Sport in the Aspirational Corporate University: A Genealogy of Athletic Programming Development at Towson University

Abstract

This project will specifically focus on the symbiotic relationship between the intercollegiate athletics program and corporatization of educational functions and leadership at Towson University as emblematic of the influence that neoliberal corporate capitalism has had on institutions of higher education and its stakeholders. We offer a genealogy of Towson University athletics to interrogate how the athletics program is a byproduct of, and vehicle for, the ascent of commercial imperatives and growing the consumer experience at the corporate university through authoritarian leadership and centralized governance. We conclude by making the argument that the corporate university lacks any real semblance of shared governance and that it has been to the very real detriment of the many stakeholders administrators suggest they are beholden to.