Foreign swimmers training in the U.S.

Originally posted by dorothyrde Does NC have men's swimming? Gull80 is correct. Not only do we have swimming but the pool (Koury Natatorium) is located directly beside the Dean Dome, college basketball's greatest arena. I'm also pleased to see Gull80 refer to us as UNC, not NC or UNC-CH.

Well you know us Northerners, can't get our initials correct. It is nice UNC still has men's swimming. Right now, the U of I women's team is scrambling for a place to practice as their pool gets shut down very soon.

Originally posted by dorothyrde Does NC have men's swimming? Yes. In fact, Chip Peterson will be swimming for UNC next year.

I can't speak for Basketball, but I know that the entire school's conference gets a share of the pot when that school goes to a bowl game, win or lose.

Paul- I expect John to weigh in with new ammunition after this meet- that is, if he didn't explode into pieces from indignation after the relay you mentioned. Seriously, from following this meet, event by event on the Omega site, I was flabbergasted by the sheer numbers of foreign-sounding names (I also realize that is no sure criteria of who is really American or not). As a fan I believe they contributed to the quality of the meet (Super Simon!) but I take the point that they change the very nature of the meet from what it once was. As has been pointed out previously in this long-simmering debate (yes, I admit to trying to set off John) there are a broad range of types of scholarships & varieties of universities participating that would make the scholarship issue a quagmire, how about this: if this is a really important issue then only American citizens (or legal immigrants, I guess) could score points in the meet. That would circumvent the scholarship issue. Just a thought, any way...I'll sit back and slug back some rich Canadian brewskis and await the return of GoodSmith to the debate.

After following NCAA's the last 3 days and reading the following @ swiminfo.....figured this may be a conversation worth continuning: "ATLANTA, Georgia, March 25. THE team battle was decided, but there was still one relay to swim, and no one was conceding anything to anyone. With Auburn in lane 3 and Arizona in 4, the stage was set for a titanic 400 freestyle relay battle. It turned out to be all that...and more. In an incredible, thrilling finish to a superb meet, Arizona nipped Auburn, 2:48.39 to 2:48.89. Interestingly, three of the four Arizona swimmers and all four Auburn swimmers are foreigners." One more point of interest, I heard from a friend of mine last night that one of the reasons the SEC has had such a strong presence of foreigners over the years is that the conference allows them to pay in state tuition after thier first year.....?

You guys have to understand that many of these foreign swimmers were not very good when they go to their colleges. From the way I understand it, people like Simon Burnett and a few of the Auburn kids personally wrote to the coaches to ask if they could go to school there. They weren't initially recruited. Then they get to the school and go lights out. I've never had a problem wih foreign swimmers training in the US for free with scholarships. If anything, it steps up the game of the Americans they train with. But if some American student has issue with foreigners swimming in college, there are lots of college teams that have very few foreigners. Michigan and Texas stand out for me. Stanford, too. Their top swimmers are all Americans.

Originally posted by LindsayNB Sam, if it is the case that a national champion at the high school level can't get a top level scholarship then I will readily concede there is a problem. But since there are Americans getting scholarships, if the national champions aren't getting them who is and why? I didn't say he was a National Champion that is obvious. I purposely stated he was a Junior National Champion, one step below in other words.

Originally posted by Jeff Commings You guys have to understand that many of these foreign swimmers were not very good when they go to their colleges. From the way I understand it, people like Simon Burnett and a few of the Auburn kids personally wrote to the coaches to ask if they could go to school there. They weren't initially recruited. Then they get to the school and go lights out. This very well may be true. To my fault, I have never tracked where a guy like Burnett, half the Auburn team, 3/4 of the ASU team, etc. started and where they are today. I do have a hard time believing that a coach at one of these programs would use one of the very few scholarships they have in the first place on a foreign swimmer if they weren't already top notch. If a foreign swimmer wants to train and compete here, I have no problem with that at all. So if they show up at the coach's doorstep and ask to swim on their own dime (or their government's money for that matter) fine. I do think that is a little suspect, because if I were wanting to train and compete with the best here I would go to Texas, Stanford or Michigan depending on my specialty. I have a hard time believing that the best foreign athletes only want to train at Arizona, Auburn, or ASU to get better.

Originally posted by LindsayNB The idea that it is a question of how to spend taxpayer money was already debunked in the article by the Ohio coach who pointed out that for the most part scholarships don't come out of taxpayer funding. The fact remains they are receiving a free ride to a state university, which in turn is supported by the taxpayers. Why not award the slot to a deserving nonathlete who is a state resident? Even the largest state universities do not have unlimited enrollment.