Attending athletic events should be worth cultural event credit
Jason Roberts
Issue date: 1/22/09 Section: Sports
The idea behind cultural events is "to provide each student with additional knowledge which assists intellectual and cultural growth."
Sounds great on paper. The problem is that a lot of students dread these events. In my experience, students attend, get the credits and spend the entire hour texting, checking Facebook on the iPhone or vegetating from boredom.
This is not the case for all students. Some are able to take advantage of the opportunity to become wiser people. I am going to go ahead and call these students "Artsy" - interested in the finer, cultural things.
Then there are students like me, who procrastinate until senior year and have to scramble to reach the requirement. Let's stick with the stereotypes and call these students "Everyone Else."
In America, sporting events are a huge part of our culture. I'd guess many "Artsy" students would not be caught dead at an Eagles basketball game. This is because they have their own interests, or maybe they don't understand sports.
Meanwhile, "Everyone Else" looks forward to the big Homecoming basketball game each year. We fill the stands when Clemson comes to town for a soccer match.
I understand the idea behind cultural events, and I attempt to take something away from every play, concert and gallery talk I attend. But I think the requirement should be amended to add a sporting event portion. Here's how it would work: if a student comes out to support each athletic team at Winthrop at least once, he or she will gain five cultural event credits, with 13 set aside for the fine arts, entertainment and lectures on foreign nations.
Cultural events expose students to unfamiliar cultures in order to make them more "well-rounded" people. How's this for culture: The most well-rounded man in my opinion, our new president, wrote in his autobiography that the game of basketball helped shape him into the man he is today.
Barack Obama utilized his love of basketball to gain the support of Indiana and North Carolina in the spring of 2007. This is when the Obama campaign put in a full-court press against Clinton and took momentum straight to the White House. His savvy and charisma, which we know today is deeply rooted in life lessons from the basketball court, led him to just a few days ago when he gave his inaugural speech. The basketball court is where he learned leadership and determination.
Students who love drama, classical music and art typically aren't sports fanatics. This is probably because they were never exposed to athletics and don't understand the passion in sports.
But student athletes at Winthrop put their heart and soul into their skills as much as a painter does on a canvas or a musician into a song. Heart and soul are the root of culture.
Maybe if "Artsy" students had an incentive to attend and support Winthrop athletics, they would be more likely to do so. Around here, one of the biggest incentives would be cultural event credit.
Comments on this column?
E-mail Jason Roberts at
robertsj2@thejohnsonian.com
Sounds great on paper. The problem is that a lot of students dread these events. In my experience, students attend, get the credits and spend the entire hour texting, checking Facebook on the iPhone or vegetating from boredom.
This is not the case for all students. Some are able to take advantage of the opportunity to become wiser people. I am going to go ahead and call these students "Artsy" - interested in the finer, cultural things.
Then there are students like me, who procrastinate until senior year and have to scramble to reach the requirement. Let's stick with the stereotypes and call these students "Everyone Else."
In America, sporting events are a huge part of our culture. I'd guess many "Artsy" students would not be caught dead at an Eagles basketball game. This is because they have their own interests, or maybe they don't understand sports.
Meanwhile, "Everyone Else" looks forward to the big Homecoming basketball game each year. We fill the stands when Clemson comes to town for a soccer match.
I understand the idea behind cultural events, and I attempt to take something away from every play, concert and gallery talk I attend. But I think the requirement should be amended to add a sporting event portion. Here's how it would work: if a student comes out to support each athletic team at Winthrop at least once, he or she will gain five cultural event credits, with 13 set aside for the fine arts, entertainment and lectures on foreign nations.
Cultural events expose students to unfamiliar cultures in order to make them more "well-rounded" people. How's this for culture: The most well-rounded man in my opinion, our new president, wrote in his autobiography that the game of basketball helped shape him into the man he is today.
Barack Obama utilized his love of basketball to gain the support of Indiana and North Carolina in the spring of 2007. This is when the Obama campaign put in a full-court press against Clinton and took momentum straight to the White House. His savvy and charisma, which we know today is deeply rooted in life lessons from the basketball court, led him to just a few days ago when he gave his inaugural speech. The basketball court is where he learned leadership and determination.
Students who love drama, classical music and art typically aren't sports fanatics. This is probably because they were never exposed to athletics and don't understand the passion in sports.
But student athletes at Winthrop put their heart and soul into their skills as much as a painter does on a canvas or a musician into a song. Heart and soul are the root of culture.
Maybe if "Artsy" students had an incentive to attend and support Winthrop athletics, they would be more likely to do so. Around here, one of the biggest incentives would be cultural event credit.
Comments on this column?
E-mail Jason Roberts at
robertsj2@thejohnsonian.com
Viewing Comments 1 - 1 of 1
Chris Osborne
posted 1/25/09 @ 10:55 PM EST
While I agree that games should be worth Cultural Event credit, there are two things I have an issue with the way you propose it.
1 - It appears that you're asking for 1 game to get you 5 Cultural Event credits. (Continued…)
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