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World-famous Korean golfer Ji-eun Park (English name Grace Park) was just admitted by Ewha Women’s University. Ewha's announcment said, “Grace will get a diploma normally with like other students. She will have on-line education during the season and will visit to Korea off-season to get missing parts supplemented by her faculty advisor. We don’t see any problem with this because she was an excellent student both at high school and in college in the US.” Ewha continued happily, “We welcome her. It is an honor to have world-famous player here.”
This is really a good thing. Grace Park's decision to enter a Korean University, given the inconvenience of distance and widely different cultures, shows a passion for her country that ordinary people can’t easily express.
However, it raises difficult question: will the rules be observed? Most of us tacitly understand that sports stars scouted with big money for the glory of a school get a diploma without even attending class. Most of us grudgingly condone this practice.
But let’s look at the American case. Even a star athlete, no matter how aggressively recruited by the college, will be sanctioned against participating in games if he doesn't get certain required credits. Every player graduates the hard way. It is also unthinkable for a professor to give credits to a player who does’t attend class. For this reason, people have special respect for players who graduate from college with a good GPA. That’s why Grace is praised in the US as a brilliant woman, not merely as golf machine.
Even “Emperor of Golf” Tiger Woods, whose achievements are so numerous they are difficult to list, had to leave Stanford University because he could not keep up the pace with study.
I wonder what would have happened to Tiger Woods in Korea. I suspect you might hear that it's ridiculous to require a full study commitment from sports star scouted for the glory of school. You might also hear that it's foolish not to count your blessings and give thanks for the great player’s presence.
I saddens me to think how many times I have witnessed a producer of glory - an Olympic gold medalist, a baseball or basketball star - acquiring credits for a diploma by just registering for courses.
I thus fear that Grace Park's role as a student will disintegrate into a public relations show - 7 NCAA wins for the college, and so forth.
The Good Book says that there is a Righteous Path which human beings must follow, and that life will be good only if we walk this path …
But in real life, the Righteousness Path often just an on ramp to the Expedient Superhighway. It is not clear which powerful people in Ewha admitted this star player by special rules that allowed her to skip procedures required of other students. I just hope that they don't forget the bleary eyes of the other people who sat up all night studying for their university entrance exams.