Athletics diverts money from academics at some schools

College Search & Selection
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<p>from the latest Chronicle of Higher Education -week of Jan 23, 2009</p>

<p>In all, more than two dozen athletics departments are involved in or planning endowment campaigns, the Chronicle survey found. Their combined goal: $2.3-billion.</p>

<p>Athletics contributions already cut into donations for academic programs on some campuses. Now athletics fund raisers are making a bigger play for bequests, worrying some academic gift officers who have been chasing the same prospects as the economy has soured.</p>

<p>"The fact that athletics crosses all disciplines and colleges makes this more challenging, because they can go into any alumni base — engineering, pharmacy, sciences, and arts — to solicit estate gifts," says David Cave, a senior major-gifts officer at the University of Michigan. "And they might have a certain edge because of their approaching donors with benefits."</p>

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<p>Don't worry about Michigan collegehelp. They have the sixth largest endowment of any university in the U.S. They just completed a huge campaign. Use another school as an example.</p>

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<p>Michigan is worried about Michigan. I am not worried about Michigan.</p>

<p>Other schools mentioned:
Berkeley
Duke
Boston College
Stanford</p>

<p>"It's not just elite institutions trying to score big funds. Five other athletics programs — at Florida State University, Louisiana State University, Oklahoma State University, the University of Minnesota, and the University of Texas — all have goals of $100-million-plus sports endowments."</p>

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<p>This is silly... 99% of schools -including the Ivies - have to "divert money from academics" to athletics. Most colleges and universities do not have self-supporting athletics programs so the money has to come from what could potentially be more funds for academics. Michigan, OSU, Texas, Florida, and Georgia are among a very small handful of colleges with profitable and self-funding athletic programs where not a cent of tuition, taxpayer money or endowment funds is given to sports. Typically, even if a school has a profitable football team, it's not enough to fund the rest of the athletic programs so money comes from <em>somewhere</em>. There may be a legitimate argument that such schools have made college athletics too commercial, but I'm not sure how fair that is considering it results in $0 academic funds having to be diverted to fund sports.</p>

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<p>I think the main point of the article was that athletics programs at some schools are undertaking large fundraising campaigns that compete for contributions with academic fundraising. The athletics fundraising tends to win the competition because they can offer sports entertainment perks to donors.</p>

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<p>I don't think there is that much overlap between academic and sports motivated givers. Often the top givers are smart enough to know where they want their money to go.</p>

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<p>barrons, if that's the case, then the argument that sports will increase the amount of alumni support and networking around the school and inspire more people to give money back is tenuous at best. It would suggest that people who give back only because of the connected feeling they get from strong sports give back only to support sports and not to support other areas of the school.</p>

<p>I think that's quite untrue.</p>

<p>However, this does bring up an interesting point-- alumni fund raising is, essentially, a zero-sum game and I imagine it would be very difficult to quantify whether the effect of increasing the donor pool through sports actually offsets the change in how donations are made to various parts of the university.</p>

<p>It's particularly interesting because some institutions, like the Ivies, already have some of the highest alumni donation rates. Are they spending more or less (as a percentage) to sports programs relative to say, Duke or Stanford? Is there a considerable pool left to tap for donations that would, in fact, counteract the redirection of funds into athletics to justify significantly boosting those programs? All good questions that apply to the hawkette thread of last week.</p>

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<p>
[quote]
barrons, if that's the case, then the argument that sports will increase the amount of alumni support and networking around the school and inspire more people to give money back is tenuous at best. It would suggest that people who give back only because of the connected feeling they get from strong sports give back only to support sports and not to support other areas of the school.

[/quote]

That's not what barrons is saying.</p>

<p>When I donate money to my alma mater, I can designate it to go to general sports, a particular sport, general scholarship fund or academic department. I know where my money is being put to use. </p>

<p>My alma mater is also trying to build a sports funding endowment by selling rights to stadium seats. It is an entirely separate fundraising campaign.</p>

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<p>It appears Stanford may be addressing the issue by cutting some sports programs.
Strapped</a> Stanford might cut some sports teams - MSNBC Wire Services - nbcsports.msnbc.com</p>

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<p>I also don't agree that overall giving is zero sum. People are motivated by different things. I like sports but give zero to it. I graduated from the biz school but give little or nothing to it. I give significant amounts to the arts, library, and liberal arts depts. Why--because they appreciate it it more and need it. The SOB already gets plenty of money IMHO. The arts are always pinching every cent. When I give $1000 to art history I get a long personal note from the head of the dept. and an invitation to stop in for a tour. A $1000 to the SOB you get a receipt.</p>

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<p>Sports endowment, Endowment per athlete from sports, overall Endowment per student, Institution</p>

<p>$212,000,000 $485,126 $122,784 1. U. of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
$150,717,426 $444,594 $924,348 2. Duke U.
$100,000,000 $381,679 $169,380 3. Boston College
$80,058,950 $274,174 $128,028 4. Georgia Tech
$61,873,981 $129,715 $289,840 5. U. of Virginia
$56,000,000 $147,368 $76,457 6. U. of Washington
$51,000,000 $126,551 $27,840 7. U. of Georgia
$49,390,069 $109,756 $43,189 8. Pennsylvania State U.
$48,051,366 $141,328 $20,672 9. U. of Connecticut
$46,139,682 $69,909 $59,632 10. Ohio State U.</p>

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<p>None of those schools' academic programs are hurting for anything.</p>

<p>On the surface level, it doesn't matter if those schools are doing fundraising campaigns for both academics and athletics. Athletics have their place in American higher education; people who love the teams will give money to them. People who don't will give money to the generalized fund or specify them for academic means.</p>

<p>I mean, this argument could be used for any other part of a university's operations -- research, landscaping, recruitment (of employees), facilities maintenance, extra-curricular organizations (fraternities/sororities, special interest groups)...etc, etc. A university is a business with many different arms, only one of which is academic work.</p>

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<p>"The nation's biggest athletics departments are quietly trying to raise hundreds of millions of dollars for separate sports endowments, heating up the competition for donors and raising questions about institutional priorities during the economic crunch.</p>

<p>At least eight programs hope to bring in more than $100-million each to defray the rising costs of college sports, a Chronicle survey has found. The athletics department at the University of California at Berkeley is shooting for $500-million. Duke University's wants $350-million. Boston College's says it needs $250-million.</p>

<p>They all have Stanford University in their sights. The Cardinal's athletics endowment, which topped $500-million last year, kicks out $25-million or more every year for scholarships and other program needs and has helped the university capture the Directors' Cup as the country's winningest sports program for 14 consecutive years.</p>

<p>Duke, whose athletics endowment reached $150-million last year, has to raise $13-million a year in private donations to cover its athletes' scholarships. "If we could take that $13-million and use it to enhance the program as opposed to paying a bill, we would be in an advantageous spot," says Tom Coffman, associate director of athletics for development and planning."</p>