Interesting read:

http://education.newsweek.com/2010/09/22/the-case-against-college-athletic-recruiting.html


Very interesting quote from the article on a topic that has been discussed here a million times, that sports generate higher donation levels:

"The other claim, that donations increase if teams win, was disproved by former Princeton University president William G. Bowen and James L. Shulman in a study of 30 selective colleges (which ran the gamut from large to small, private to public, Division I to Division III). The authors found no increase in alumni giving the year after an improved performance in high-profile sports. In some cases, they actually found that such giving declined after a good football season, possibly because more academically minded alumni dislike seeing their alma mater as a “football school.”

That was a very interesting article. Thanks for posting the link. My impression was that scholarships and lenient admission standards for athletes evolved a hundred years ago as schools brought in "ringers" to win contests. The idea that it evolved as a form a racism is an idea I haven't heard before. I do note that the article is more focused on athletics in elite private schools rather than in state universities, though. I'm not sure that the situation is completely the same.

One point that occurred to me as I read it is that we are now seeing a tremendous growth in for-profit "universities". One thing you don't see these for-profit universities doing is athletics. Therefore we can conclude that from a purely money perspective, sports are not profitable.  I also do think that there is something to the traditional view that a certain amount of sports are good for everyone. I think colleges should require all students to do some PE, or participate in some sport, at least at the intramural or club level. I think that a healthy body and and a healthy mind go hand in hand.

Note, there are a lot of other things these for-profit universities don't do, either, such as research. I personally don't have a very high opinion of them - I see many of them as existing solely for the purpose of getting students to borrow more than they should in the form of student loans, and milking the student loan system, enslaving those students to future debt for a degree of marginal value. In the long run I think some of the for-profit schools that actually provide a good educational value will survive, but many of them will fail when the student loan system blows up in a few years, just as the mortgage loan system just blew up.

And another: http://lsia.tamu.edu/2010%20Excellence%20in%20Management%20Final%20Results.pdf

Nice to be ranked above Stanford, USC, Oregon, BYU, UCLA, Penn State, Florida, Duke, UNC, Purdue...

Not sure what happened.

http://www.usatoday.com/sports/college/2010-09-21-student...


Regarding our proficiency of spending, that's great but the article above talks about just who's money is being spent.  The problem here is this is a Nationwide ordeal, and I wish I had a simple answer, however I am afraid this is a zero sum game.

Funny you say that because the closest of the Big Three (Football, Basketball, and Baseball) is baseball with it's minor league system.  However College baseball has the worse turn on investment of the other two, the lowest graduation rates, lowest apr's, highest transfer rates and general overall disregard for education.

And D.A. I agree!