New Jersey Senator Cory Booker is a man driven by passion.
Passion to succeed in the classroom, on the field, in New Jersey, in the Senate, and in the country. But before Senator Booker was elected as the first African American Senator for the state of New Jersey, he was a brilliant student-athlete and All-American high school football player who earned a scholarship to play tight end at Stanford University. He received his undergraduate and graduate degrees from the university, was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship, studied at the University of Oxford and then returned to the states to study law at Yale, graduating in 1997.
His desire to serve was evident in all that he did. He moved to Newark and founded a nonprofit to tackle slumlords in the city, even living in a housing project for eight years. He served on the Newark City Council, was elected the city’s Mayor in 2006 and became the state’s Senator in 2013, where he has served ever since.
But he never forgot his roots in education, sports and community organizing and he’s prepared to take on a new opponent- the NCAA.
“Football taught me about character, honor, leadership, discipline, grit and so much more,” wrote Senator Booker in a piece penned for Sports Illustrated. “The men I played with, who coached me, believed in me, taught me and demanded from me, all shaped me in profound and indelible ways. I can never repay them or my sport for what it did for me; but I am on a mission to pay it forward and join with others to bring much-needed justice and fairness to college athletics.”
Booker recognizes the ways in which college athletes are exploited by an antiquated, unfair system maintained by the NCAA.
“The NCAA likes to create a fiction that a scholarship for an athlete’s education is proportionate recompense. But the hours athletes put in make it hard for them to have a fair shot at the full education they are promised. College athletes can commit 30 to 60 unpaid hours a week to their sport, with no reasonable time left over to take on a traditional part-time job or internship if they need extra money. The NCAA does not adequately enforce time restrictions, making it challenging to balance a full course load, earn a degree on time and meet the demands of one’s sport.”
He also pointed out the hypocritical eligibility standards, misleading graduation statistics and the racial imbalance that the NCAA sometimes masks.
“The NCAA touts a 90% graduation rate, but that tells only part of the story—and is very dependent on how they cut and/or fail to disaggregate the data. For example, just 56% of Black male athletes, who generate an outsize amount of college sports revenue, graduate within six years.”
Now Senator Booker, and his colleagues in the Senate, have introduced the College Athletes Bill of Rights, legislation meant to combat the systematic exploitation of the NCAA. This bill will address not just monetization and revenue sharing opportunities for student-athletes, but also health and safety based issues.
Booker is not one for games and delays and is ready to light a fire under a slow-moving NCAA. He recognizes that pressure is needed to change a system that has gone unchecked for too long, and the civil servant is prepared, once again, to fight a system that needs a time of reckoning.
“Congress must act to protect the well-being of college athletes. And all of us—former players and fans alike—must join in the effort.”
Senator Booker has a record of success in fighting for change and he’s not one to back down despite the odds.
The NCAA better suit up.
