UNM students got a crash course in American economics and priorities on Tuesday when regents approved a 13.2 percent increase in tuition for students taking under 15 credit hours. The hike included a nearly $1 million increased student subsidy to athletics. That equals $165 per student and $4 million total. In the past two years at UNM, student fees for athletics have doubled. If UNM is going to strong arm the student body into doling out welfare for a system where $2 million a year isn’t enough money to retain a coach, students should be demanding added security for their college athlete peers.
In the world of NCAA sports, cash indeed rules and as one commentator noted, “The only thing ‘amateur’ about the NCAA is the leadership.” While cut-throat corporate culture permeates deeper into the college sports arena, the disparity in just deserts between the players and those getting rich off their athletic ability (labor) widens. This in itself is cause for concern and is an extension of the larger American economic picture where the holy grail of corporate cash is a key to public coffers. Although athletic departments fund a large part of their budget through television deals, alumni donors and sponsorships, it becomes increasingly problematic when students are forced to subsidize a system where uncompensated players fuel the riches of the NCAA elite and their corporate kin. In the current system, college athletes become disposable cogs in a financial machine that doesn’t necessarily guarantee them an education and comes with the risk of serious injury.
Historically, only one-year scholarships have been allowed for student athletes by the NCAA. Coaches had the ability to cancel scholarships for any reason or without cause. And according to a 2011 PBS Frontline, Money and March Madness, the average athletic scholarship is “$3,000 short of covering a student’s essential expenses.”
Last year, the NCAA began allowing schools to grant multi-year athletic scholarships. This, however, did not come without a fight. When the NCAA put the multi-year grants to a vote, 90 percent of Division 1 schools participated and over 60 percent of those voted against the measure. Fortunately a super-majority was needed to override the measure and it passed. This merely granted schools the option to award multi-year scholarships, it did not require it.
Some Big Ten schools, as well as SEC powerhouses Auburn and Florida have begun giving four-year guarantees. When I contacted the compliance department within UNM athletics to ask about the number of multi-year athletic scholarships UNM gives out, the representative told me that she typically doesn’t give out that information and referred me to athletics communications. This was an odd stance coming from a compliance official in regards to public information. This commenced a chain of hand-offs and befuddlement that circled back to the compliance department. The representative did state that UNM complies with NCAA regulations and if a coach wishes to grant a multi-year scholarship that’s what they would grant. She would not, however, give me any figures. I will update this post when I find out how many, if any, multi-year scholarships UNM has granted since the measure went into effect.
UNM Athletic Director Paul Krebs, appears (3rd page, 3rd bullet point) to be genuinely for the multi-year scholarship measure and noted in the Albuquerque Journal that, “UNM probably can’t afford not to follow suit if the schools it recruits against are offering scholarships for multiple years.” To UNM’s credit, they voted to not override the multi-year measure. NMSU voted to overturn it. UNM students, for their imposed philanthropy, should hold the administration and the athletic department’s feet to the fire on this.
This issue is particularly timely in the wake of Louisville player Kevin Ware’s devastating leg injury, which was seen in gruesome detail by millions of people on live television. The publicity paid to Ware’s high-profile “snap” will most likely guarantee that he retains his scholarship. For any other NCAA athlete unfortunate enough to suffer a severe injury like that, the result is typically a revoked scholarship if the recovery doesn’t go as planned or takes too long. And regardless of the scholarship, if an athlete’s injury exceeds the $90,000 deductible for NCAA insurance, the player is stuck holding the ongoing bill.
If that’s not enough to draw a collective disappointed head shake consider this, the NCAA currently makes millions of dollars by licensing the names, likeness and images of former NCAA players in a variety of financial ventures, from video games to jerseys. At a certain angle this seems fair considering student athletes sign an agreement not to profit off their athletic participation while in school. It becomes blatantly flawed from a variety of angles when students graduate, or don’t, and the NCAA continues to profit off that name and image with no compensation to the former student athlete. Former UCLA player Ed O’Bannon and others are currently pursuing “a potentially billion dollar class action lawsuit” against the NCAA for this practice.
So it’s a completely plausible scenario within the current system for a student athlete to suffer a Kevin Ware-like injury, have his or her scholarship revoked, get stuck with decades of medical debt and a couple years down the line find an animated re-enactment of their life-changing injury in a video game making millions of dollars. If you’re thinking, “they wouldn’t”, they would.
In the words of Oscar Robertson, one of the inaugural members of the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame, former Olympic and professional basketball player and former president of the NBA Players Association:
Student-athletes are treated like gladiators—revered by fans and coveted by member institutions for their ability to produce revenue, but ultimately viewed as disposable commodities. They are given no ability to negotiate the contents of their scholarships, often punished severely for even the smallest NCAA violations, and discarded in the event they suffer major injuries.
Meanwhile, member institutions are often given free passes amid NCAA violations so that they can protect their and the NCAA's financial interests (punishment of institutions generally comes after years of neglect). At the end of the day, both the NCAA and its member institutions are focused on the money they can make off student-athletes, not on the student-athletes' best interests.
The NCAA pulled in $871.6 million in revenue in 2011-12. It is unconscionable that student athletes aren’t granted more rights and protections, especially in terms of finishing their education. UNM students have a rare opportunity in that the UNM athletic director has already stated publicly that he’s on board with multi-year scholarships. Saying is one thing, doing another. Demand something for your dollar and speak out for those most vulnerable within a system where one class gets rich standing on the backs of another. It’s good practice for the American economics and priorities you’ll be faced with when you graduate.
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