Volume 7, Issue 3

Colgate's President Rebecca Chopp explains why colleges should maintain a balance between academics and sports competition.

Chancellor Gordon Gee of Vanderbilt University emphasizes the essential role that coaches play in character development in this interview with JCC's David Eberhardt. Gee stresses that coaches must first live by the standards that they set for their studentathletes in guiding their moral decisions.

The Journal of College and Character's editor Jon Dalton asks President Larry Shinn of Berea College how he believes sports and coaches influence character development in youth.

Few university athletic programs are likely to have a more loyal supporter in their president than "T.K." Wetherell, an FSU graduate, a former member of the FSU football team, and a life-long supporter of FSU athletics.

Student-athletes' "ego orientation," which is oriented toward the goal of producing sports success, fails in most educational settings whereas "task orientation" is more effective in encouraging educational development. By recognizing this goal-setting difference, advisors can better steer collegiate student-athletes toward academic success.

The present study sought to investigate further the defining of character by interviewing a sample of Division IA head coaches. Important commonalities in how coaches define character are presented.

Can one's experience in organized sport help create good citizens? Little empirical evidence exists to explain or predict athletic pathways to engaged citizenship. The purpose of this exploratory, cross-sectional study of eleven teams of NCAA D-III female collegiate athletes (n = 160, M age = 19.5, SD = 1.2) was to examine how civic attitudes and behaviors (Keeter, Zukin, Andolina, Jenkins, 2002) related to individual athlete and team climate variables

Participation in sports continues to be a major part of our society. Individuals participate in sports for health and fitness reasons, but also for "other" reasons; such as character building and socialization. Whether sports builds character is an ongoing debate. This paper adds to the discussion by providing insights into what character is and what it looks like in sports, and reviews some of the literature and research on whether sports does build character.

The purpose of this study was to examine intercollegiate athletic compliance officers' approaches to rule interpretations and deliberations. Compliance officers representatives from each of the Pacific Ten Conference institutions were interviewed. The findings showed that different approaches were used in reading and applying NCAA and Conference regulations. The different approaches to interpretations and justifications have important implications for professional ethics educators and policy makers.

Whether or not institutions need to respond to academic dishonesty is certainly not an ethical dilemma, but the type of response deserves thoughtful consideration.

Wayne W. Dyer asserts that there is a spiritual force, right at our fingertips.

The authors document the collective thinking and dialogue among participants in a year-long dialogue sponsored by the National Forum on Higher Education for the Public Good, hosted at the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor.

Students with strong religious beliefs, regardless of political convictions, will be moved by the stories in Soul of a Citizen.

Colette Swensen attends Florida State University and plays on the FSU women's soccer team. Her essay demonstrates the influence that coaches shed on the players that they are guiding, not only in skills in their sport, but in life.

In Values of the Game (l998) Bill Bradley writes that sports provided him not only with great joy but "values that can shape a lifetime (p. XV)." Participation in sports seems to have a similar impact on many people, and several of the writers in this special issue of the Journal of College and Character describe the life-shaping influence of sports in their own lives and the lives of others. Participation in sports can provide great enjoyment as well as lessons in character that, as Bradley argued, stay with you for a very long time.