College athletes need to be paid a small amount because of the large amounts of revenue they bring for their schools. The media is filled with stories of the NCAA and how star athletes sometimes receive money and gifts from colleges. Since the NCAA prohibits athletes from having a job during the school year, these players need a monetary form of income. This makes it difficult for the athletes to resist the temptation of accepting compensation for their performances. With little time for a job, they should be allowed a small, but reasonable allowance. Granted there are some cases where an athlete accepts an amount of money that is extreme, but these occurrences would diminish with the institution of a regular allowance.
Athletes do not have time to work due to strenuous practice schedules. A NCAA division 1 football or basketball player has a schedule comparable to having a nine-to-five job, plus being a full time student. It is like someone working a steady job and turning the paycheck back to his employer. There are huge amounts of revenue being brought into the universities by athletes. According to the Intercollegiate Athletics Report of 1999 Boise State made over seven million dollars on athletics alone. Despite this, some of the athletes that make the money for their schools cant even afford to buy the team sweatshirt that they are making popular.
Collegiate sports have become a big business. $38 million dollars was paid to Notre Dame by NBC for the exclusive rights to broadcast its football games for five seasons, and a major TV network will pay $117 million dollars a year to broadcast a major bowl game (Polo). These schools are benefiting from their athletic programs, more so than the athletes. The University of Michigan, for example, averages 14 million dollars in ticket sales alone. (Last) Universities pack their stadiums to capacity to maximize the money they take in from each sporting event. Since colleges and universities make a fortune from their athletics, it is only fair to give them some sort of compensation. What happens to the kid from the small town recruited to a large university on a full ride for athletics? Some say his school is paid for and that is enough, but where is he going to get the money to go home for the holidays or even take a girl out once and awhile.
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Universities care more about a winning record than the athletes on their teams. Many colleges have a graduation rate of athletes of less than 50%. (Anderson) Schools often fire coaches unless they have great records disregarding the graduation rate of their student-athletes. The NCAA has admitted that the scholarships athletes are given are around $2,000 short of whats necessary to get by on per year. (Anderson) How are the athletes expected to be able to come up with the difference? This fact leads many to consider the option of going pro early.
Schools, however, should not be allowed to pay more to their athletes than other schools. This would cause them to have an unfair pick of the top rated athletes. The money given to these athletes would be only enough to help them with some of the daily expenses in life, not to bribe certain players to your school. By paying college athletes a fair amount of money each month, more might put their pro careers on hold and finish their college education. If they were compensated, it could deter athletes from entering the draft before graduation
Being a college athlete has more disadvantages than advantages. Their grueling schedule of practices, weight training, and games leaves them unable to participate in the job market. This leaves them no money for anything extra-curricular, a luxury that many other students enjoy. They are selected based on their skill to bring more money into the school. This being unfair to the athletes they should receive an allowance based on the schools revenue.
