Amateurism revisited: how U.S. college athletic recruitment favors middle-class athletes

Operation Varsity Blues: Disguising the legal capital exchanges and white property interests in athletic admissions

“…I selected Coastal-U because it is a highly selective, public, research-1 university and member of the NCAA's Division-I, power-five conference, placing it among the most infamous and competitive college sports programs. Across several publications, I used my findings from these interviews to outline an exceptional pathway to college via sport that privileges white, elite communities (Hextrum, 2018a(Hextrum, , 2018b(Hextrum, , 2019.…”

“…For this article, I summarize and apply my findings from past studies on college athletic recruitment to the details of the OVB case. Previous studies into athletic admissions have revealed the historic contexts of exceptional admission practices of athletic admissions (e.g., Smith, 2011), the demographic trends of who most benefits from these policies (e.g., Shulman & Bowen, 2001), and the athlete narratives of how they navigate recruitment (e.g., Eckstein, 2017;Hextrum, 2018aHextrum, , 2018bHextrum, , 2019. The FBI evidence collected to prosecute OVB offers rare insights into how coaches and administrators conceptualize and conduct athletic admissions.…”

“…Court filings against Michael Center, a tennis coach at the University of Texas explained how "admission officers are deferential to the coaches' judgment about applicants' athletic abilities" (Smith, 2019b, p. 2). Without uniform or transparent admission standards, athletes create dossiers full of pliable criteria like photos, resumes, and references which are not solicited from universities but if presented can increased one's odds of recruitment (Hextrum, 2018a(Hextrum, , 2018b. Through his network, Singer learned how to create dossiers and pose his clients as elite athletes-exaggerating or lying about their athletic credentials-in ways that appealed to athletic departments.…”

“…My findings challenged the existing notion that exceptional athletic admission primarily support low-income men of color. Instead, I documented how athletic admissions are designed to favor those from white, middle-and upper-class communities (Hextrum, 2018a(Hextrum, , 2018b(Hextrum, , 2019. As one of a few scholars who study college athletic admissions (other notable studies include: Eckstein, 2017;Shulman & Bowen, 2001;Smith, 2011) reporters contacted me for comment shortly after the Court released the OVB indictments.…”

“…In this conceptual article, I explore the logics and evidence behind my media comments that OVB resembles legal athletic admissions. To support my argument, I use evidence from two theoretical frameworks, Cheryl Harris' (1993) whiteness as property and Pierre Bourdieu's (2011) capital exchange; OVB legal documents; and my published studies into athletic recruitment and admission (Hextrum, 2018a(Hextrum, , 2018b(Hextrum, , 2019. I explain how Singer's actions are criminal under current law because college admissions disallow bribery, or what Bourdieu (2011) refers to as direct capital exchanges.…”