<p>Well, it’s not a problem for me. But, the 1.1 billion the schools make is a strong motivator. Also, if schools only taught academic, esoteric subjects these days, it would be one thing, but they have degrees in almost every field these days… Business, marketing, Restaurant management, Fashion merchandising, Auto mechanics. I mean, why not a major in football? It’s hardly out of the realm of what they teach now.</p>
<p>Pages and pages back, poetgrl wrote this:</p>
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<p>I found that an extraordinary statement. Many people that I know scoff at big revenue sports, and would be in favor of getting rid of the corrupt college football system. I was surprised that poetgrl hadn’t even met one such person, since my circles are full of them. But now I understand better, after reading [this</a> article.]( <a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/08/upshot/the-places-in-america-where-college-football-means-the-most.html?rref=upshot&abt=0002&abg=1]this”>http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/08/upshot/the-places-in-america-where-college-football-means-the-most.html?rref=upshot&abt=0002&abg=1)</p>
<p>The authors write:</p>
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<p>And apparently, it’s equally hard to explain to someone from the Southeast how unimportant college football is to Californians and Northeasterners. We just don’t care. Percentage of Facebook users in Alabama who “like” a college football team: 37. Percentage of Facebook users in New Jersey, where I grew up: 3. In California: 5. People in those states would be perfectly happy to have football minor leagues, instead of colleges, supply players to the Jets, Giants, Eagles, Raiders and 49ers.</p>
<p>I’m not from the southeast, but I can assure you that the fans of USC would completely disagree as would the UCLA and Cal fans.</p>
<p>All the TV money goes to the Northeast Media establishment, not to mention the advertising dollars. I know people don’t like to hear this, but the schools are making 1.1 billion dollars from this. Do you fully get how much media and advertising money is devoted to this Saturday afternoon pass time, how many people make a living from this? It’s not just coaches.</p>
<p>I have never, except on this board, heard people who wanted to do away with D1 athletics. I have friends who are Ivy educated, etc… Most people I know were educated at top 25 institutions. </p>
<p>I know you think football isn’t important, but given the numbers and the number of viewers nationwide, you are not in the majority.</p>
<p><a href=“College Football TV Ratings for Teams and Conferences: 2013 Regular Season - Good Bull Hunting”>College Football TV Ratings for Teams and Conferences: 2013 Regular Season - Good Bull Hunting;
<p>Millions and millions of viewers for Stanford, USC and UCLA, but you are right, it is the midwest and the southeast which is most passionate about college football. I’m not sure what difference that makes, though, given the numbers and the money. It’s not like it’s up to someone outside the midwest or the southeast if they will have football.</p>
<p>You can chose schools that don’t have sports, Cardinal Fang? Or that don’t offer football and basketball since those seem to be the big problem sports for you. You don’t really care that Oral Roberts U might teach courses in a way you don’t agree with because you (or your children) don’t go there. You don’t care that Directional U might let in a student with a low gpa, or that BYU has different admission standards than Yale for LDS members because you don’t want to go to those schools. Why does it matter how Alabama runs its football program or that football players at Notre Dame only take 12 credits during the season and then make some up in the summer? Of course, going to a school without sports would eliminate the Ivy league schools, Stanford, Duke, Notre Dame, all the NESCAC schools and most in the top 100. Pick a school that offers the things you like the way you like them, and let others pick schools that offer sports and even BIG sports that they like. Lots of choices out there.</p>
<p>Why do were care that the NFL uses college football as a minor league? If we, as a society, really cared about the football players who can’t read and write, we’d worry about them as 8th graders. Harvard isn’t letting in anyone who can’t read or write. A big state school will have a few students in remedial classes, and they aren’t all athletes. It’s the mission of a big public school to educate its youth, and they try to serve as many as they can. At least those players have hope of an education because it is better than flipping burgers. It doesn’t hurt the other students to have lower level kids in their schools just like it didn’t hurt them in public high school-just take the classes at the level right for that student. Each can learn at his own level. Those admitted into Harvard and Yale with an athletic Likely Letters are not hurting other Harvard and Yale students, and the athletes probably add to the ethnic, economic, and geographic diversity of those schools. If they don’t let the hockey player from Minnesota into Yale, that doesn’t mean Yale has room for one more student and that it’s going to be ANOTHER all 4.0/2400 student from Connecticut. The athletes aren’t keeping your child out.</p>
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<p>Please do not insult me by making ridiculous numeric claims that I can easily disprove. It is untrue that a majority of Americans follow college football. It is untrue that a majority of Americans think college football is important. </p>
<p>Check out this [excellent</a> Nate Silver article](<a href=“http://thequad.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/09/19/the-geography-of-college-football-fans-and-realignment-chaos/]excellent”>The Geography of College Football Fans (and Realignment Chaos) - The New York Times):</p>
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<p>Subtracting one quarter from one reveals that I am in the overwhelming majority of people, three quarters of Americans, who do not follow college football regularly. </p>
<p>That article also shows the distinct lack of interest in college football in California. California is a big state, with a population of over 38 million. But if you add up the the fans for UCLA, USC, Cal and Stanford it’s less than 3.5 million. Anemic.</p>
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<p>Note that 3.5 million is still a large number of fans in an absolute sense, even though it is only a small percentage of the state population. So the number of college football fans can be large and small at the same time.</p>
<p>You’re asking why I care that schools admit underqualified athletes, make money from them and don’t pay them? Here is why:</p>
<p>1) I hate dishonesty. Colleges that pretend that illiterates are college students getting college degrees are lying.</p>
<p>2) I hate exploitation. People should be paid for their work. College football is popular (not with me, but with many people). Colleges make a ton of money from football. They should pay the people who are doing the work. “College student” football players are in reality full time minor league athletes. They are doing a job and should be paid for it. </p>
<p>3) I hate paying for exploitation and dishonesty. As a taxpayer, I am paying for the UCs to exploit athletes, because although some college football teams make money, Cal doesn’t. In the guise of education I am paying for the UCs to operate a minor league football franchise. The UCs are strapped for money, and shouldn’t be using taxpayer dollars to operate minor league teams. (Please do not bother to try to tell me that the majority of California taxpayers are UC football fans. They are not. I already demolished that argument above.)</p>
<p>Thank you, Cardinal Fang. I am a New Yorker and although I have encountered my share of manic college football and basketball fans, the whole big-money big-TV college sports thing has always seemed bizarre to me. I like to think that we should expect better (see 1 and 2 above) from our nonprofit institutes of higher learning.</p>
<p>Cardinalfang. Don’t know why you want to say I am insulting you. It’s tedious. </p>
<p>College sports is no different than any other high revenue business. There are quite a few dollars to say that it’s not going away. </p>
<p>I don’t care if it does, but it’s not. As long as it’s not, we need to make changes. </p>
<p>So one question is are these guys worse off in college than they would be with the alternative a minor league professional. Be worthwhile to ask Michael Jordan what it was like to be a minor league baseball player or maybe watch bull Durham<br>
Now compare that to college:
- full paid tuition room and board
- boosters/agents slipping you money
- can pretty much get away with anything you want on campus including rape
- you are the bmoc and we know what that gets you
- 80000 adoring fans every weekend </p>
<p>I think it’s probably true that many high school athletes would gladly take the deal even if they understood upfront that they wouldn’t really be getting an education (indeed, they might consider it a bonus to learn that they wouldn’t really have to attend class)–because why would they need an education? They’re going to the NFL! To me, however, this still doesn’t make it OK to exploit them in this way–it works great for those who do make it to the NFL, but for those who don’t, maybe they’d be better in a minor league program–maybe followed by college or vocational training.</p>
<p>Well, it’s been shown that their services, even the least talented player, at the high revenue schools is worth 120K per year to the school. You do the math.</p>
<p>Football is the strange one since it seems to be so in bed with the NFL. There are other avenues to become a pro for all other revenue sports, but not football.</p>
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<p>So, sm74, you prefer the hypocrisy? You think a nonprofit or government university should support this? Do you think it’s in the best interest of a kid to receive these “benefits”?</p>
<p>The question isn’t how many Americans support college football but how many American college students/parents/alums do. Do all Americans even support college? No. Do all Californians, or even the majority, support higher education at all? No. The majority would like to pay less in taxes and feel each person going to college should pay his own way.</p>
<p>Colleges might be giving degrees to illiterates, but you haven’t proven that at all, you’ve just stated it. Who got degrees who didn’t earn them? What did they study?. McAdoo didn’t get a degree from UNC, he took classes there. Earlier in this thread people were arguing that these athletes should go to community college and get degrees from CCs - so it’s okay for SOME colleges to give degrees to illiterates but not other schools? It’s okay as long as the receiver of the degree wasn’t a receiver on the football field?</p>
<p>A few years ago Cal dropped several sports (I think 5) and those sports-hating taxpayers of California went nuts and demanded those sports be reinstated. Some were reinstated because that’s what the people (students, alums, sports lovers) wanted. The university felt it was right for the university to reinstate them even though they are revenue losing sports.</p>
<p>Again, you don’t have to go to or support schools with sports programs. You do have to pay taxes and a small portion of your taxes do support colleges and universities which happen to have sports, but some of your taxes support other things which you may not like such as war, the arts, drug rehab centers, welfare, religion, immigration (legal or not so legal), hunting and fishing, fracking, big pharma, unions --everyone pays for some programs they don’t like. Your tax dollars are also supporting major league sports through public stadiums, tax incentives to teams, police and fire support on game days, public transportation to those publicly owned facilities. Sucks, doesn’t it?</p>
<p>boosters really don’t slip them money anymore. A lot of them could use the money, but it’s really discouraged. In fact, if they borrow a car, the way your normal student might borrow a car? They can be made ineligible. If they use connections to get a job the way any other normal human being on the planet would use connections to get a job, they can become ineligible.</p>
<p>It’s a kind of wierd situation which is coming to an end.</p>
<p>It should be interesting to see how it all turns out.</p>
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<p>Actually, football and basketball make money at Berkeley and UCLA, according to <a href=“http://businessofcollegesports.com/2011/06/20/which-football-and-basketball-programs-produce-the-largest-profits/”>http://businessofcollegesports.com/2011/06/20/which-football-and-basketball-programs-produce-the-largest-profits/</a> , but the athletic departments overall lose money (which is why Berkeley recently cut some other sports that cost money, though some were reinstated after outside donations and funding came for them).</p>
<p>The actual problem or scandal with much of the football and basketball teams (and probably other sports teams to some extent) has to do with the academic qualifications and success (or lack thereof) in college course work of the athletes. While other sports may be less scandalous in this respect, they clearly cost money.</p>
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I disapprove of any school giving a degree to an illiterate. That’s not the same as accepting an illiterate and turning him literate, something which some schools find they have to do.</p>
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<p>Also, medical care for senior citizens is a huge one in the US.</p>
<p>On the college front, costs paid by the student and parents (and/or tax subsidy at public schools) can pay for many things other than just the education:</p>
<ul>
<li>dorms and dining halls</li>
<li>assistance finding off-campus housing</li>
<li>administration relating to student organizations (including fraternities and sororities)</li>
<li>intramural sports (including maintenance of sports fields, gym, etc. for student use)</li>
<li>career center</li>
<li>counseling</li>
<li>student health service on campus</li>
<li>campus beautification and maintenance</li>
</ul>
<p>But would parents send their kids to a minimalist university that provided just the education, but none of the “extras” common associated with it?</p>
<p>1) I hate dishonesty. Colleges that pretend that illiterates are college students getting college degrees are lying.</p>
<p>Show me the current number of illiterate players vs those taking and passing real classes excluding UNC. Here’s a new star on the SF 49rs in college.</p>
<p><a href=“Chris Borland Interview - 2013 Fall Football Practice Tour - YouTube”>Chris Borland Interview - 2013 Fall Football Practice Tour - YouTube;
<p>2) I hate exploitation. People should be paid for their work. College football is popular (not with me, but with many people). Colleges make a ton of money from football. They should pay the people who are doing the work. “College student” football players are in reality full time minor league athletes. They are doing a job and should be paid for it.</p>
<p>The value of a full college scholarship is at least $50K per year. That’s a good starting pay with a degree these days. And they get lots more time off than real workers do. </p>
<p>3) I hate paying for exploitation and dishonesty. As a taxpayer, I am paying for the UCs to exploit athletes, because although some college football teams make money, Cal doesn’t. In the guise of education I am paying for the UCs to operate a minor league football franchise. The UCs are strapped for money, and shouldn’t be using taxpayer dollars to operate minor league teams. (Please do not bother to try to tell me that the majority of California taxpayers are UC football fans. They are not. I already demolished that argument above.)</p>
<p>UCs contribution to athletics is trivial in the big picture. Net around $4 million out of $2.3 billion budget</p>
<p>Excellent article, ucbalum. It says that Cal football made some $5 million a year.</p>
<p>But your article is from 2011, before Cal spend $474 million on a stadium refurbishment. Five million dollars a year isn’t enough for the debt service on half a billion.<br>
<a href=“Cal stadium plan financially flawed – The Mercury News”>Cal stadium plan financially flawed – The Mercury News;