• Welcome to OGBoards 10.0, keep in mind that we will be making LOTS of changes to smooth out the experience here and make it as close as possible functionally to the old software, but feel free to drop suggestions or requests in the Tech Support subforum!

Air Force Athletics scandal

Deadbolt

Deadbolt

Well-known member
Joined
Mar 16, 2011
Messages
10,023
Reaction score
470
Location
Raleigh, NC
Seems even the service academies can't keep things under control.

The athletic department at the Air Force Academy will be investigated after a thorough report from the Colorado Springs Gazette revealed details of wild parties with sexual abuse and drug use as well as academic wrongdoing.

The Gazette compiled the report using allegations from documents released by the Air Force under the Freedom of Information Act. Superintendent Lt. Gen. Michelle Johnson, who has been in her current post since Aug. 12, 2013, confirmed that she has called for an Inspector General's investigation of the athletic department.

via Colorado Springs Gazette:

"These efforts will help in eliminating subcultures whose climates do not align with our institutional core values," she said in a statement released Thursday exclusively to The Gazette. Johnson said the academy has taken steps to correct the problems within the athletic department. "Despite all of our efforts, I expect we'll still have issues with a few young people who will make poor choices," she wrote.

Documents newly released to The Gazette reveal how serious those "poor choices" of the past have been. They detail parties dating to 2010 where cadets, including a core group of top football players, smoked synthetic marijuana, drank themselves sick and may have used date-rape drugs to incapacitate women for sexual assault.

The culture was so wild that academy leaders canceled a planned 2012 sting out of concern that undercover agents and confidential informants at a party wouldn't be enough to protect women from rape.

Many of the details come from agents of the school's Office of Special Investigations. Using confidential informants, the OSI was able to gather information from the parties where most of the alleged misconduct took place. In 2011-12, the OSI ran a dragnet "that probed the activities of 32 cadets, including 16 football players and several other athletes."

Of those 16 football players, only seven stayed at the school through graduation. Two football players were court martialed and discharged, two were dismissed and the rest reportedly were in a group of cadets that resigned or "were kicked out for unrelated conduct."

The report is thorough, and very troubling considering the complicated world where Air Force (and other service academies) exist between big-time college athletics and government service. You can find the entire report online at The Gazette.

http://mweb.cbssports.com/ncaaf/eye...nspector-general-investigation-into-athletics
 
Oh wow, a problem with sexual abuse and assault in military culture and specifically a football team?!?!?!?!!111

WHO COULD HAVE EVER GUESSED THIS MIGHT HAPPEN?!
 
The culture was so wild that academy leaders canceled a planned 2012 sting out of concern that undercover agents and confidential informants at a party wouldn't be enough to protect women from rape.
Click to expand...

Wait...does this mean that they didn't send anyone to the party? That seems even more dangerous.
 
Wakeforest22890 said:
Oh wow, a problem with sexual abuse and assault in military culture and specifically a football team?!?!?!?!!111

WHO COULD HAVE EVER GUESSED THIS MIGHT HAPPEN?!
Click to expand...

This. Any shock and surprise about this is out of ignorance and arrogance.
 
Huh. I wonder what coach directly benefited from the implementation of easy courses for AFA basketball players beginning in 2004-2005?

The explosive story that came out over the weekend from the Colorado Springs Gazette primarly detailed alleged nefarious and illegal behavior from former cadets/football players at the United States Air Force Academy. It also puts a damning light on former administrators and coaches that allowed such a culture to foster, the purported wrongdoings spanning the course of a decade.

We've detailed AFA's impending investigation, which is mostly regarding football, over at Eye on College Football.

But there is a basketball angle to this. The Gazette's report claims one economics class was "created" to help/ease the burden on two former star AFA hoops players, back in 2004-05. The class was held to accomodate the players' schedules, reportedly taught specifically to tailor around their games and practice time.

This kind of thing isn't uncommon, but to see how former econ prof David Mullen laid it out to the Gazette, you can understand why it would raise eyebrows.

Specifically, I was asked personally to run a section of microeconomic theory where I taught it to two students -- the two star basketball players on the team at the time," Mullin said. "Not just basketball players -- only the two stars."

Mullin said he gave in to the request by his boss in 2005 and taught the course to the smallest class he'd seen -- center Nick Welch and guard Antoine Hood, who had lead the team to the 2004 NCAA Tournament, where they were knocked out in the first round.

"Antoine Hood received an A- and Nick Welch received a B. How did that happen? I tailored meeting times around their playing schedule," Mullin wrote in an email to The Gazette. "There was a stretch where we didn't meet fo rtwo weeks. Everything was customized. I watched over them as they did their homework. We had the DFEG (Department of Economics and Geosciences) conference room regularly booked for our meetings. Welch initially was given an incomplete but was allowed to complete the course several months later. This was also most unusual."

[Andy] Armacost, the dean, admits that the basketball stars got special treatment, but denies there was any wrongdoing. Often, he said, cadets -- athletes and nonathletes -- encounter scheduling conflicts that require special arrangements. The two stars, he said, needed a class time that didn't conflict with basketball practice.

"I would say what we were trying to do is accomodate the needs of an economics major," Armacost said.

Is moving class time around to help students at advantage? Some could argue yes. Others -- perhaps the NCAA -- could take issue with a course explicitly being taught for only two players.

At a time where the University of North Carolina has endured three long, ongoing years of attacks and allegations over academic improriety -- and straight-up phony courses -- for its former student-athletes, this information from another highly regarded American institution is unsettling.
Click to expand...

2005-2006 was AFA's 24-7 NCAA Tournament season. 2005-2006 and 2006-2007 were "his" only winning seasons. Winning the right way, indeed.

http://www.cbssports.com/collegebas...tailored-class-around-two-former-star-players
 
Last edited:
Let it go?

I actually think this might be an interesting argument for what the model should be if we are going to have a goal of getting our athletes a real education. I think most of us are going to be a bit skeptical about athlete-only classes, but how else do you do it? Schools should have to provide an opportunity for them to pursue their academic interests without hinderance from their athletic commitments. It is true that their schedule makes it difficult for them to have the freedom to pursue any class or major that interests them. This is very different from UNC, where they simply removed the obstacle of attending classes.
With all the demands on student-athletes, Universities are going to have to raise the current bar to give them a real ROI. We need to come up with something better.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top