One of Americans’ favorite pastime activities has been watching or participating in college athletics. College athletics have always been something more pure and interesting than professional athletics because it isn’t about the money. However, over the years, college athletics have changed for the worse, as players have been drifting further away, core reason being lack of funds for the players (Eric, p. 250). This has led to the call for reforms in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) decision against payments for student-athletes. College athletes deserve to be paid due to a number of reasons. To begin with, the athletes happen to be the ones responsible for the huge sums of revenue that universities receive from the college athletic competitions (Jonathan, p. 1). The rise in popularity of sports in the American society, coupled with its high profit margin for the colleges due to commercialization has led to creation of much revenue for the universities. It is however very unfortunate that the student-athletes responsible for this, end up without even a penny of the revenue that they helped bring forth. There have also been contracts worth billions of dollars being signed between the universities and various broadcasting stations but the colleges still end up not paying the students. This can be better described as capitalism due to its lop-sided nature where the student-athletes do their best to aid in revenue creation for their universities but get nothing out of it. Others may argue the students get paid indirectly by being offered scholarships to be able to obtain their degrees in various fields of study. However, there is the question of; does this compensation help them out with their student loans. Or even enable them to comfortably partake in money-related activities? The answer still remains “No!” The student-athletes have to juggle their tight academic schedules, fixed training sessions and undertake their home-related activities all at once. This leaves them with very little or no time to seek an income-generating job like other college students. The student-athletes spend most of their free and available time participating in activities related to their respective sports. For instance, football players will either be working out in private gyms, training with fellow teammates or even educating others about the sport. Student-athletes commit much of their time to sports related activities. Currently, making the payment of student-athletes into a reality may be a difficult if not an impossible task (Lesly, p. 1). This is due to the many economic and legal hurdles that prevent this from happening anytime soon. Though the funds from ticket sales and television broadcasting may bring in millions in revenue, these funds would never be enough to cover the costs of the different departments. Most sports are aired on national television, giving the student-athletes even more of an incentive to perform at their highest possible level. Very few college-athletes end up turning pro in their sport even though the amount exposure and the massive viewing they get in college, but yet this still attracts many fans and future athletes as well. Apart from the economic reasons, it is not clear where to draw the line in payment of the student-athletes. Will it be the football players, tennis players or basketball players who will be paid more? Not all the sports bring in huge amounts of revenue for the university, but all the students spend their precious time to represent their colleges. It was once considered that athletics is young men and women competing, sweating, bleeding and learning game; a concept that no one wishes to change or alter. If anything, it should be added that athletics help in interaction and better understanding of people according to the Greek. It would however be fair and prudent if the student-athletes had a piece of what comes out of their own sweat and blood literally. This does not mean advocating for payment of the student-athletes like professionals, but rather a payment of the athletes as sign of gratitude and financial compensation.
Work Cited
Chait, Jonathan. “Fixing College Sports: Why Paying Student Athletes Won’t Work”. New York Sports. n. d. Web. 1 Nov 2012.
Sobocinski, Eric. “College Athletes: What is Fair Compensation” 7 (2010): 250-256
Ryder, Lesly. “Don’t Pay College Athletes. Huff Post. Web. 1 Nov 2012.
James, Brown. “Paying College Athletes." StudyMode.com. 12 2007. Web. 1 Nov 2012
Cited: Chait, Jonathan. “Fixing College Sports: Why Paying Student Athletes Won’t Work”. New York Sports. n. d. Web. 1 Nov 2012. Sobocinski, Eric. “College Athletes: What is Fair Compensation” 7 (2010): 250-256 Ryder, Lesly. “Don’t Pay College Athletes. Huff Post. Web. 1 Nov 2012. James, Brown. “Paying College Athletes." StudyMode.com. 12 2007. Web. 1 Nov 2012
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