ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, February 26, 1997 TAG: 9702260049
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-8 EDITION: METRO
"[W]HAT bothers me," university President Paul Torgersen said Monday of the off-the-field problems that in recent months have beset the university's Orange Bowl football team, "... Virginia Tech is being cited as an example of a national problem."
Good point - so far as it goes. Nationwide publicity is one principal benefit that the sponsoring universities derive from winning athletic teams, particularly in high-profile sports like football. If favorable publicity generated by success on the field is negated by unfavorable publicity generated by misbehavior off, then the whole enterprise comes into question.
But while Tech is far from the only school in America to encounter such troubles, such troubles aren't common to all schools. And while Tech's image across the country is a legitimate concern, it isn't all that's on the line.
Virginians ought also to worry about the situations that made it possible for the university to be plausibly cited as an example of a national problem. On the line as much as the university's image are its own self-respect, its ability to maintain a campus community that can live and learn together in reasonable peaceableness, and fairness toward those of its athletes who don't get into trouble.
The new policy unveiled Monday seems a good start. It includes formal across-the-board standards of discipline, up to and including dismissal from the relevant team, for Tech athletes who run afoul of the law. Disciplinary decisions are to be made not by the coach of the applicable sport but by Athletic Director Dave Braine.
Greater care is to be taken in recruiting. Specialists are to be hired in sports psychology and life-skills development. Athletes will be more closely mentored and monitored. Most of the cost of the initiatives - as much as $500,000, Braine estimated - is to be paid from bowl proceeds, and not from academic funds.
Tech's willingness to take a tougher line, and to commit resources to the task, may well win the university a measure of good publicity to counter the bad.
But the greater test of the policy's success will be its long-term impact closer to home. The result to look for, and the one we hope for, is teams made up of solid citizens and capable students - teams, that is, in which the Tech community and the people of Virginia can take unalloyed pride regardless of won-lost records or number of bowl bids.
LENGTH: Short : 48 linesby CNB