University of Akron students want to know how much of their fees go toward athletics

[Balsy]

What it boils down to is that students are paying to allow other students to attend college for free. $400 might not sound like a lot in consideration of overall tuition but to a college student it most definitely is. I wonder if this could be the beginning of a backlash of regular students involuntarily supporting these programs.

Bingo. And it even goes deeper than that.

[ZippyRulz]

Proposed bill would cap student fees for college sports

http://hamptonroads.com/2015/01/bill-could-force-odu-withdraw-conference-usa?utm_medium=referral&utm_source=t.co

[ZachTheZip]

Proposed bill would cap student fees for college sports

http://hamptonroads.com/2015/01/bill-could-force-odu-withdraw-conference-usa?utm_medium=referral&utm_source=t.co

The proposed cap of 20% of the budget would see not only 90% of the FBS forced to shut down athletics completely, but all of DII and DIII.

Instead, cap coaching salaries and see where that gets you.

[Dave in Green]

It's a mess, isn't it? All the have-nots need more money to compete with the haves, and no one wants to pay. Making poor students foot the bill through bigger and more difficult to pay back student loans is not a viable longterm solution. I'm sure there are many students at UA and other less wealthy Ohio colleges who would be just fine with their schools dropping the fees, dropping high level athletics and letting Ohio be represented in the college sporting world by tOSU with its wealthy benefactors picking up the bills in lieu of the poor students.

The same situation exists in pro sports, where the smaller markets couldn't compete with big New York and Los Angeles money. That's why pro sports came up with methods to try to make the playing field more level. College athletics are just starting to try to deal with the problem, and right now everyone is confused and running around in circles. Some of the proposed solutions could have dire unintended consequences. Like the game of Monopoly, similar situations exist in just about everything where big money buys up Boardwalk and Park Place, fills them with houses and hotels and waits for some poor sucker to land there, go bankrupt and end up in jail.

I sure don't seen any simple solutions. I think this conversation is going to be going on for a long time, and a lot of crazy stuff is likely to happen along the way.

[Balsy]

Well said DiG. And Zach I think that's a good idea, but who'd be dumb enough to shoot themselves in the foot first?

[BirdZip]

Balsy pointed out that it costs about $4900/semester according to UA's website. Honestly, I had no idea it was so cheap.

[zippy5]

Is that without housing?

[ZachTheZip]

Is that without housing?

Yes.

Affordable housing near campus is becoming an issue as old houses get torn down and replaced with large apartment complexes that charge $800+ a month for rent.

[LosAngelesZipFan]

When you look at this data, the two words that leap to mind are "unsustainable" and "ridiculous". I can't help but look at this from an overall NEO perspective, aggregating what UA, Can't, CSU and YSU are spending. All are public universities whose students come from the area. In aggregate, these students are being burdened with about $60 million a year subsidizing sports (UA and Can't $42M of that total).

Basically, the public college students of NEO are paying to build an Infocision Stadium each and every year.

I don't see how this is at all sustainable. When UA jumped to 1-A, the disparity with the top tier schools was massive. Now, that difference is an order of magnitude larger than that. With this playoff set up and the advent of direct payments, the gap will not only grow larger, it will grow even faster.

UA and MAC schools will face a choice-- exhaust themselves financially or get off the hamster wheel by dropping down (or out altogether like UAB). Our other option, because of geography, is confederating UA and Can't in some way, which in some other threads I have made the argument for at least studying. To me, these numbers-- the sheer size of them-- not only begs that question, but demands a serious look at anything that might alter the collective trajectory.

[ZachTheZip]

Bottom line: If enrollment stays steady or goes up over the next five years, that's a signal that this kind of spending is a perfectly valid way to fund athletics. If it drops significantly, then it's a sign that parents and students have looked at the numbers and decided that they don't like what they see.

Alumni and outsiders calling it unsustainable completely ignores the beliefs of those who will actually be paying it.

[Balsy]

I don't agree Zach. You can still be a student at UA, and continue being a student at UA...and still believe this is a ridiculously high amount of money. If you don't like something, that doesn't mean you run away from it. You fight to change it from within. It also doesn't validate it as an appropriate way to fund athletics. IMHO it allows AD's and athletics departments to be lazy. They don't have to actively engage the community, alumni, or students in any meaningful way. Why? Because there's no repercussion if they don't. They'll still be funded regardless as to how the community, alumni or students view them.

$800 a year equates to rough $20,000,000 a year used on something not directly supporting the purpose of a University. Even as an Alumni who enjoys athletics; I'm looking at this objectively, and see all criticism as 100% justified.

[LosAngelesZipFan]

I guess another way to look at it is this. The fees are in essence a special purpose tax on a specific activity-- kind of like taxing cigarettes. But instead of dissuading an activity that costs society-- a sin tax-- this is actually a tax on one of the most productive things society can encourage which is getting a college degree.

$60M a year, growing each year in an effort to stay "in the game"...that is a large chunk of money in an economy the size of NEO. BTW, think about what $60M would fund if it were servicing debt-- you could fund billions of dollars in long-lasting capital improvements.

I'm just saying this level of subsidy is forcing kids who are trying to do the best thing for themselves, and by extension the community, to shoulder a large extra burden in pursuit of what appears to be an increasingly evanescent dream. How much is too much? Is a competitive MAC football team worth $1 billion in investment over 20 years? $500 million? $100 million? UA has probably invested something like $130 million on football since the jump to 1A. To what end? Even if we were in the position of dominating our conference, which clearly we are not, what would that be yielding for us as the MAC goes from irrelevant to whatever is beyond irrelevant.

There is no reason to believe that more the same will yield a different result. And there is strong reason to believe that more of the same may not even be possible as costs explode (which they will as the new playoff increases funding to power schools and direct payments to athletes happen). It just seems like we are at a point in time when we need to think radically different.