Delaware Valley College Athletics

Writing Style: Fabulous! Information in these chapters is consistently presented in a clear, concise style. The reader is very much 'involved' in the material. " Deb Gural, Red River College "I particularly appreciate Berk's inclusion of multicultural perspectives. It is important to help students, particularly those who are just beginning their professional preparation, to put what we know about young children and their development into a cultural context. This text does that masterfully with words AND with pictures." Nancy Freeman, University of South Carolina "The thing that I am most impressed with is the examples the author uses. I found that often I had new insights in to child development issues even though I have been teaching and working in the field for years. These insights were so well thought out that I think that they would be very helpful students when learning the material. " John Prange, Irvine Valley College "As always, Berk provides a comprehensive discussion of developmental issues. What I appreciate is that the text provides good coverage of areas that are often neglected by other texts (especially applied developmental issues). " Deborah Laible, Southern Methodist University "The author's writing style is very engrossing. She is exceptionally accomplished in her knowledge of developmental psychology. I think her writing will be easy for my students to follow. " Algea Harrison, Oakland University "The writing level of this text is exemplary! The integration of research findings and "plain language" explanations allows the students to interactseamlessly with the text… This is a wonderfully comprehensive and intelligent resource. " Matthew DiCintio, Delaware County Community College "I really enjoyed the writing style used by the author. I particularly liked the way that the story from the beginning of the chapter was woven throughout all the sections of each chapter.

Big-time college sports embodies the ideals of amateurism and provides an important complement to university education. Or so its apologists would have us believe. As Andrew Zimbalist shows in this unprecedented analysis, college sports is really a massively commercialized industry based on activities that are often irrelevant and even harmful to education. Zimbalist combines groundbreaking empirical research and a talent for storytelling to provide a firm, factual basis for the many arguments that currently rage about the goals, history, structure, incentive system, and legal architecture of college sports. He paints a picture of a system in desperate need of reform and presents bold recommendations to chart a more sensible future. Zimbalist begins by showing that today's problems are nothing new--that schools have been consumed for more than a century by debates about cheating, commercialism, and the erosion of academic standards. He then takes us into the world of the modern student athlete, explaining the incentives that, for example, encourage star athletes to abandon college for the pros, that create such useless courses as "The Theory of Basketball, " and that lead students to ignore classes despite the astronomical odds against becoming a professional athlete. Zimbalist discusses the economic and legal aspects of gender equity in college sports. He assesses the economic impact of television and radio contracts and the financial rewards that come from winning major championships. He examines the often harmful effects of corporate sponsorship and shows that, despite such sponsorship, most schools run their athletic programs at a loss. Zimbalist also considers the relevance ofantitrust laws to college sports and asks whether student athletes are ultimately exploited by the system.