COLUMBIA AND ATHLETICS

The decision of Columbia University to put all intercollegiate athletics under the central control of the institution itself is another sensible attempt to put collegiate sport in its proper perspective. This change places athletics within the sphere of the regular college curriculum.

Whether the attempts of Pennsylvania and, more recently. Columbia will have any far reaching effects on the popularity or the gate receipts of football can only be revealed by time. But the decrease of this over emphasis is only secondary. If these universities succeed in organizing an effective control of athletics, football will take its place along with the other sports that the college sponsors.

Harvard for some years has used relatively the same system which Columbia is new establishing. The intramural teams are governed by the same director as the University teams. Its success augurs well for its future at Columbia. It is only reasonable that athletics, which have assumed so important a roll in college life, should be included in the college curriculum. The system of divorcing the mental from the physical education adopted at so many colleges, leads to antagonism and inefficiency. Columbia has succeeded in uniting those two branches of American education in what should prove a most satisfactory method.