<p>Interesteddad, Wow. Just goes to show you, by selecting the data you want to expose, you can suggest almost anything be true. ;)</p>
<p>SS raised an interesting correlation in post #28, regarding how Rutgers apps increased with its football team's success, thereby potentially increasing the selectivity of Rutgers.</p>
<p>You might conclude that schools with huge successful football programs which "dig down deep" in the stats to bring in the good players, may end up INCREASING their selectivity rating and academic quality of overall admits via the prestige generated by the football team. (USC comes to mind)</p>
<p>(whoops sorry I forgot this thread was about DIII)</p>
<p>Onemoremom:</p>
<p>I believe that the coming split in DIV III may well occur along a fault line of "allowing post season play" versus "banning post season play".</p>
<p>For many years, the elite LACs banned postseason NCAA competition. If the member schools of the NESCAC opted for a return to this policy, Williams would have some hard decisions to make.</p>
<p>For a balanced look at NESCAC competition, I think you should also consider the views of the other schools. Of course, Williams likes it the way it is. They outspend the other schools in the conference by a mile and, in many sports, use conference play as a "homecoming-style" tuneup for national championship tournaments against much larger schools (that they also outspend).</p>
<p>Yeah, and I'd been hoping for that Boise State/Yard-By-Yard National Championship Game. :(</p>
<p>Bay, I still think it applies. Maybe no scholarship $$ is involved, but athletes are still recruited & given breaks in Div III. Also Rutgers has Div III sports at the Newark & Camden campuses & the article found the imapct was felt in their admissions, as well. Newark is loaded with non-traditional students with no varsity college sports in their future, yet the application numbers are rising. People like to be connected to winners. The Newark campus is a few acres of concrete & you can't throw a frisbee without knocking someone in the head. Yet the football/applications surge still was quantifiable.</p>
<p>mimi -- I would not call knocking off a grand or two from a $45,000 tuition/R&B bill a subsidy. It's a loss-leader. A teaser. An enticement. A clever means of alluring, attracting, or seducing students & their parents, if you will. But not a subsidy.</p>
<p>"For a balanced look at NESCAC competition, I think you should also consider the views of the other schools."</p>
<p>Idad: </p>
<p>It's important to note that the Williams athletic director was referring to NESCAC members when she stated: "we all looked around and said, "Who decided we had to split?’ ” Melendy said. “We like the way things are. It’s a big group, but we can handle it."</p>
<p>"If the member schools of the NESCAC opted for a return to this policy"</p>
<p>Fortunately, the NESCAC members seem to be forward-looking, unlike one of its old alums. And the other NESCAC members aren't exactly slouches in the spending department, either.</p>
<p>Maybe you would look more kindly on Williams if your next child could be accepted there.</p>
<p>"Maybe you would look more kindly on Williams if your next child could be accepted there."</p>
<p>My kid was recruited and accepted there, and received three phonecalls from the head of her department and alums urging her to attend. So? (For the record, I think Williams should spend as much money on athletics as they choose - it's their money, and lots of students like it that way. They just shouldn't hide that more than 50% of the student body is involved in varsity, junior varsity, and intercollegiate club sports, making it, as far as I am aware, by far the most athletic liberal arts college in the country. What's wrong with that? If folks don't like it, they shouldn't attend - my d. walked.</p>
<p>"mimi -- I would not call knocking off a grand or two from a $45,000 tuition/R&B bill a subsidy."</p>
<p>Why do you assume that students or their families are paying it? Swarthmore probably spends the difference on fertilizer for the arboretum. NOTHING comes off the bill.</p>
<p>
[quote]
They just shouldn't hide that more than 50% of the student body is involved in varsity, junior varsity, and intercollegiate club sports,
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Who's hiding? Of course Williams is full of athletes, outdoorsy kids, physically active kids. I don't know the if the accurate statistic is 50% or 90% as every student I know there does something sports related even if it's just a loopy game of broomball at 2:00 a.m. </p>
<p>The point that I would make about Williams (and most likely about many other of the schools at the top of the sports spending list) is that they spend plenty on other things too and attract kids who are multifaceted -- athletes plus. The investment in the arts -- music, dance, studio art, museums, theater -- is equally impressive. They've mountains of money and there's no reason for either/or.</p>
<p>Sports and academics. Sports and art. Sports and science. Sports and politics. These are not mutually exclusive interests.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Maybe you would look more kindly on Williams if your next child could be accepted there.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Well, that will have to be one of life's great unknowns, since my only child withdrew her application in December. </p>
<p>However, knowing how her stats stacked up, knowing the details of her application, knowing that she was accepted to Swarthmore with no hook, and knowing that she was a double-legacy at Williams (not many of those around before now), I am reasonbly confident that Williams would have been an option. </p>
<p>I would have been happy if that's where she ended up. Lord knows I had to bust my butt for the better part of a year to even get her to go back for a real visit as a senior after she spent a blizzard weekend in January Billsville with her mother as a junior. You know I'm a fan of liberal arts college education and Williams is certainly good in that department.</p>
<p>Actually, my daughter's best friend in high school did end up going to Williams...and we recommended the school to her and her parents (who had more attractive full-ride financial offers on the table). The last thing we've ever heard from her friend was freshman year when she told my daughter that the drinking was insane in her freshman entry and that she spent Saturday nights in her room. The friend won't have anything to do with my daughter (and other high school buddies) because my daughter told her that she goes to parties with alcohol at Swarthmore. Apparently, the Williams friend views college drinking as an either/or deal....insane or not at all. Go figure.</p>
<p>"Mind you, these are athletic budgets. They don't include the big expenses, like athletic scholarships"</p>
<p>They also probably don't include a lot of capital espenses like the Ritzy Rec Center pool used by the swim team or the Convocation center used by the basketball team or those acres of well manicured playing fields (or in many cases the costs of manicuring them). Of course they also don't include any of the revenues generated, usually not much gate at DIII's but you might be surprised at the booster money that still comes in or the gifts for facilities or the licensing fees for branded clothing and merchandise etc. etc.</p>
<p>A lot of rather creative accounting goes on with atheletics.</p>
<p>
[quote]
$247 TUFTS UNIVERSITY
$239 EMORY
$233 CARNEGIE MELLON
$222 BARD COLLEGE
$194 EMERSON COLLEGE
$193 UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO
$179 WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY IN ST LOUIS
$110 CASE WESTERN RESERVE UNIVERSITY
$101 ROCHESTER INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
$85 NEW YORK UNIVERSITY</p>
<p>One thing they have in common is they are larger than some of the LAC's which certainly drives the per capita costs down but still - I do think there are some observations that can be made about about environment, even to just compare them against there like-sized but more sports interested compadres.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Additional confirmation about the environment: the larger institutions among these low-spending schools are members of the University Athletic Association (CMU, Case, Emory, Chicago, WUSTL, NYU, Rochester), a "conference" that generally earns high marks for keeping athletic recruiting under control and requiring student athletes to be representative of the rest of the student body academically.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Swarthmore probably spends the difference on fertilizer for the arboretum.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Ha. Now, you knew I'd have to find the answer to that, didn't you?</p>
<p>OK. The Scott Arborteum was initially endowed with a gift in the honor of Scott toilet paper magnate, Arthur Hoyt Scott (Swarthmore Class of 1895). Since the orginal endowment, others have endowed many more named gardens on campus. The total Arboretum endowments stood at $21 million at the end of 2004.</p>
<p>The arborteum spent $776,000 from endowment returns in 2004 ($552k in direct expenses and $224k as a transfer to the College for general overhead). The total operating budget of the Arboreteum was $1.1 million or about $750 per student per year.</p>
<p>I think that most members of the Swarthmore community would agree that the gardens, landscaping, and ampitheater contribute to the quality of campus life in a significant way.</p>
<p>One of the reasons many DIII schools spend on atheletics is because it actually helps them to recruit good students. You would be surprised at the number bright kids who love sports who may be a step slow, an inch or two too short, or 20 lbs too light to make it in DI or DII atheletics who none the less want to continue playing at a competitive level after high school. When it comes time to chose between say Vanderbilt and a good LAC where they can continue their atheletic career go for the LAC.</p>
<p>So the Eph vs. Swat choice comes down to football and icehockey vs. badminton and flowers. Hmmm. ;) (I'd choose the latter, but it's just me. :)) (The reality is that I'd choose "none of the above".)</p>
<p>Probably more like football versus 24/7 health care.</p>
<p>Because the college our son attends(RPI) came up on the list I was interested to determine what impact their Div 1 hockey team had on the overall athletic budget. I know the numbers are somewhere but I couldn't find them.</p>
<p>But what I did find out was very interesting. The non-personnel cost for all athletics is managed, not by the Athletic Director, but by the Student Union and by students. This includes general physical recreation, intramural sports, club sports, varsity sports and even that doggoned Div 1 mens hockey team.</p>
<p>I am not sure how long the RPI Student Union has been in existance but if it has a long history its responsibilities w/r to the athletic programs may be modeled after European colleges and universities. There all athletics are club level sports administered by student participants too.</p>
<p>Thanks for those arboretum pictures, idad. They brightened my spirits on a day I'll be de-icing walkways here in NJ.</p>
<p>SS-they are probably de-icing the walks at the Scott Arboretum too albeit with eco-friendly de-icers-like sunshine?</p>
<p>Nice pics Idad!</p>
<p>LOL! Sunshine in below freezing weather is not a de-icer. Unless you don't mind broken legs. My method is my trusty ice chopper & a good strong back & shoulders.</p>