Keep in mind that ~35% of ALL students want to be engineers or scientists (as of 2006: <a href="http://www.heri.ucla.edu/nih/downloads/2010%20-%20Hurtado,%20Eagan,%20Chang%20-%20Degrees%20of%20Success.pdf" rel="nofollow">http://www.heri.ucla.edu/nih/downloads/2010%20-%20Hurtado,%2...</a>).<p>Also 60% of them drop out (or switch) within 5 years.
Based on my (perhaps limited) understanding of where they get their data set, isn't it possible that the percentage of athletes interested in engineering be overrepresented by the source? I would imagine an online social network for recruiting student athletes would be just sort of thing that would skew towards people who had computer access and savvy?<p>Wouldn't someone like the NCAA be a better place to derive this sort of representative data as far as what incoming high school students are interested in majoring in? Presuming of course that the NCAA was the only game in town as far as collegiate athletics was concerned (is it?).
I can't tell if this is supposed to be surprisingly high or surprisingly low.<p>Either way, it is worth pointing out (perhaps to the choir) that the stereotypes of dumb jocks and fat nerds are not realistic, if they ever were. Strong minds correlate with strong bodies.<p>Which reminds me, I need to get back in my routine, and go out there and run today after work. :)
There seems to be an undercurrent of resistance against student athletes, when keep in mind that even engineering schools have athletic programs. They are generally D3, but the athletes in these programs face a relatively demanding schedule. And, from my experience, these slots are usually not walk-ons in the pure sense of the term, so the students coming in are noticed during high school for their athletic abilities. I'd hesitate to say 'recruited,' because D3 - and D2 - recruitment is not the same as D1 and I think D1 is the model people conjure.<p>Maybe we (as in the scientific and math-inclined) like to feel special, because 'we solve hard problems.' Maybe we were always picked last, while we watched the more athletic and popular lead. And they took our lunch money. Whatever the case, rather than trying to minimize athletes, we should try to support and encourage each other, athletic or not.
I wanted to be a billionaire during high school (I still wouldn't mind it but it's not a driving goal). Wanting and becoming and doing are very different things. How many engineers and scientists were high school athletes? I'd be interested in that percentage.
I'll informally confirm the 60% drop out statistic.<p>When I first started college (engineering focused school) the dean of undergrad academics had us all stand in a line and did the "look left and look right" thing - chances are that out of the 3 (yourself included), 2 of you will not make it to graduation. I thought he was joking until i got to my 4th-5th semester and a lot of folks i knew were either transferring out or switching to business type majors.<p>Education in engineering is a lesson in self discipline.
Sadly this seems unrealistic given the constraints placed on student athletes and the time consuming nature of engineering studies. It's really hard to find blocks of time to work on CS projects when you're spending 6+ hours a day outside of classes training for any given sport.