George Boakye-Yiadom. Professor Surin. Eng-112-32 . February

One of the reasons why the NCAA will not pay athletes is because it would compromise the integrity of intercollegiate athletics. Student athletes should be paid for three main reasons: college athletics play an important part in the amount of revenue a university brings in, players drop out and turn to professional sports early because of the money and fame, and it would help with any financial burdens that the student might have while trying to get an education.

College sports are one of the largest and fastest growing markets in today’s culture. With some college sports games attracting more viewers than their professional counterparts, the NCAA is one of the most profiting organizations in America. Recently there has been controversy in the world of college sports as to whether the college athletes that are making their universities and the NCAA money should receive payment while they are playing their respective sport. Many believe that these athletes should be paid. Others argue that they are already receiving numerous benefits for playing that sport from their universities. Many of the proponents of paying college athletes are current or former college athletes who believe their hard work and hours put into practice and competing go under appreciated. They feel that while the athletes are making the university money, the athletes do not receive any cut of these profits. Opponents feel that athletes already receive numerous perks and should not receive extra compensation on top of the perks they already receive.

Ever since college students started playing sports, back in 1879 when Harvard played Yale in the first collegiate sports game, the question of whether college athletes should be paid was addressed. From that point on athletes, coaches, and college administrators have brought forward points agreeing or disagreeing with the notion of paying college students. The students argue that they deserve to be paid due to the revenue that they bring for the college and because of the games they play and the championships they win. At first the idea of paying college athletes was out of the question, but now the argument has gone from a simple yes or no to a heated debate. Since college athletes are given a free education, they should not also be paid.

If the NCAA decided to pay college athletes, it would create more problems than solutions. For example, if student-athletes are offered a salary, most likely the cost of school tuition will go up because the money paid to the student-athletes must come from somewhere and the revenue from sporting events and memorabilia will not be enough to cover all student-athlete salaries as well as expenses to run all the college’s sports programs. In addition, not all college sports draw the same fan base and therefore, income is greatly varied between sports programs which in turn will create an unfair balance when determining the salary for each student-athlete. All student-athletes regardless of which sport they are participating would expect equal pay.

Sports have been a big part of culture in the United States since the 1900’s. Sports has become a multibillion dollar business of sort, with spots such as baseball, basketball, and football captivating americans.With american sports gaining popularity, the growth of college sports went on the rise. In 2013, The National Collegiate Athletic Association statistically generated $912,804,046 (Alesia, 2014). With all of this income that the NCAA brought in, one has to raise the question, should college athletes be paid? Even though college athletes are student athletes, they should be paid because they are practically employees to the college without compensation.

One of the reasons why the NCAA will not pay athletes is because it would compromise the integrity of intercollegiate athletics. Student athletes should be paid for three main reasons: college athletics play an important part in the amount of revenue a university brings in, players drop out and turn to professional sports early because of the money and fame, and it would help with any financial burdens that the student might have while trying to get an education.

College athletics are becoming more like the professional leagues except for one big issue, money. Student athletes bring in a vast amount of revenue for the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) not to mention recognition and notoriety regarding the athlete’s university. However, the debate continues as to whether student athletes should or should not receive payment for playing college sports.

Student athletes should not be paid. A misconception is that all athletic programs in the NCAA make head-over-toe profit. There are three divisions of intercollegiate athletics, and frankly division three athletic programs don’t make as much or have a profit when compared to division one programs. “Critics of paying college athletes note that only a small number of them compete in sports or on teams that actually generate revenue”. (Paying College Athletes) The truth is only a fraction of athletic programs are actually profitable, while most pose a cost to the institution. The question arises primarily in division one programs and typically in the sports of basketball and football. The argument is made that these institutions receive millions of dollars from their student athletes’ performance, in return they should be paid.

A topic that is very controversial for everyone is, should student-athletes in college be compensated? There numerous evidence that supports in favor and many against the proposition of paying student- athletes who play sports for their university. As a college athlete, students are putting their bodies on the line each game they play. There’s possibility of suffering a traumatic brain injury or being paralyze after physical contact. These athletes are sacrificing their bodies and physical health at an opportunity to play a game which they love, and hopefully play it in the professional level. While that’s taking place, college football and basketball are big business that keep expanding. College sports bring in a large amount of revenues. The result is that many of them fail to graduate. Paying college athletes would not ruin amateur sport because even though most college athletes do get scholarship and should focus on their education it doesn’t help them if most of the time they are not attending classes to be in practice or games. College sports do make a high-income and athletes deserve a portion of the revenue they bring their programs.

My first reason why NCAA athletes should not be paid is that they already receive compensation in the form of scholarships. In a survey conducted by John Dennis in 2013, he found that 69% of the public is opposed to paying college student athletes in addition to their scholarships. If college universities began to pay their student athletes, this would raise the cost of education for non-athletes wanting to attend that university. Some may suggest taking away scholarships and giving salaries to

With the increasing popularity of college sports over the past couple of years, a very controversial topic has risen pertaining to whether college athletes should receive payment or not for playing. The main problem behind the topic of paying college athletes is that college sports rake in massive amounts of revenue for their respective schools, athletic staff, and the NCAA (National Collegiate Athletics Association) but the athletes which participate in these sports and create all the revenue reap none of the financial benefits. To create a better understanding of how profitable college sports are, I present the following quote from Tom Gerencer’s article, “How Much Money Does the NCAA Make?”, “The NCAA makes about $1 billion per year. College athletics as a whole pulls in about $12 billion annually.” (Gerencer 2016) After grasping how much the NCAA and schools profit from college sports, it is very easy to see why there is a problem and why so many people argue that college athletes should be paid for their play. Along with the many supporters of college athletes being paid, there are various people who believe they should not due to their beliefs of education being more important than anything else in college. Now, although college athletes not being paid is the main problem it is not the only problem; the NCAA, which is the organization which runs all college sports, are adamant about college sports being an amateur league and because of this they do not allow athletes

Each university associated with the NCAA differ in size and budgeting. Some schools would have no problem paying each student athlete at their school only because of their profits from their ultimate money sports such a football and basketball, while other schools struggle now to even field enough teams to remain an NCAA school. This is why I find it intriguing to see where each school lies on how this situation could affect them. Athletes being paid could also affect high school and pro sports as well which interests me more to research this topic. High school athletics could improve by students pushing harder at the high school level to reach the college level because of pay, while pro sports could have many different affects such as students not leaving school early because of pay at the college level now.

College athletics is a very diverse organization involving a lot of students, mainly as the players, and non-students such as officials, coaches and others. The leading governing body for college athletics is the National Collegiate Athletic Association, NCAA. College sports is itself a big industry involving sponsorships, TV networks, endorsements, retail products and marketing. But in spite of it being a big business, the players are not compensated for the work they deliver. This opens up two opinions: should players be paid, or should they not? Kristi Dosh’s article, “The Problems With Paying College Athletes”, discusses the various problems with paying college athletes, and the biggest question being where will the money come from. On

The purpose of this research is to identify why college athletes should be given money in return for their involvement in sports. This research sources from several authors from different backgrounds and specialties. The research includes many aspects of college athletes, numerous reasons for paying athletes in college, and many other solutions other than paying college athletes. This information will likely be used to support the cause for athlete pay or the improvement of the college experience for a college athlete.

Now you might be thinking, well if the players get paid it’s gonna ruin college sports, but it would actually make the NCAA more competitive. As listed on ListLand.com “ If the NCAA paid its athletes, the students would not have to add extra stress worrying about where they will get their money from.” These student athletes would no longer have to worry about getting part time jobs and put more effort and energy into their sport to become better competitors.