Sporting equality

In May, the University of Alabama received national accolades after the firing of head football coach Mike Price for his unacceptable behavior during a school function. The prime candidates for the opening included a long list of possibilities, but none more attractive than Green Bay Assistant Sylvester Croom whose resume included coaching future Hall of Famer Barry Sanders. In addition to impeccable professional credentials, Croom also held strong ties to Alabama as a player and assistant coach, where he helped bring two national titles to a storied program. It seemed to be a natural fit that Croom be instituted as the next head coach, but university officials had other ideas as they instead introduced Mike Shula.\nThe news of Shula's hiring immediately made national headlines. Rev. Jesse Jackson said a coach of African-American decent was once again overlooked in favor of a candidate whose qualifications were not nearly as high. These words sparked a ripple across not only the sports world, but also challenged the politics behind the hiring policies of the university as well as the logistics of affirmative action.\nI bring this up because the underlying concepts of affirmative action have come under much scrutiny in the last several months, both on a local and national scale. The perceptions have been seriously questioned by politicians, community leaders and students. Last week, the IDS reported on Scott Dillon and a set of missing reports that questioned the admission policies at the IU School of Law. Dillon's report presented facts that supposedly showed the school was passing on individuals who were highly qualified in order to meet an instituted quota.\nWhile Dillon made a justifiable opinion, the fact of the matter is that problems continue to exist that reaffirms the need to protect minority interests. In 2002, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported the jobless rate among African-Americans and Latinos was a staggering 17.5 percent, nearly three and half times larger than someone of Caucasian decent (5.2 percent). The thing is though, one does not need statistics to necessarily see problems observable to the naked eye. Continuing in the world of professional sports, the minority community has advocated that organizations consistently overlook the minority race in the job hiring process. In an interview on the popular ESPN show "Pardon the Interruption," Johnny Cochrane used the NFL as a notable example in which only three of the 32 teams (9.4 percent) have a head coach of a minority race. Further, he referenced the fact that of the six coaching positions this past off-season, only one minority candidate was heavily courted while proven winners like Dennis Green were left on the sidelines again.\n So, how can society live up to the creed that all men are created equal? I don't have the answer for this, but what I do know is that questioning the quota system at this point is unfair. Although Dillon had a justifiable opinion, the realization in fact is that the world is not fair. If people were accepted on the basis of credentials and skills in the first place, there would be no problem. However, it doesn't take a law student to realize that this isn't always the case. \nUnless changes are made to individuals' perceptions, then there needs to be some sort of protective barrier for those who have spent years being passed up and left out, as the NFL has so dearly demonstrated. \nI do believe there is a median to which contrasting sides can come to a considerable agreement and terms like affirmative action can eventually be dropped in favor of the term equality.