The payment of student athletes is an issue that has been in a heated debate for a long time. Many believe that giving any more compensation to athletes is detrimental and violates “amateur status” as defined by the NCAA.
I feel student athletes deserve a little more compensation for their time commitment to the university. But the way they are going about receiving it recently is misguided, and they should reconsider their reasoning behind their requests.
NCAA athletes recently signed a petition requesting that the NCAA give student athletes a cut of the television revenue. This caused me to rethink my stance on compensation of student athletes. I think signing this petition would bring college sports closer to the level of a professionalized industry.
The petition suggests that the percentage of TV revenue be placed in an “educational lock box,” which would be paid to the student athletes once they had exhausted their eligibility. They would receive all their money upon graduation and use it for whatever they wanted.
This strikes me as a bit too close to making college athletes more like professional athletes. They’re capitalizing on selling themselves and taking part of the revenue that they create for the university they represent. This goes strictly against the NCAA rules for student athletes. But across the country, many student athletes are wanting more than what they are currently receiving in scholarships.
A study conducted a year ago by Ithaca College revealed that an average Division 1 “full-ride” scholarship comes short of covering all tuition, student fees, books and all other costs by $2,951. So, recently, NCAA president Mark Emmert recommended a maximum increase of $2,000, which the Board of Directors agreed to on Thursday.
But the National College Players Association has requested at least a $3,200 increase. The NCAA is skeptical to add the $3,200 requested by the NCPA, is that only about 24 of the over 300 Division 1 schools turned a profit. This disagreement between the two sides might have contributed to the current NCPA petition being signed by so many student athletes. The student athletes have no voice while the two sides bicker about their future.
I understand how these student athletes want to have their scholarships to cover the entire cost of attending school. But the reasons behind wanting more money after they graduate don’t seem practical. They watch these coaches and universities make all this money based on their efforts. It might not seem fair to them because it seems like everyone around them is making millions of dollars while they aren’t making any money whatsoever. But we can’t forget that their tuition is mostly fully paid for.
The other major reason for players wanting these TV revenue shares is the fear of not being able to continue to play after putting their bodies through four years of intense physical activity. But I think that the dangers of playing college sports are risks student athletes should be aware of when they decide to play a sport.
Supporters of the student athlete perspective make the point that they are the ones generating all the revenue in college athletics. Without the players, college sports wouldn’t be a billion dollar industry.
But this revenue split would open up the potential for a lot more problems. Looking at the NBA’s current lockout situation, the same thing could potentially happen to college athletics a few years down the road when players decide they want a bigger share of the total revenue. The last thing we need is lockouts in college sports.
The idea that students should receive a portion of TV revenue is one that would push college athletics closer to being more like professional athletics. These student athletes do go through a lot for their universities and deserve to be compensated. But I think the compensation should be making the “full-ride” scholarships cover the entirety of the students’ college expenses.
