In his April 9 letter "Unjust athletic programs hurt African-Americans," Michael Derocher points out the alarmingly low graduation rates of the black basketball players at many colleges and universities, especially those who fared well in recent NCAA tournaments. The letters starts out by naming specific schools and graduation rates. Derocher goes on to suggests that a "win at all cost" attitude from the college athletic programs, have created a situation where the schools and coaches rake in millions of dollars and the athletes are "left out to dry."

Derocher has a legitimate concern, but he goes a little overboard when he labels this situation "modern day slavery" and says that the two people who should be most enraged by it are Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. First, I don't know what modern day slavery is, but to imply that this is anything like the slavery in this country before the Civil War is entirely off base. Secondly, wouldn't the Revs. Jackson and Sharpton's involvement in this situation lessen the urgency and credibility, since Jackson and Sharpton were also accused in the letter of being involved in too many other issues?

While I thank Derocher for his letter and agree with it in principle, I don't think he gave enough information to explain why the graduation rates are so low. The situation is a lot more complex than Derocher makes it seem. The graduation rates do not include players who turn pro early, like Carmelo Anthony, who surely will leave Syracuse early, nor do they account for players who transfer to other schools. So a player like Dan Miller will not count toward either the University of Maryland or Notre Dame's graduation rate.

Also left out was the current trend of players who almost have to leave school early or risk losing millions of dollars. And it's not just the black players. Players like Troy Murphy or Mike Dunleavy, who probably would like to have stayed in college for four years, leave early to maximize their draft position. For some strange reason, NBA general managers penalize most players who stay for their senior seasons. A player like Shane Battier, who as a senior was the National Player of the Year at Duke was selected after three high school players and an international player. Both Juan Dixon and Lonnie Baxter, two seniors who were instrumental in Maryland winning the NCAA title last year, were selected after Chris Wilcox — a sophomore who was not as important to Maryland's success. These examples show that it is practically mandatory to leave school early to have an NBA career.

Still, there is no excuse for some of these schools having zero graduation rates among its black players. There is plenty of blame to go around for the low graduation rate, but the primary responsibility lies with the NCAA, the athletic programs and the coaches. It seems to me that since they are the ones who make up the rules and make the money, they have to get together and decide whether or not they are going to enforce laws that say the players have to be both students and athletes — meaning that graduation is important — or they have to stop the hypocrisy and start paying the athletes.

• Center helps to build community
  
• Don't eat the veal
  
• Challenging ROTC to see other views
  
• What about the environment?
  
• Examining graduation rates