The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Opinion
6 — Wednesday, June 29, 2022

BRANDON COWIT
Managing Editor

Stanford Lipsey Student Publications Building
420 Maynard St. 
Ann Arbor, MI 48109
 tothedaily@michigandaily.com

Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan since 1890.

VANESSA KIEFER
Editor in Chief

Think about a time when you’ve 
heard a comment about college 
athletes not going to school “for 
school.” 
Maybe, 
instead, 
you 
know someone who has been 
disincentivized from continuing 
athletics in college because they 
“need to grow up” and “be realistic” 
about their future. All these phrases 
and countless others are unfairly 
thrown at hopeful athletes working 
hard to turn their dreams into 
reality. That’s because for decades 
athletes were split into two camps: 
those with professional prospects 
and those without them. Today, 
however, the realm of amateur 
athletics and sports business is 
bustling with opportunity, even 
for those who lack the skill and 
athleticism to be a professional 
athlete. Job openings for regional 
sports agents, sports economists, 
sports lawyers and the numerous 
other opportunities created in this 
particularly volatile time for the 
NCAA provide sprawling pathways 
of career potential for ex-athletes, 
non-athletes 
and, 
especially, 
student athletes.
In last year’s LSA Student 
Government election, hundreds 
of students voted in support of 
creating a sports management 
minor, with 75 of those students 
saying 
they 
would 
enroll 
in 
the offering outright. This is 
significant because students who 
are not even enrolled in the School 
of Kinesiology, which has a sports 
management major and would be 
the potential minor’s parent school, 
are willing to sign up in droves. This 
trend seems destined to continue.
A series of rulings in name, image 
and likeness (NIL) court cases 
provided a watershed moment 
in 2021, where athletes became 
able to use their own names for 

business partnerships. From local 
car dealerships to cryptocurrency 
auctions, NIL has opened the 
floodgates for both the financial 
prospects of college athletes and 
an explosion of labor demand for 
those facilitating this new fixture 
of collegiate athletics.
The University of Michigan, 
as a true microcosm of the new 
NCAA landscape, has recently 
made many sports management 
classes available to students. These 
classes often focus both on projects 
specifically designed for navigating 
NIL’s effects on marketing and on 
incentivizing boundless creativity 
in maximizing NIL benefits to 
all stakeholders. Even alumni are 
swiftly organizing NIL offerings 
for athletes.
Interest in the sports industry 
has 
even 
spilled 
into 
LSA 
undergraduate programs through 
Sports and Economics, a new 
upper-level 
economics 
elective. 
With more national media coverage 
dedicated to NIL deals, additional 
course offerings outside of the 
School of Kinesiology will be 
essential to the subject’s complete 
study.
It is not all sunshine and roses 
yet, as the University clearly has 
a shortage of course offerings 
compared to the immense student 
demand for sports-related study. 
However, our School of Kinesiology 
was still rated the second-best 
college for sports management in 
the country — despite not offering 
a sports management minor at all.
It’s even easy to show a path for 
how a sports management minor 
could easily be organized. The 
minor could begin with SM 203, an 
introductory course already offered 
by the School of Kinesiology, and 
could continue with any number 
of the 200-level, 300-level or 
400-level 
courses 
available 
to 
sports management majors. This 
supplemental 
program 
offering 

would be immensely valuable to 
anyone, including student athletes, 
seeking to tailor their studies to 
their occupational aspirations.
The good news is that the 
University seems to be making an 
effort for both its student athletes 
and sports management-related 
studies as a whole. Athletic Director 
Warde Manuel has professed a 
focus not only on navigating NIL’s 
effects but also on the need for an 
inextricably linked advancement 
of education for student athletes. 
What is better for helping equip 
student athletes with professional 
skills 
tailored 
for 
the 
sports 
industry than expanding the course 
offerings and degree programs 
available to them? Additionally, 
with greater investment in sports 
management studies, non-athletes 
studying disciplines adjacent to the 
sports industry (such as economics 
or business) could increasingly 
study the effects of NIL, helping the 
University truly become the face 
of sports management education 
around the globe. The University 
has both the resources and an 
interested 
student 
population 
sufficient enough to make a sports 
management minor and ascend 
beyond to new academic frontiers.
Student athletes who dedicate 
themselves to their craft can have 
a future in sports beyond being 
an athlete. Using their time as 
students, or even returning to a 
familiar campus, can mold passion 
into a tangible set of skills with 
which to build a lifelong career in 
the familiar realm of sports.
The numbers are clear regarding 
sports 
management. 
With 
the 
financial prospects in the sports 
industry 
increasing, 
especially 
with the advent of NIL at the 
college level, it’s no wonder why 
the interest in its study is growing 
abundantly; the onus is now on the 
University to give the people what 
they want.

QUIN ZAPOLI
Editorial Page Editor

Do personality tests really 
know us?

The rise of sports management in the 
age of NIL

I

f you were to ask me what 
kind of dessert I am, I would 
probably say a chocolate chip 
cookie. When it comes to seasons, I 
am obviously autumn. I also belong 
in a quaint ranch-style home, am 
destined to marry a Taurus and 
should definitely eat steak for dinner 
tonight. These facts have been 
determined by my various choices 
on the entertaining black hole that is 
Buzzfeed Quizzes. From my choices 
on what food I would like to have at 
each meal to my dream vacation, this 
website can seemingly figure out all 
aspects of my destiny. 
My love for these mindless 
quizzes 
has 
evolved 
into 
an 
obsession with more psychologically 
sound examinations. My favorite test 
has become the Myers-Briggs Type 
Indicator, or “MBTI,” a 90-or-so-
question online assessment that 
makes judgments about one’s values, 
social skills and overall personality. 
A proud “ENTJ,” I take this test to 
heart and attribute almost all of my 
interactions and traits to this simple 
combination of letters. I tend to 
immediately make judgments about 
people I meet, usually immediately 

thinking someone is an “I,” as 
in introvert, or are a close toss-
up between a person focused on 
“thought” or “feeling” when it comes 
to decision-making. 
There are reasons as to why 
personality tests, both silly and more 
professional, mean so much to us. 
Whether it be the results from the 
MBTI test, our Zodiac signs or our 
status as a “morning person,” we 
like to be told who we are by other 
people or, in some cases, computer 
algorithms. Psychologists say that, 
as humans, we are often dependent 
on the perspectives that others have 
of our qualities. We desire validation 
for who we believe ourselves to be 
in our minds. We take what these 
quiz results say seriously because 
we feel empowered by the results; 
we like to know who we are, and we 
want others to know us as well. It 
feels good to be placed into a distinct 
“type” of person. It lets us know that 
we belong somewhere — that we 
are like others out there — and that 
our habits and personality fit into a 
group.
Understanding 
ourselves 
is 
a central reason why we take 
personality tests, but another reason 
is to understand others.

Read more at michigandaily.com

J

ulia Child’s kitchen is full of 
light. The preeminent cooking 
instructor 
and 
celebrity 
chef of the 20th century, Child 
is credited with introducing the 
American public to international 
fine dining. On her PBS television 
show “In Julia’s Kitchen with 
Master 
Chefs,” 
a 
charismatic 
chef sports colorful silk blouses, 
decorates her countertop with 
fresh flowers and delights guests 
with her inviting disposition.
Child passed away in 2004, 
but 
clicking 
through 
cooking 
channels shows that her legacy of 
elegant food and bright, tasteful 
presentation remains. On Food 
Network, Italian-American chef 
Giada De Laurentiis sprinkles 
salt over pesto crostini in her 
immaculate 
white 
kitchen. 

Meanwhile, 
on 
the 
Cooking 
Channel’s “Real Girl’s Kitchen,” 
actress Haylie Duff beams over a 
cornucopia of mini muffins for her 
Christmas brunch.
The world of celebrity chefs 
displayed across American channel 
guides is narrowly defined. On 
Food Network, producers create a 
utopian atmosphere for their female 
celebrity chefs. Women never 
break a sweat while drizzling olive 
oil or carrying large salads out to 
their perfectly manicured gardens. 
The channels are aiming to sell 
products, so, of course, televised 
kitchens are aspirationally flooded 
with sunlight. Our favorite chefs 
don spotless aprons when using 
their sponsored KitchenAid mixers 
and never lose their megawatt 
smile. The aim of these shows is to 
sell a heavenly world to American 
women.

Read more at michigandaily.com

Cooking in heaven, living in hell: 
an exploration of #MeToo on 
cooking television

LINDSEY SPENCER
Opinion Columnist

TYLER FIORITTO
LSA Senior

AVERY CRYSTAL
Opinion Columnist