Look For Those Lights Tonight

A week or so ago InsideHigherEd.com posed the question: Football is everything?

The Nike ad of the same name (sin question mark) doesn't just assure us that yes, football is everything but also reminds us of some of our finest stereotypes about student athletes and high schools. Classrooms filled with young strong men garbed in game-day uniforms (it's not clear that there are students in the class who are not football players) who sit disrespectfully with their feet up in class and who know to expect special treatment since it is, after all, game day. These are mostly young black men who are waltzing down the hall, giving high fives and flirting with a come-hither Hollywood hot blond girl. All distractions cast aside for the big game, of course, before which this team of young men gather to pause for prayer. They are then victorious in a stadium that looks more like FedEx field than a high school field and is packed with cheering fans with signs and face make-up.

All of this under those Friday Night Lights. Yes, NBC has managed to make a longer version of this ad with its "The OC meets Odessa,Texas" teen drama where the coach doesn't teach any classes at the school ("football coaching is more than a full time job" quips the wife)and the girls bake cookies for their assigned star players. The show, by the way, does not air on Friday night (maybe because it would take us away from making the big game?).

Also, read Sara's earlier post on single sex. Because it's important and worth reading, not because it relates to football. Although if we DO go single sex, this may change the cookie-baking rules.