for updates throughout the day head on over to www.aljazeera.com. >> hi, i'm lisa fletcher and you're in the stream. only a tiny fraction of those in college sports going pro are colleges setting up student-athletes to fail in the real world? >> waj is here, and he's bringing all of your live feedback, we'll bring out as much as possible. we've been tweeting about this all day and many people say

it's the student-athlete's responsibility to determine their destiny, but many say they feel sorry for these young men and women. >> their dividing line is personal responsibility and people feeling empathy saying they're kids, young adults. we have jamie, for anyone, athlete or not, college is what you make of it. you get out of it what you put into it. and on our facebook page,: >> finally on google plus: >> yeah, not that i've ever had that option but many kids feel their careers are that limited.

less than 2% of college players sign those contracts and become professional athletes. for many who don't make the cut adjusting to life after sports is challenging to say the least. there is no shortage of former student-athletes who say they lack the skills and experience needed to be competitive in the real world. suddenly exciting for jobs with can be difficult and demoralizing. so are colleges setting student-athletes up to fail or is it on the athletes to prepare themselves for life after sports? we're joined by scoop jackson. and john harris, thanks to everyone for being o on "the stream" .

if you work hard and you dedicate yourself in sport you'll play in college. if you play in college you have a good chance to go pro. do student athletes. >> first, thanks for having me. i think student-athletes hear it. they hear consistently that only a small fraction make it to the next level. but many in that room were only one of ten student-athletes to make it to play college. i think a lot of student-athletes, they always beat the odds, they don't want to hear it. they say i'll beat the odds and i'll become pro. >> you know, you played in the uc system presumably in two of the best basketball schools there. you've been in the pressure cooker, how well are

universities doing communicating the reality to student-athletes that there is a very good chance that they're going to be in that 99% that has to rely on the college degree and not their collectability. >> thank you for having me. this is quite an honor, i've been looking forward to this. i would say that they're doing a haphazard job communicating fully . student-athletes understand it but only to a certain extent. beyond that they're not capable of understanding that there are such huge odds in playing in basketball or football. what they're doing is they're on the court, and their minds are focused on playing. to go back to what john said, it doesn't start in high school but middle school. you're stuck in a system in a

combine up until you're released. your train of thought is perpetuated over time so that you can continuously believe that you can make it. so it's very, very difficult to remove yourself from the reality that is not there. >> well, our community is chiming in. reilly said. >> we've got david who said, i feel so story for these student-athletes >> we have a video comment from brook. >> i went to a top ten university, at times it felt as though academic counselors were

focused on me maintaining performance and eligibility by all means. keepin if your parents are hands-on its easy to fall in the short-term as well. academic counselorrers need to sit down with the athletes and encourage them to take challenging courses. >> are star athletes given the short pass, this privilege that undermines their eventual life after college? >> i don't know if it undermines but makes them understand what they're there for. they're there for the purpose of performing for that university. it's not their job to think about what they're going to do afterward. that's somebody else's responsibility. i don't know if they're setting them up to fail but to succeed. there is a fine line. student-athletes when they get

to college, brook said something interesting. she said in her commentary, when they graduate. when you deal with basketball, football, and baseball, the graduation rated is low because you're able to enter your workforce without a degree. >> it should be if they graduate. >> let's go back to what we're talking about earlier. for those people who think that athletes have to or can or are given the option for themselves to think they won't make it, every professional athlete in every sport will tell you you don't make it to the next level even thinking that in college. you can't think you won't make it because you won't. everyone has to force themselves to think not that it's not going to happen to me, but that i am that good. i know it's a rarity and 1% chance of this happening, but in order to make it there you have to think that way. anything less than that, then you won't make it. >> to piggyback off of what was just said,

it starts as early as middle school. you're in this constrict in which you're only allowed to think about what the task or goal is in hand, that is making it where you need to be. that's the league. it is very tough, like i said, to take that mindset away from a child because all they're thinking about is what their career path that they've already chosen. it would be of great help and great service if academic advisers understood this and cultivated this with the glean at 18 years and 19 years old when you've been taught this and you've been conditioned in thinking a certain way, are they going to hear anything that an academic adviser tells them when in this particular situation they're only going to be there

for a short amount of time. then it's not going to happen for them. >> adrian mcbride, he started this national program helping kids transition, and he dealt with companies and potential employers and student-athletes, and he ran into just that. the athletes didn't want to hear it. they wanted to stay focused. and the employers didn't understand the need and his organization fell apart after a few years. talk about this frame of mind that was brought up. it starts in mile middle schoold your identity is so tightly connected to your performance. what is it like to peel it back and transition to a life of athletics. >> to paraphrase douglas, it's hard to fix a broken man. what we really want to do is--we do take aim at trying to really help guys who are--who grew up with the nfl players association

and retired soccer and helping those guys in their transition when they're 25, 30, and 35 and up. we started the athlete foundation to attack this at the grass roots. you don't even have academic advisers at the high school level. they're not engaging with them until the collegiate level. the lower we can attack this problem, the more success we're going to have with helping the adult. >> this is going to be something that will fake a long time to solve. >> we'll get the community involved: >> so who is to blame when student-athletes are not ready

for life after sports? tweet us your thoughts. we'll get them in right after the break.

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>> welcome back. we're talking about life after college sports and the role of college, university boards and students themselves in preparing athletes for the real world. john, you started an organization to help form athletes are education and career developments. how is that different from general career development and advice that is given to a non non-student-athlete. >> i think our focus is to get the student-athlete to realize that they're more than and to go there 365 years to show athletes they're much more than athletes. we like to use the term

lif life-lete. they're more than an athlete. we work one-on-one with the guys taking them through a pretty intensive process through career development workbook. we don't use the term career transition because i think everyone is in transition. we want to talk about development and keep their mind positive about the direction they're going. we take them through an intensive process to help them understand the value of the brand that they have. the fact that someone played at cal or depaul or played at georgetown, they need to be able to utilize that to navigate just like a general student would, and so we try to get them to engage in different ways. >> speaking of those navigational tools there are universities that are launching entire projects to help student-athletes to do that, one of them is notre dame.

w dame. >> talking about the giant, the big dollars, some schools bringing in $50 million to $60 million to $70 million. what can be done in the midst that have? it's not going anywhere. >> it's not going anywhere, but every athlete has the responsibility to look around them to find like minds and like souls that they can attach themselves to and use as bridge marks where the university may

not be able to do that for them. for magic johnson to mike tyson, we could throw the university out of this. look at magic johnson's career and mike tyson's career. post career what can you do with your life? everybody here would never thought mike tyson once he got through boxing would still be relevant to the degree that he is still relevant. he found a way to turn his life into something to do with his postboxing career. >> no, but he has resources around him to reinvent himself. >> he did that as an athlete. magic johnson went to michigan state, i'm not sure that michigan state laid the groundwork, but i'm using these two as books ends as beyond what the university does, athletes in all genres, in all of the sports, you have two individuals

and a lot in between. we could go to bill bradley, allen page, michael jordan, we can go down the line of what athletes have done but use that as resource. there are other athletes who have done things in a wide variety of field that they can use how they want to move forward post playing the game. >> we have 20 seconds. >> i would just like to say one thing to all athletes understand that you come from an unique situation. you've learned how to be motivated, take goals, take punishment, endure and create things out of thin air. forward. if anyone can tap into those qualities that made you an athlete, you can take those on the road and go anywhere. >> well said, my friend. a terrific discussion. in the meantime, waj and i will see you online. ♪

>> welcome to the news hour force. >> buildings collapsed in india killing and trapping dozens. 1234 we have the headlines in europe including stay away from the coast. weather warnings as britain is battered by floods and storms. >> seeking a new life in