FIND THE BLACK STUDENT WHO

IS NOT AN ATHLETE!

Imagine being an Ethiopian in Rome. Even imagine you are a citizen going to the coliseum where there will be more gladiators who look like you but few. if any, citizens with your skin.  Imagine being a fan rooting for your gladiators.  Do you think the black guy with huge muscles in the Roman armor is like you?

Now look at the graphic above and think about our state where the proportion of pre professional African Americans enrolled as student athletes (not mention the Black players on our game winning Seahawks!) so far outnumbers the Black folks we see on our streets.  Who do you root for at a Husky game?

Then go back to the graphic and find the black student who is NOT an athlete.  How do you suppose she feels about the culture at UCLA?

Read more about the disparity in our sister PAC 10 12 school where the Bruins have more  NCAA Championships than they have Black male freshmen!

Then think about this the next time you go to a “Husky” game.  Who are YOU rooting for?

Hell, I root for the Huskies too.  What I do not root for is the fact that we recruit Black athletes to the UW without competing for the same Black students who go to Stanford on athletic scholarships.   When asked about this by myself and by a Black colleague, the AD claimed that the UW was not a good enough school to compete for these players!

I think that is bullshit.  The UW is a world  leading school, better than Stanford in many departments that I would guess at least some African American students might value.  Hell. I have an idea!  Why can’t the UW recruit these kids as just plain students?  Then there can be no dammed NCAA limit on the scholarship and a smart kid who decides her would rather be a doctor then an NFL tackle could just choose to do that?

Why don’t we use the Athletic Department as tool to make the UW a place more superb African American students might want to go to?

Or do we just want  “them” as gladiators?