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Volume LXXXVIII, Number 43 University of Southern California	Monday, April 14 1980
Hubbard talks on athletic issues
By Amy Alpem
Sports Editor
President John R. Hubbard's close association with the athletic department, particularly with the football team, has raised the academic eyebrows of many observers
—	faculty and students alike. This prompted one concerned university professor to facetiously suggest "we find a president who the football team can be proud of." Right now, it appears the opposite is true. Hubbard's football fanaticism has not helped the university to break a mold which casts it in the image of a football factory. Hubbard discussed this issue in context with the current conference athletic investigation on the football field the first day of spring practice.
Q. Are you concerned with the stereotype this university has that accuses us of emphasizing athletics as much as academics?
What we are facing is the penalty of success. For so long we have been successful with our football team, and now we are paying for that success.
Q. Are you saying this image does not hurt us?
The football team is an appendage of the university.
Q. Is it an arm or a leg? Do we stand on it, or lean on it?
We lean on it. Academics is what we stand on. Either we stand or fall by academics. The point I am trying to make is that this is a private university. We don't have to have a football team. We don't have to have a med school or a law school. But when we elect to, we should have the best we can.
Q. What are your opinions on the incident regarding football players enrolled in a debate class that they were not attending?
Calls debate problem breakdown of teacher’s integrity, not system
Our system is based on the assumption that the professors and students operate with integrity. Occasionally, this breaks down.
Q. What broke down in the debate class incident?
It was a human breakdown, not a breakdown in the system. I am crushed that a member of my profession didn't play the game fairly. We had a situation .hat was not honest.
(Continued on page 12)
Probation a possibility if violations determined
By Carole Long
City Editor
If the university is found to have violated Pacific-10 or National Collegiate Athletic Association rules stemming from the academic controversy involving members of the 1980 Rose Bowl football team andfor the question of accurate transcripts of a university sprinter, the governing bodies of the conferences could put the university on probation.
This probation could vary in type, length, and severity, depending on the violation.
University athletic officials question the possibility of such a move and seem confident that "no violation has been committed."
Pac-10 officials could not comment on the current investigation they are conducting but said a decision would not be automatic or imminent.
"We're a ways from determining a penalty. I wouldn't foresee any action to be taken until the next Pac-10 council meeting May
23	through 25 in Seattle," said Jim Muldoon, public relations director for the Pac-10.
The council, composed of directors and faculty representatives from the 10 schools in the Pac-10, is the governing body of the conference.
The NCAA, though believed to be investigating the university, would not give official confirmation of such action.
There are two main ways the Pac-10 can become involved in investigating a school.
"We can either get involved through request of the university or we can get involved as a result of revelations which have appeared in public print," said Wiles Hallock, executive director of the Pac-10.
Richard Perry, director of athletcis, said he met with Pac-10
(Continued on page 11)
Evolution of football controversy
What happened when pigskin met sheepskin
By Richard Bonin
Associate Investigations Editor
The pride of the university's football team, especially since the arrival of Coach John Robinson, has been its well-publicized emphasis on academics. Not only has Robinson turned out national championship teams, but he has been quick to note the scholastic achievements of quarterback Paul McDonald, a second team Academic All-American in 1978 with a 3.7 grade point average, and the number of his players with 3.0 and better grade averages.
"We college coaches must do the best possible job of making sure our players get a wide campus experience. I want our players as ambitious about school as they are about football," Robinson has said. Toward that end, Robinson established a tutorial and counseling program for his players giving Jeff Birren, former athletic academic adviser, the responsibility of coordinating course schedules for football players.
The. academic program was hailed a smashing success with its philosophy giving meaning to the concept of the student-athlete. It became the model for other progressive universities to emulate.
But controversy and failure hit in February when it was revealed that 34 football players were to receive credit for three Speech Communication courses without having to attend classes.
"It was like finding out your kid's on dope," Robinson said after the discovery that his coun-
seling program was misused.
The Daily Trojan was the first to expose an athletic-academic scandal at the university. On Feb. 21, the campus newspaper reported that the football players were enrolled in Speech Communication 422, Problems in Argumentation Theory, Speech Communication 490x, a directed research course, and Speech Communication 380, a forensics laboratory open only to members of the debate team.
University officials, who discovered the scheme around Dec. 3 or 4, gave the athletes enrolled in Speech 422 and 490 incomplete marks. Two of the players enrolled in the directed research course were originally given "illegally registered" marks. A source said they had received this classification because they managed to get into Speech 490x after the university's drop and add deadline without proper authority.
University officials, however, later rescinded the "illegally registered'' marks because (after checking the students' late-add petitions) it was realized the class had been added prior to the deadline, a source said. The players were given incomplete marks instead.
Other sources, however, are suspicious about the authenticity of the players' late-add petitions. First, the sources said, two of the petitions were approved by a speech faculty person on Dec. 4, the first day June Shoup, chairman of the speech department (now the Communication Arts and Science Department), confronted John DeBross about her investigation into Speech Communication 380. DeBross, who was eventually forced to resign as director of forensics, taught Speech 380 and 422 and was the professor sponsoring the (Continued on page 8)
Robinson/Perry
Page 12
Scholar athletes.
Page 7
Economic view
Page 3
Other investigations
Page 2
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JC transcripts
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