A Big 10 Conference committee passed a resolution earlier this month aimed at halting exorbitant athletic spending and curtailing the overcommercialization of college sports. The committee’s decision follows in the footsteps of policymakers at eight Pacific 10 Conference schools who passed a similar resolution in the spring.
The resolutions, and the ideologies behind them, seem to be gaining momentum nationwide as legislative appropriations shrink. Schools in the Atlantic Coast Conference and the Western Athletic Conference are considering comparable proposals.
Backers of the resolutions, like University of Oregon English professor James Earl, are quick to point out they are not “just a bunch of nerds who don’t like football.” Rather, Earl said, they are interested in slowing the rapid growth of athletic programs because the programs are detracting from the educational mission of higher education.
“The path that we are now following … already has lead to a growing sense among members of the public — and even members of the community — that athletic success is the main goal of too many institutions of higher learning,” Myles Brand, Indiana University president, said in a speech to the National Press Club. “We must get off that path. We must make certain that academic concerns are first and foremost. To do that, we don’t have to turn off the game. We just have to turn down the volume.”
One way to turn down the volume is to limit corporate exposure in college sports by reducing the number of pauses in games for commercials and by scaling back the number of logos displayed by athletes and coaches, resolution backers say.
But University of Oregon Athletic Director Bill Moos said reducing corporate revenue for college teams would trim funding that athletic departments depend on.
“Institutions have continued to lessen their degree of funding for intercollegiate athletics programs,” Moos said. “That has forced us to be innovative in finding ways to fund our programs. (Corporate sponsorships) have become a major portion of the funding model for intercollegiate athletics.”
Another demand of the resolution is for universities to rescind athletic subsidies in order to control the “arms race” of athletic facility building on college campuses — and thereby force athletic departments to live within their means. The University of Oregon Senate recently agreed to such an arrangement with intercollegiate athletics.
“Faculty everywhere are of a single mind on this issue,” said Earl, an original planner of the Pac-10 joint resolution. “The most important thing I’d like to make clear to the public — including students and fans — is that they understand faculty are not opposed to college athletics, per se. We just want to slow the growth in the future.”
Earl said there is a growing dichotomy between athletics and academics that must be bridged, beginning with students and student athletes. The resolutions also suggest that academic support systems for athletes, such as tuition waivers and tutors, be integrated into schoolwide efforts.
“I don’t agree with that,” Moos said. “Student athletes have a lot more demands on their time than normal students. There are exceptions — there are students that work and non-traditional students — but with plans and practice time and other parts, a student athlete’s life is different than that of the ordinary student.”
Jon Sanders, a policy analyst for The Pope Center for Higher Education Policy in Raleigh, N.C., said many groups — including “academic purists” and “feminists” — have pushed athletic reform ideas for years. But that probably doesn’t mean much to athletic conferences near the southeastern corner of the country, he said.
“I think it would face an extraordinarily tough road,” Sanders said. “There are so many people out there not involved in a university — alumni, supporters — who enjoy the games and don’t care to be bothered with the issues behind them. That’s not just to blame them. College athletics drives a lot of revenue for colleges, especially successful ones.”
Pac-10 presidents examined the athletics resolution and have said that while they believe in the viability of the athletic system, they also said the problem of the “arms race” would be addressed.
Earl said reforming athletics policies will take a substantial amount of time, but after talking with University of Oregon President Dave Frohnmayer, he said the resolution is high on Frohnmayer’s list of priorities.
“We’re in the middle of a big campaign for a stadium and have a team on the way to one bowl or another,” Earl said. “It’s not the time for expressing these differences of opinion.”