Along the Way: Big universities, gifted athletes, big pay
Do not be surprised if we soon hear of gifted student athletes being paid big dollars for playing major sports for the colleges and universities they are attending.
That’s my conclusion after a conversation I heard that included retired Kent State University and Bowling Green University President Carol Cartwright, who currently serves as vice chair of the NCAA’s Division I Infractions Committee.
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“At the top tier of college sports, it’s beginning to look like sports are really becoming professional,” she responded when I asked her about it. She said, “The patchwork of rules about compensating athletes for their name, image, and likeness, may give the committee plenty to consider as it does its work.”
Carol and Phil Cartwright were in the area a week ago to attend “Applause,” the big retirement send-off for Dr. Alex Johnson, who has served nine years as president of Cuyahoga Community College. Emceed by TV personality Leon Bibb, the gala, held at Cleveland’s Public Auditorium, raised a reported $1 million to further the educational mission of Tri-C.
Speaking at the event’s conclusion, Johnson went out of his way to salute Carol Cartwright, whom he said, mentored him during his years at Penn State University when he was doing his doctoral work.
Janet and I were privileged to observe “Applause” while seated among guests the Cartwrights invited to their table. They included retired Cleveland State and Kent State President Michael Schwartz and his wife, Joanne, and retired Kent State Provost Paul Gaston and his wife, Eileen.
While visiting, Carol reported that her daughter, Susan, has a booming floral business near where they live in Napa, California. Susan worked for the renowned Longwood Gardens in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania. Her skills and knowledge have enabled her to capture the business of a sophisticated California clientele whose wealth enables them to stage weddings for their children costing hundreds of thousands of dollars, a level of affluence beyond my comfort zone.
Phil, whose avocation is music of which his knowledge is encyclopedic, continues to perform with Dixieland groups wherever he is. He is probably one of the finest four-string tenor banjo players in the country.
Also, during the evening when some of us were sharing stories about volunteering as retirees, Mike Schwartz remarked he has enjoyed serving as a trustee at the Cleveland Institute of Art. The Plain Dealer two weeks ago did a Sunday feature on the CIA’s remarkable turn-around under the leadership of its president, Grafton Nunes. Nunes is retiring after a 12-year stint, having steered the artistic school into new quarters on Euclid Avenue cattycornered, across from Severance Hall.
The Cleveland Institute of Art has graduated many who have become well-known designers. Perhaps the best known is Viktor Schreckengost, honored at the age of 100 by President George W. Bush in 2006 with the National Medal of Arts. His “Jazz Bowl”, designed for Eleanor Roosevelt in the 1930s, is pictured in some art history textbooks.
May 4th Visitors Center Publicity?
Mike Schwartz was also complimentary about the updated exhibit at the May 4th Visitors Center on the KSU campus. He and Joanne had toured it at the invitation of President Todd Diacon. The conversation reminded me that someone connected to the center asked if improved signage and even a mention on the community’s digital bulletin board might not be appropriate.
I know people after 52 years still remain uneasy about May 4th, but the question is a valid one. The confrontation on the Kent State campus that led to four students being killed is starting to be mentioned in reputable American history books that cover the Vietnam era including the multi-volume Oxford Hstory of America.
Several years ago, when the Record-Courier helped host the trustees of the Ohio Newspaper Association in Kent, a visit to the center was arranged. The trustees, most of them publishers, were impressed. I interpreted their remarks as the May 4th Visitors Center having made Kent State and the Kent community look good for having embraced the painful event as part of history.
David E. Dix is a former publisher of the Record-Courier.
This article originally appeared on Record-Courier: Along the Way: Big universities, gifted athletes, big pay
