Letter to the Editor: Regarding "Playing sports, choosing concentrations"

Regarding "Playing sports, choosing concentrations"

If one would study all of the diverse co-curricular and extracurricular "affinity groups" on campus, I expect that one would find a different pattern of concentrations in the majors declared among those respective groups. Indeed, diversity of thought and cognitive abilities is what contributes to an exciting intellectual environment.

If every affinity group's academic interests were the same, a direct replication of the total mean, Princeton would be a very dull place to go to college. Diversions from the mean where it comes to a choice of major is the very definition of the diversity of thought and intellectual interests that Princeton should be seeking in order to avoid a homogeneous student body that only thinks and acts the same way.

Princeton athletes greatly benefit from the pedagogical excellence of our coaches and the practical experience of working together toward common goals within a publicly competitive environment. They engage in and experience the spontaneity of the creative and performing arts, the practical implementation of teamwork, the social psychology of organizational behavior, the development of cognitive bandwidth to analyze and adapt to changing competitive situations, the construct for honest effort and ethical decision-making — and much more.

Damn, I'm proud of our student-athletes.

"Education Through Athletics" at Princeton is thriving, and our student-athletes and this University are the better for it.

Gary Walters

The Ford Family Director of Athletics