Colleges Cut Football To Save Money -- Is It Worth It?

Gone are the pigskins from Cal State-Northridge. Hofstra University's yardlines are no longer pocked with cleat marks. And Western Washington University has put to bed its 107-year tradition of brotherly sport.

More colleges are moving to cut football as they confront their respective budget issues. It seems like a reasonable decision: eliminating the costly programs can save schools millions.

But in an op-ed in the Chronicle of Higher Education, Idaho State University vice president Gary A. Olson calls that budget fix "shortsighted."

He writes:

Even a noncompetitive or "losing" team can help the university in multiple ways.

The mere fact of having a football team, for example, is often a plus for students thinking about enrolling. I've had students tell me that although they were not sports fans, they felt good about attending an institution that sponsored a football team. Perhaps it is because football and college life are so intertwined in the American psyche, but whatever the explanation, having a team can help recruit students, and having a winning team can help attract even better students.

Olson also aruges that sports are actually wise investments -- teams engender loyalty in alumni, and thus donations:

When I served as a dean at another institution, I worked closely with donors who had allegiances both to athletics teams and to an academic program. Frequently those donors wanted to support both. I am certain that in many of those cases, we might not have been successful in interesting the donors to give to academic programs were they not first interested in athletics.

What do you think?

Comments

[athomeinidaho]

01:18 PM on 05/11/2010

Olson knows what he's talking about. Idaho State University has won precisely three football games in the past three seasons and the head coach just got a big contract extension. And that's how things work in Idaho.

[farmilyman]

06:43 AM on 05/10/2010

Good sports teams can hide the worthless education you get at some schools.

[realitytrumpsbull]

12:11 AM on 05/10/2010

Football, like baseball, started out as a sport that anyone could pretty much play. Then, it got BIG, and the sponsors came, and the investment dollars came, and huge gigantic stadiums were built in which people could sit and watch this athletic spectacle. Then more money came, and television came, and then pay-per-view, and multi-million-dollar contracts were signed, and then the doping specialists from the horse track showed up, and the XFL was born, and the lights got brighter, the pants got tighter, the billboards animated, and...at some point, it all just became content that served as a bed for the REAL money, which was in beer and potato chips.
Would soccer be better? I don't think so, they have drunken fans and big ads and commercial breaks, too, no real big difference...

[Andman0121]

12:10 PM on 05/09/2010

Good! If you're on the fence about this issue just ask yourself one question: Do you think a college should cut most of its scholorship funding to pay for a jumbotron on the football field? If you answered yes you must be insane.

Cut sports scholorships and limit the sports programs to a particular percentage (small) of the school's budget. I just solved the problem.

[AxelDC]

12:12 PM on 05/10/2010

Schools that have a jumbotron are usually making a lot of money off their football and basketball teams. Basketball is relatively cheap and a big moneymaker. Football has far fewer programs, but many of those are highly profitable. University of Texas would lose a lot of money cutting football.

In basketball, the jumbotron is also used when the arena is hosting guest lecturers, concerts, etc. The basketball team is just paying for a tool that is well used by the school.

[earlyautumn]

09:12 AM on 05/08/2010

Good. Football is a great distraction in the academic world -- high school, and college. It gets in the way of the arts -- whenever there is a financial crisis, it is the arts which bear the brunt -- not football. Our high school and college marching band programs create not music lovers, but football fans. The "we have to be #1" mentality is damaging to the entire psyche of our country. Members of losing pro football teams are so frustrated they take it out on their families. Compare the "losing" Detroit Lions, and the Detroit Symphony. The symphony members receive community approval night after night and year after year. Because they do not have to be compared with the Chicago Sympony. Both orchestras are great organizations. I would like to see football eliminated in every college and high school in the land. It would improve our intellectual level considerably. Perhaps the male part of our population would begin to take an interest in selecting intelligent members for congress and for the presidency. We also might stop creating O.J. Simpsons.

[bkrider9]

07:08 PM on 05/07/2010

I joined the track team in my senior year at college and found I had become part of a minor cult. Team "spirit" began at fanaticism and went up from there. The Stalinist co-captains gave speeches as if the locker room existed deep in the USSR. I think athletics and physical training are essential for everyone, but the extreme competition in sports is destructive.

[SF TKF]

06:04 PM on 05/07/2010

I felt good about attending a college that offered no athletic scholarships. If the football team (or any other extracurricular activity) is a major drain on the finances of the school, it should be eliminated.

[Wei-Yin Ko]

03:24 PM on 05/07/2010

I think the importance of a football team varies from college to college. For these colleges I doubt losing a football team would have much of an impact. I don't think students choose to go to colleges like Kenyon or WUSTL for the football culture...

[kurios]

10:05 AM on 05/07/2010

Theoretically yes. I am a student at Hofstra, and very few students attended the football games...its really only missed by the players on the team itself.

[TexasLiberul]

09:50 AM on 05/07/2010

I was pretty much brainwashed to attend UT, and the initial draw was the sports. I later came to respect the scholastic environment. There seemed to be a good balance then in the 1970's.

Recently (last fall), I went to see the 'Horns play CU. I thought I was in a pro football setting: Jumbotron (which you watch more than acutally looking at the players on the field), advertisements booming at an ear-splitting level, all sorts of sports gear hawked at you, and luxury boxes surrounding the field. It had an almost sterile feel to it. Each player that made a good play was profiled on the over-sized screen. It was almost as if they were demi-gods.

I left vowing never to attend another live game. Mind you, I was in the band, my brother was, too, and I will probably have my ashes spread somewhere there.

The movie "Blade Runner" keep running through my mind. The stadium was clean, but the overall feel was bloated, techo-wonderworld and cultishly creepy. No intimacy, too distant and overwhelming.

[bkrider9]

06:44 PM on 05/07/2010

Sports like this are the religions of a dying society. Blade Runner indeed.

[AxelDC]

12:14 PM on 05/10/2010

You could say the same thing about 3D movies. Are they a "religion of a dying society", or a faddish use of technology in entertainment?

[LeonBNJ]

07:34 AM on 05/07/2010

There are millions of smart, well qualified college students who could better use a full or part schlorship than someone who gets a full ride just because they can play a sport like football. There is something wrong when a school with the permission of the NCAA, can offer a good football player a 'schlorarship' even if they are well below the school's academic standards so they can have competitive teams as well as for racial 'diversity' needs. It is wrong to pay a coach like a bank CEO when students are starving to pay their tuition. The liability insurance, facility and other costs of running a major sports program is getting to exceed the income from alumni contributions at many schools. In all a resetting needs to be done at all major schools and maybe ending of football programs or going to a lower level of competition is the right thing to do.

[SF TKF]

06:06 PM on 05/07/2010

This is how I feel about it too, and it's why I specifically went to a school that didn't offer athletic scholarships.

[nickclone]

07:09 PM on 05/07/2010

I wish I had that kind of choice.

[blueballs]

06:00 AM on 05/07/2010

If the only reason for attending college were classroom instruction, junior colleges, ITT Tech, the U. of Phoenix et. al. wouldn't be laughed at as much as they are.

The value of a college education is the rich combination of education AND social experience and sport -- whether by participation, attendance or presence -- is an integral part of that. You may not actually partake of any of it, but it IS (or should be) available and you still benefit from its community. It's kind of like the space program. It might seem unnecessary but it gives rewards far beyond its investment.

There, of course, is another reason: Alumni gather at these events and it serves as a connection; both from the school to the Alumni and from the Alumni money back to the school.

Does it need to be football? Ask the University of the Pacific; once a center of the football universe with Amos Alonzo Stagg; now mostly a footnote in history. Beyond once employing a now Supreme Court Justice, there isn't much happening there and the slide *started* when they dropped football.

[buzz in illinois]

03:44 PM on 05/07/2010

There isnt much happening at the Univ of the Pacific...How about Univ of Chicago? UC dropped football in the 20's after a national championship because they saw way back then the waste of resources football was at the university. UC is still one of the best colleges in the country and produces great research and scholarship every year. UC doesnt come up in discussions of top universities because of no football, but to those in the know they know better.

[DRaymond]

03:53 AM on 05/07/2010

Sports indeed can engender school spirit and allumni support, But does it have to be football? For example the Duke Blue Devils get a lot more recognition and identity from their Basketball team than their Football team (BTW yes they do have a football team). And it is WAY less expensive to field a basketball team than a football team (fewer players, less equipment, fewer coaches, and lower injury insurance).

[ladyvader]

04:15 AM on 05/07/2010

Kansas is the same. People want to play there for basketball, but not so much in football.

[trunk65]

09:14 PM on 05/07/2010

Sorry to disagree with you, but your university looked the other way for years, because you had an abusive coach, who "restored" your football program.

[constitutional 1]

08:20 AM on 05/07/2010

Atlantic 10 Conference is filled with basketball teams from schools without football.

[zzcat]

01:02 AM on 05/07/2010

I am curious, seriously...what exactly does football have to do with college or education? I can understand in high school, it's a form of PE, but college?

[Amalek]

02:44 AM on 05/07/2010

You obviously never went to college.

[KIVPossum]

02:53 AM on 05/07/2010

In 4 years at UNC I never went to a game.

[SF TKF]

06:07 PM on 05/07/2010

I went to college and I've never understood it either.

[Hematite]

09:00 AM on 05/07/2010

Nothing.

[B Cryer]

12:02 AM on 05/07/2010

Well this should balance out the cutting of educational programs.