Money spent on college athletics while reducing money spent on academics

[gb93433]

How does it make everyone feel to know that college athletics spends 5 billion dollars on athletics and takes in 4 billion? A loss of one billion would fund approximately 1000 departments in colleges.

I am aware of a local college of about 12,000 students that just a few years ago took 1.2 million from academics to fund athletics. It is up to around 4 million now. While at the same time tuition has increased about 50% and they no longer offer scholarships that include full tuition, and room and board.

We are giving out money to China, recruiting graduate students from foreign countries and give them scholarships while at the same time do not recruit in America.

 

[The Scribe]

Most American's view athletics and other classes as needed over academic classes. Which is sad and they still wonder why America has fallen so far behind other countries.

We are giving out money to China, recruiting graduate students from foreign countries and give them scholarships while at the same time do not recruit in America.

Giving money to communist countries has to stop.
Giving away scholarships to foreign students, while bypassing American citizens has to stop. Why should they get a free ride, while American citizens can't afford one semester at college?

 

[bobbyd]

Disclaimer: this comes from the point of view of a person who has over $10000 in student loans and earned a degree...may sound bitter.
Personally i think that college athletes who get a free ride just so they can drop out a year or two later should have to repay their scholarships to the university for academics to worthy students who actually are pursuing an education.

 

[billwald]

The University of Washington football program claims to be self supporting. I suspect that much of the money transferred from academics is because of the equal time for female sports law.

Bread and circuses is important to keep the slaves' minds off of important stuff like war and their own poverty.

 

[North Carolina Tentmaker]

gb, where do your numbers come from?

The expense of college sports comes from the mandatory funding of female sports and the unusual sports that don't fund themselves. Football and basketball programs generate funds that are used to pay for the swimming and gymnastics. If you want college sports to generate more money then those smaller programs are the ones that will suffer. And don't forget that sports themselves are part of the educational experience. You want to cut sports? What about music programs, how much money do they generate? How about music or debate? How much money do the national spelling bees generate?

When it comes to income generated by mainstream sports like football and basketball don't forget all the merchandising. Also don't forget the students who came to a school because they became a sports fan first. Lots of kids where I live dream of going to UNC and Duke but they have no clue about their academics.

In my opinion major college and even high school athletes are taken advantage of. We let them sacrifice themselves for our amusement and entertainment and then throw them away when they are no longer fun to watch.

bobbyd, as someone who played college sports (not on scholarship) let me tell you there is no such thing as a 'free' ride. Every dollar of that scholarship money is earned and then some.

It sounds like your local school may have some administrative problems gb but lets not throw out the baby just yet.

 

[gb93433]

gb, where do your numbers come from?

The expense of college sports comes from the mandatory funding of female sports and the unusual sports that don't fund themselves.

It sounds like your local school may have some administrative problems gb but lets not throw out the baby just yet.

The "problems" you suggest are a natioinwide problem suggesting that sports improves a university's image and its programs. When in reality it is quite the opposite. Usually athletes in large universities bring down the academics in the classroom. In some universities there are athletes who have had their grades changed that a professor gave them so the athlete can play instead of perform academically in class.

About one month ago was a documentary on TV and they interviewed college administrators and those involved in sports.

Read the article posted at http://www.uni.edu/unitedfaculty/posted_documents/Intercollegiate Athletics.pdf

I teach at a smaller state university and the students pay 2/3 of what the students pay at the university mentioned in the article. Our athletes are actually some of the better students because there is not much emphasis on athletics.

Just a few years ago many universities offered scholarships which paid tuition, and room and board. I have not come across any today that offer any more than just tuition.

 

[North Carolina Tentmaker]

gb:

I read you link and I do agree with you that there seems to be a problem at Northern Iowa. The growth there in athletic expenses and the increase in the amount of subsidies paid to athletics from the general fund indicates this. It is especialy shown by the comparison with Iowa and Iowa State. From the article:

UNI subsidies its Intercollegeate Athletics program with nearly twice as many dollars as does Iowa State University ($2.97 million) an dover three times as many dollars as does the University of Iowa ($1.57 million). while the University of Iowa and Iowa State University get 2.81 and 8.86 percent, respectively, of their Intercollegiate Athletics budgets from the General Education Fund, at UNI, nearly 54 percent of the Intercollegiate Athletics spending comes from the General Education Fund.

Where I disagree with you is that this problem is that bad nationwide. It is true that if you take general fund subsidies out of the equations most schools loose money on athletics overall. But that is still a result of mandated female programs. Individual programs, notably football and basketball are money makers.

Here is a link about Florida's football program:

http://money.cnn.com/2007/10/18/news/companies/florida_gators.fortune/index.htm

From the link:

As is the case at many schools with competitive Division I sports programs, Florida's athletic department is organized as a separate not-for-profit foundation, with its own budget. But unlike all but 20 or so of its peers nationwide, Florida's athletic department operated in the black last year. In fact, during the past 17 years, the athletic department has donated some $40 million to the university, $6 million of that this year alone.

There are some money makers out there.

 

[gb93433]

There are some money makers out there.

Compare them to MIT and their contribution to society.

Florida is noted for many more unimportant things than academics. When I was looking for a job at a university I found that most of the departments (considering inflation) had less money to spend than I did when teaching high school in 1984. I have watched the majority of labs being shut down because there is little or no money to maintain them.

The article stated that someone donated 20 million to the program. How many dollars did he donate to academics? I would wonder if the number of academic scholarships increased proportionally too.

Imagine how profitable those athletic programs would be apart from the universities? It is doubtful they would exist. I cannot think of any university that started for the purpose of promoting athletics. At the same time when we have a teacher crisis we have athletics at an all time high. The average teacher in an elementary and high school stays less than 3 years and then leaves to another job for more pay. Take a look at any university and see how the numbers of foreigners and American professors compare.

Promoting athletics as a money maker is much like promoting the church in the same way. It also shows what Americans value--fun and games while neglecting the academics.