When it comes to selecting a major, Duke football players have more diverse interests than their peers on the gridiron.
According to a recent study by the Wall Street Journal, 59 percent of week one starters for football teams in the Football Bowl Subdivision major in one of five subjects: business, sociology, communications, liberal arts or general studies. Sociology is the only one of those offered at Duke—and it is the most popular course of study among those who have declared a major on the football team, with 28 percent pursuing that field of study.
There are three main reasons football players are drawn to sociology, says Rebecca Bach, director of undergraduate studies and an associate professor of the practice in the sociology department—Duke’s lack of a business major, the flexibility the major offers in terms of scheduling classes and the diverse socioeconomic backgrounds that football players bring to campus.
“A number of football players come from different socioeconomic backgrounds from the ‘typical’ Duke student and as such may experience some culture shock on this campus,” Bach wrote in an e-mail. “Sociology offers courses that can help students make sense of systems of inequality related to social class, race and gender.”
On the other end of the popularity scale, junior running back Jay Hollingsworth is the only Duke student in the past decade to declare an interdepartmental major in computer science and African and African American studies. Interdepartmental plans of study accounted for only 20 of the 10,552 degrees conferred during that period. Starters Bryan Morgan (music), Johnny Williams (visual arts), Damian Thornton and Abraham Kromah (African and African American studies) also are majoring in subjects that awarded fewer than 31 degrees in the last seven years.
The athletic department provides resources to all student-athletes on campus. Academic coordinators assist with time management skills and can arrange for tutoring, services that starting quarterback Sean Renfree has used for his public policy major.
“Heather Ryan, my academic coordinator, she does most of the work with me,” he said. “She sets up tutors if I need it for classes and a lot for writing because I need a lot of help with my writing. She’ll help me as much as she’s allowed to.”
Ryan, the director of academic support for Duke athletics, said that she and her staff ensure that the student-athletes are making progress toward their degrees each semester. It’s up to the NCAA, not Duke, to ensure that the athletes are truly being students and not just enrolling in five physical education classes, she said.
Since the football team only travels a few weekends in the Fall, the players don’t face scheduling challenges as severe as other teams, like the men’s and women’s basketball squads, Ryan said. Still, there are no biology, biomedical engineering, mechanical engineering or political science majors on the football team, four of the 10 most popular majors at Duke.
“Overall, the truth is with their time demands, there are a lot of things they don’t have the luxury of figuring out for themselves, especially with the NCAA rules for eligibility,” Ryan said. “They have advisors and deans on campus responsible for advising as far as Duke goes. We provide them with resources to be successful in the classroom.”
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