Ivy League student-athletes from the class of 2021 whose seasons were canceled this year due to the coronavirus pandemic have been given the opportunity to complete their athletic eligibility next year. However, they must enroll as full-time graduate students at their current schools in 2021-22, and must be admitted to a degree-granting program through the “normal” application process.
Seniors on fall and winter sports teams received an email today from The Ivy League notifying them of this one-year exception to the conference’s rule that only undergraduate students may compete on athletic teams. The communication said, “In granting this waiver, the presidents acknowledge the unique impact of the pandemic during the current academic year across all three sport seasons for those students in their final year of Ivy League eligibility. This change is a direct result of the pandemic and will not be available in future years.”
The unprecedented move by the Ivy League Council of Presidents, who voted to allow the one-year waiver, is a reversal of their position last spring. In April, the Ivy League presidents announced there would be no change to their long-standing policy of banning graduate students from competing on varsity teams. This led to an exodus of student-athletes in sports such as lacrosse, where Ivy teams have won NCAA titles in the past. In August, Princeton swimmer Addison Smith announced her move to North Carolina for 2020-21. More recently, Jaycee Yegher from Harvard said she would finish her eligibility at Virginia while enrolled in a master’s program.
It is unclear how many student-athletes from the class of 2021 will be able to take advantage of the temporary waiver, given that most graduate school applications were due in January.
The Ivy League has yet to make a public announcement about this change in policy.
Not sure why everyone is upset with this decision. I understand being mad they cancelled this season. Yes, the likely could have run their sports safe, as other schools have proven.
But they made that decision, so now they’re opening the door for these athletes to swim another year. It’s not like a graduation senior wants to stay next year as a undergrad. If they want to keep swimming, it’d almost surely be as a graduate student somewhere
There’s probably going to be like 5 total who do this. They should just do separate men and women meets. Not hard to space out and be safe.
Yeah that would make sense …. since every other D1 conference seems to have it figured out. But the Ivy League is too scared. Lots of brainpower gets overridden by irrational fear.
They already do separate meets and always have.
Gee, that’s so nice of them.
This is incredibly dumb. Most kids don’t want to attend graduate school at the same school as their undergrad. Also, what about a school like Princeton that focuses on undergrads? If you want to get a MBA or JD then are you supposed to just get a PhD instead? This is a ridiculous attempt on the part of the Ivy League to somehow fix the fact that they took away the final year of competition from these poor seniors while every other D1 conference in the country carried on. I hope they are ashamed that they’re afraid of their own shadow.
I totally agree that the Ivy League shouldn’t have canceled their season. On the other hand, I don’t have any objection to them making this allowance. All of these kids have more eligibility. They can use it up at their Ivy school as a grad student – or they could use it at a new school too (like the elite breaststroker going from Yale to UVA)
Yeah that’s assuming they have the money to stay in school for an extended period of time. Some people don’t need a graduate degree to advance their careers so going back to school for a swim season would be a ridiculous investment. By the way, my name is Brian Long and I’m very frustrated with the Ivy League’s actions.
And that’s when you feel guilty…
A lot of these guys probably needed the 5th year to graduate anyways.
Why would this be a rule anyway? I bet plenty of those kids are capable of graduating a year or a semester early
Why not swim this year guys?
Because He needs to train with Eddie Reese this year while He prepares for the Olympics.