit of the almighty dollar. So it doesn’t take much for even the most casual fan to wonder who benefits from those financial gains of these structural changes.
While the revenue generated has increased rapidly over the years, and coaches and administrators make about 10x more than they did just a decade ago, player compensation has remained relatively flat beyond the college scholarship that most players don’t want and fails to address necessary living costs.
Moreover, quite clearly, there is very little thought put into preparing student-athletes for life after sports. Coaches are hardly, if at all, incentivized towards academic or life outcomes of the student-athletes under their charge. Most Division 1 football and basketball players feel strongly that they’re there to play sports, and their coaches largely agree. All of these kids think they’ll go pro.
Even if the college players end up making it professionally, though, there is a life after sports. Some stop playing competitively while still in school, and they have time to readjust their lives while still on campus. Others, after four years of being shuffled through 12 credits a semester so they can spend 40+ hours per week being the best athlete they can be for the school, are left in a major identity crisis and without any support, during their greatest time of need.
Dr. Cooper is looking to help both of those groups, but particularly the latter, with his research. A tenure-track professor in sports management who has been at UConn since 2013, Cooper made the junior varsity basketball team at UNC-Chapel Hill as a freshman before moving on to the next stage of his life.
“I had a post-athletic career identity crisis while in college,” Cooper shared. “For a significant part of my life the most salient aspect was being an athlete… My self worth was very much tied into my athletic ability.”
Cooper considers himself lucky to have been in school during this time, and to have had the opportunity to experience a journey of self-discovery similar to most normal college students.
Others are not so fortunate.
“If you’re in college for four years, where a number of peers are exploring their identities, being involved in different things,” Cooper said, “study abroad, internships, changing your major… For student-athletes, who don’t get those experiences, no doubt once your career ends there’s going to be a period of challenge.”
Understandably, some former athletes are able to navigate this transition better than others. Through his research, Cooper has identified specific aspects of a student-athlete’s college experience that are indicators for success transitioning away from life as an athlete.
“I don’t think a one-size fits all approach works for student-athletes,” Cooper said.
His approach is called holistic development, and it encourages athletic departments to seek out a few simple ways to improve the athletes’ experience:
- Documentation of their experience via third-party (anonymous) survey and/or interviews
- Strengthen partnerships with on-campus resource and community centers, such as mental health, career office, cultural centers, and academic departments
- Diversify athletic staff
- Mental health training for coaches
- Incentives and promotion for coaches based on holistic development goals
In professional sports it’s easy to focus on the stars, and the millions they make, and assume every pro athlete has a great life. But it ignores the players fighting for their livelihood at the fringes and lower tier. Similarly, it is easy to see the exceptional college players on their way to millions in the pros, or the Academic All-American who exemplifies the student-athlete model, and believe the current setup is acceptable.
But the vast majority of college athletes fall into neither of those categories, and many are struggling or eventually will because the school cares more about maintaining eligibility when it comes to their academic careers.
“When coaches get paid millions of dollars solely to win games, you’ll be pretty certain that holistic development isn’t their top priority. It’s athletic performance,” Cooper said.
Dr. Cooper also is the faculty founder of a student group called Collective Uplift. The goal of this group is to bring student-athletes together to discuss issues above and outside of the playing field.
Former Husky football player DeShon Foxx was one of the first members of Collective Uplift. Recently, after three years in the NFL, Foxx made the difficult decision to end his playing career after a neck injury even though he had calls coming in from the Canadian Football League and Arena Football as well. He decided to come back to UConn to pursue a masters degree in sports management. He’s also coaching and working in the athletic department at nearby Loomis-Chaffee in Windsor, Conn.
"If I didn’t have that community through Collective Uplift reiterating that I’m more than just an athlete, I’m more to society than catching balls and scoring touchdowns, that helped me a lot," Foxx said.
"Without Collective Uplift, I might’ve pushed graduate school and taken [another football opportunity] making significantly less than in the NFL and taking on the risks and dangers of the game because my identity was football," he added.
Other former students of Dr. Cooper’s include basketball superstar Breanna Stewart and football players such as Marquis Vann, Jordan Floyd, who teaches special education in Maryland, Cam Stapleton, Richard Levy, and Josh Marriner, who started a chapter of Collective Uplift at Old Dominion University after ending up there as a graduate transfer.
UConn has provided a useful laboratory for Dr. Cooper’s work. Now he gets to share the results with the campus that provided them. The event is taking place at the African-American Cultural Center at 7 p.m. on February 18th.
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