<p>Over Halloween some friends and I went to Wagner’s house and the topic of a football team was brought up. He said it would never happen. The reason being that you have to spend equal amounts of money on girls and boys teams. The girls teams aren’t nearly as expensive as boys, so to add football they would have to both add a lot of new girl sports and take away some guy sports. That and a bunch of other reasons but it basically came down to the fact that it is way too expensive.</p>
<p>isn’t “never” sort of a strong word… other top schools such as Notre Dame and Vanderbilt manage to have a good football team… I’m not saying Emory has to have one that good but idk why starting one up is that big of a problem. Emory has got lots of money (similar to the above mentioned schools). Is this “equal spending on men and women’s teams” idea only Emory’s personal decision or it is a sort of rule that all colleges have to abide by. If it is the latter, then many have managed to do it and I don’t know why Emory can’t.</p>
<p>Some schools were grandfather’d in he said. Also because some schools aren’t D3 like Emory. Having a D3 football team = no revenue from the games because there is basically no coverage of a D3 game. Some schools are able to have D1 football while having D3 other sports, but that is because they were grandfather’d in.</p>
<p>It’s a rule that all colleges have to abide by, aka Title IX. If it’s the D3 thing they’re worried about, I really don’t think it costs that much to put together a D3 team. No scholarships, minimal coaching salaries, small stadium or you can even pay to use a stadium already in existence. What’s the big expense they’re so worried about? The equipment? High schools pay for that. Or they could go D1 if they want the revenue. To even out the men and women, just pick up some expensive women’s club sports, pay them a little more than they need, maybe use an accounting trick here and there and I think they could get it done. If Emory really believes it’s about money, I don’t believe they’ve ever researched the costs. Plus they’re not taking into account all the benefits: school spirit => more alumni donations, more recognition, and like I said before I think it would bring the student body together.</p>
<p>I may have to agree on this to some extent. While Emory was not grandfathered into a particular D-1 sport, it should be possible to start one. Our endowment is quite a bit larger than Vandy’s for example (and lots of top D-1 colleges for that matter). One problem after its establishment, however, may be the allocation of donations and investments. It’s possible that for a while building the program may lead to such things being unevenly diverted to sports as opposed to academics, and then there is the whole “recruitment issue”. I don’t know if top institutions with D-1 sports that were grandfathered in have this issue as of now. Emory is known for academics that are clearly good enough for us to hold our own (in terms of rankings and stuff) with top institutions that have D-1 sports. Even with that said, Emory is still growing in that area as Emory’s prestige (and its money) is relatively new compared to its peer institutions (which is why I hate when others from peers rag on Emory, it’s clearly still in development, give it a chance). I think we should see how far development of the academics goes us before seriously considering sports. In other words, let’s perfect our strengths before venturing into a potentially costly new territory.</p>
<p>Emory doesn’t have to become a D1 competitor to start a football team, even though that would increase our recognition, total applications and selectivity. There’s still plenty of benefits to a D3 program: it’s cheap, students still get the tailgating and game day experience, you’ll still get a boost in school spirit and a more cohesive student body, I think the last two combined would add up to more applications, and you’re still gonna get more alumni donations. I just really don’t understand the money argument. Emory has the money and I can’t believe it’s that expensive (even with Title IX) to run a D3 program.</p>
<p>That would definitely help garner school spirit, but I know there has to be something else that can increase apps. and selectivity. Out of curiosity, I wonder what WashU did to increase the amount of applications and selectivity. I thought they had a similar sports program to that of ours. From what I understand, it was their successful advertisement campaigns (Some people tell me that they use questionable practices, but I have yet to hear specifics). Honestly I don’t know if Emory is that great in the category of bringing attention to itself. The US Newsweek rankings kinda save its life. This should not be essentially the first place that high school students find out about it. The new rankings and successes micro site is a start, but people will only see it if they find out about the school and then decide to log on Emory.edu. Now that we have the good numbers, people should know what’s behind them well before they apply. It needs to work on getting its name out of the south and key holdouts (mere metropolitan areas almost) in the north and MidAtlantic. Arguably Emory seems really successful, especially for a school in the south, in matriculating international students. I believe we have the highest percentage among the “southern ivies”. I don’t quite understand why. I wish someone could elaborate on an idea as to why a higher-ranked school like Duke wouldn’t attract more. Perhaps it’s Atlanta and its relatively progressive nature that attracts international students (not to mention the decently large Korean population concentrated in Gwinette County among other places). But in the end, the question is, how do international students find out about us in the first place? Obviously through means more effective than those within the states.</p>
<p>I agree with you guys that it would be amazing if Emory had a football team, but there are many logistical problems with it. The first is money. One of the biggest misconceptions of university endowments is that it sits in a bank somewhere, waiting to be spent. If that were the case, Emory wouldn’t have made cuts because of the economy last year. Most of Emory’s endowment is invested, and the interest or profits from those investments are available to be spent, not the principle. In addition, most of the endowment is earmarked for something specific at the donor’s request. This can’t be changed. For example, the Woodruff money from 1979 pays for professorships and Emory scholarships. There isn’t any extra money laying around.</p>
<p>As for cost, we simply don’t have practice facilities. Football needs around 10 coaches, even at the high school level, plus athletic trainers, and support staff (secretaries, etc.). These people need offices, which you have to pay for, plus a salary. Then you need a locker room for 55+ athletes, a much larger training room, more athletic fields (IM sports are already played late at night because of clubs sports practices… can’t use Candler), and a stadium for games (rent Decatur HS?). Plus, you have to find the land to put these things on (the woodpec doesn’t have the space). These are only the things that come off the top of my head. </p>
<p>My point is that this is an investment of tens of millions of dollars. I just don’t think the initial start-up cost makes it feasible without a huge alumni investment. Even if the day-to-day costs are relatively nominal, just setting up the program represents a larger burden than Emory is willing to take. I feel like this idea comes up every couple of years. And if it were possible, Emory would have done it a long time ago.</p>
<p>[The</a> Associated Press: Division III colleges debate role of sports](<a href=“http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jTkq3O9bCAzL6Gt7Y2DYs0m7vLfwD9CJBKU80]The”>http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jTkq3O9bCAzL6Gt7Y2DYs0m7vLfwD9CJBKU80)</p>