Allocating College Athletic Programs

Many students participate in extracurricular athletics, but sports are not worth their extreme cost. Amanda Ripley, author of a Scholastic Scope article, states, “Maintaining a grass field can cost more than $20,000 a year” (11). She also says that during out of town games, schools provide transportation for teams, cheerleaders, band, meals, and hotels (Ripley 11). These facts reveal that extracurricular sports waste an outrageous portion of a school’s already quite limited budget and it is absolutely critical to put that money towards updating the campus and creating a better learning environment. Ultimately, if institutions don’t stop squandering their money on after school athletics, the future of education will be a grim one.

Should college student-athletes be paid has become a much debated topic. The incentive for a student-athlete to play a college sport should not be for money, but for the love of the game. It has been argued that colleges are making money and therefore the student-athlete should be compensated. When contemplating college income from sporting events and memorabilia from popular sports, such as football and basketball, it must not be forgotten that colleges do incur tremendous expense for all their sports programs. If income from sports is the driving factor to pay student-athletes, several major problems arise from such a decision. One problem is who gets a salary and the second problem is how much should they be paid. Also, if the income

College athletics are becoming more like the professional leagues except for one big issue, money. Student athletes bring in a vast amount of revenue for the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) not to mention recognition and notoriety regarding the athlete’s university. However, the debate continues as to whether student athletes should or should not receive payment for playing college sports.

Ever since college students started playing sports, back in 1879 when Harvard played Yale in the first collegiate sports game, the question of whether college athletes should be paid was addressed. From that point on athletes, coaches, and college administrators have brought forward points agreeing or disagreeing with the notion of paying college students. The students argue that they deserve to be paid due to the revenue that they bring for the college and because of the games they play and the championships they win. At first the idea of paying college athletes was out of the question, but now the argument has gone from a simple yes or no to a heated debate. Since college athletes are given a free education, they should not also be paid.

Every Saturday during the fall season, everyone will tune into watch the coveted college football games. Watching The Ohio State Buckeyes or The Notre Dame Fighting Irish, battle on the field to see who is the true victor. But no one every truly ask what the money is behind the programs. The Ohio State Football teams annual cost is $34,026,871 while the whole university annual budget is $5.7 Billon (). Just the football team is .59% of all the budget, even though this seems like a very minimal number it is quite huge mathematically. If the college would choose to make budget cuts the odds of the program being cut are so minimal, they would rather cut the English department even though it is way less beneficial for the college. College football is one of the few varsity level sports that all colleges have, most sports programs a black-holes money wise. Sucking in vigorous amount of funds while returning little to none. In 2014 out of the 130 DI Football teams only 24 teams actually made a profit from the sport (). Football being the number one sport in most colleges. The bigger the school the more money it will be able to produce from the football team but this is very rare. The whole subject about why college sports are even a thing is very controversial. One has to truly look at if the whole athletic programs are truly worth it. College athletic programs are very controversial and should be cut in some schools. College athletic programs cost way too much, are rarely

“Likewise, almost all NCAA championships “lose money.” However, overall NCAA revenue, primarily derived from the Association’s media agreements and the popularity of the Division I Men’s Basketball Championship, helps 400,000 student-athletes at more than 1,000 member institutions learn and compete in 23 sports and 88 national championships” (NCAA 2).  Most colleges typically lose money on most of their sporting teams, and with the income from the few sport teams they are able to provide for other students.  Since a lot of colleges are losing money in the industry, they wouldn't be able to pay the athletes if they don't generate revenue.  This would cause students to go to colleges that make money knowing they would be getting paid, compared to a college that doesn’t have financial stability to pay athletes. College would not be college anymore. The universities would become franchises and inevitably turn into a smaller version of the NFL.  The law Title IX makes it mandatory for each team to provide the same amount of benefits to each student.  From the incomes to these few sports, the less popular sports at schools would be cut because they do not have enough revenue coming in to pay the players. "("Student-athletes generate billions of dollars for universities and private companies while earning nothing for themselves.") This is indisputably untrue. Student-athletes earn free tuition, which

Colleges bring an incredible amount of money by their sport teams alones. According to John Brill, a sports journalist writer, “College football and basketball generate more than the National Basketball Association, a total of more than $6 billion yearly.” The money made from these sporting events are not being used correctly which is frustrating many college athletes. The money that is being

In the United States, college athletics are growing larger by the minute. College athletics contribute not only to the recognition of colleges and the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), it also contributes to the income of colleges and the NCAA. Without student athletes, these colleges and the NCAA would not reap the benefits of college athletics, such as: increased awareness of colleges, higher application rates, and of course the revenue brought in from game and event tickets, apparel, and contracts for licensing and television rights. Since the student athletes, who devote a great deal of time to their sport, are the cog in the machine that is the NCAA and college athletics, they deserve the fair and rightful compensation that they certainly do not currently receive. Here is exactly why student athletes in the NCAA should be compensated for what they do for their colleges, on and off the field of play.

The argument of paying college athletes outside of the scholarships they may be receiving is becoming a rather popular topic. “Should College Athletes Be Paid?”, an article in Santa Clara Law written by Ron Katz, Isac Vaughn and Mike Gilleran weighs both sides of paying student athletes. They argue the point that regardless how you look at the situation, a handful of college sports have become a business. Sports such as Men’s football and basketball being broadcast on television now generate approximately $750 per year for colleges. It is acknowledged that the ones who are bringing in this money (the student athletes) are not receiving revenue from the sport they are playing. The idea of treating all sports the same was possible back in the day but today you cannot deny that one sport may bring in much more than another. Therefore Gilleran et. al. concludes that each school should be able to choose if they want to start using the business idea and paying the athletes for their work. “Alabama head coach, Nick Saban’s contract extension calls for him to make $45 million over the next eight years. His players, on the other hand, receive only the NCAA scholarships that does not even cover their basic living expenses.” (Gilleran et. al. par. 27) How is it that

The idea of paying college athletes to compete is not new, unlike most people think. This debate has been around since the 1800’s. The college sports industry makes about $11 billion in annual revenues. Fifty colleges report annual revenues that exceed $50 million. Nationally in 2010-11, the top 15 college basketball programs generated roughly $293 million, less than a third of what the top 15 football programs generated, baseball makes very little money compare to basketball and football according to Jeffrey Dorfman. These revenues are coming from multiple sources, such as ticket sales, sponsorship, and broadcasting rights. The National Collegiate Athletic Association recently sold broadcast rights to its annual men 's basketball tournament for upwards of $770 million per season. At the University of Alabama, the head football coach, Nick Saban, recently signed a contract paying him $7 million per year; more than 91 times the average wage of an Orange County public school teacher. However, the facts I have mentioned so far concerns football only. Football and basketball are the biggest sources of athletic revenues in the majority of universities. So with all this money involved, should student athletes get a percentage of the revenue their sport brings to the university?

There has been considerable controversy over the past years on whether or not National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) athletes should be paid or not. Fans, players, and the board of the NCAA all have their separate beliefs on why or why not the athletes should be paid. These young athletes work their hardest on the fields and attract millions of fans and think money fans pay to watch them perform, can go to them. The University of Alabama made approximately $124 Million dollars in operating revenue in 2008. Based upon those statistics, you can see that athletes have a reasonable argument of why they should be paid a salary when the school is able to afford to do so. While one side believes they should be paid, another side believes they shouldn’t be paid because instead of receiving pay, that possible salary is substituted with a scholarship and education.

Research from “College athletics programs make a lot of money, send little to academics” the University of Texas at Austin brings in a average of 184 million dollars each year through athletics. The question that floats everyone's mind is why are the athletes not getting paid . Some believe paying them will no longer show value of the game. However others believe they should be paid because they dedicate their lives to the sport. The NCAA must recognize the benefits of compensating college athletics because, college athletics work hard everyday , makes the sport more competitive and helps players support themselves financially.

Most student-athletes playing a sport in college are there on an athletic scholarship. The scholarship is granted to them by their respective schools and is worth anywhere from $50,000 to $200,000. According to Edelman, the football program alone at University of Alabama brought in roughly 143.3 million dollars of revenue. In perspective, that’s about 2 million per player. Even though Alabama is an elite program and brings in more than the average football program, the NCAA brought in nearly $845 billion in 2011 per Sonny. Now it is obvious there many ways a university brings in revenue, but it is safe to say that a player is worth more than that $100,000 scholarship. In fact, a substantial share of college sports’ revenues stay in the hands of a select few administrators, athletic directors, and coaches. Now think about what college athletics would be without the world class athletes it has today, or without any athletes at all. If a school didn’t “award” athletes these scholarships, there would be

The “contradiction at the heart of big-time college football,” as Michael Oriard describes it, is the competing demands of marketing and education. The 1890s proved to university administrators that there was an enormous market for collegiate football, which postulated opportunities for university building. Since this ubiquitous realization, there has coincided this blatant, yet unchanging contradiction that academic institutions are permitted to profit off of the services provided by its student-athletes while the athletes must idly accept that they are amateurs, donating their efforts to their respective schools. The schools then direct this revenue toward strengthening their athletic departments, and thus continues this seemingly endless growth of big-time college sports, all while athletes remain uncompensated and academics continue to take a backseat.

The NCAA’s greatest fear about paying student athletes is the money itself. They worry it will be spread thin between all the sports departments, but with all the money circulating around the college sports industry, they should not have any concerns. The two most popular college sports, football and men’s basketball, generate over $6 billion in annual revenue combined; more than the amount the National