College Athletes: Should They Be Paid? - Essay Sample

Introduction

College sports are known to generate billions of dollars in the United States annually, albeit the revenues generated from those games are used in programs, services, and opportunities of distribution that benefit conference members and schools directly (Hess). However, many questions arise concerning student-athletes, basketball, and football students owing to the tremendous amount of revenue that they bring. There have been proposals on paying college athletes that have drawn polarizing responses stemming from politicians and athletes who have shown their support for allowing students to make money during their college careers. However, the colleges and the administrators of athletes have dismissed the idea. They oppose the idea of citing that college athletes are about students playing other college students and not employees playing employees. The questions invoked by this debate would be, would athletes be paid differently regarding in the sports they participate? Or how would the true worth of a college sports team be quantified, and from where would the money come? The debate on college students' payment has therefore been a controversial issue with the supporters citing that the names and images of students are used in adverts and profits, thus warranting them some gains. At the same time, critics assert that students do receive scholarships as a form of their payment for their talents.

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Why Student-Athletes Should Get Paid

Payment of student-athletes for their participation is of the essence since it encourages healthier student-athlete and eliminates their needs to find outside employment to sustain themselves. Most scholarships are only limited to offer tuition fees, accommodation, and broad coverage for sports participation, albeit not all take students to qualify for them. Additionally, most athlete students have their image used in adverts and products in the generation of revenue. Still, they are never compensated for the same payment of student-athlete should, therefore, make them channel all their focus on academics and athlete devoid of worries of making ends meet. Another reason why student-athlete should be paid since it is a full-time job involving jangling between eight-room, film sessions, classes, and the field (Martinez).Similarly, the schedules for National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) tournaments need extended periods requiring the athlete students to miss school, classes and the nationally televised games that generate lots of revenue (Martinez)

Moreover, payment of student-athletes provides relief for their families who are always tasked in providing direct support to them in the quest of abiding by the current rules of payment. Since student-athletes are never allowed to autograph items to generation revenue, each family is hence mandated to pay for their students to be in school. Paying for athlete students would, therefore, allow for financial relief for their families who may not have the funds to cater for long term support. Additionally, payment of athlete students provides incentives to play since the students would use the funds to cover the costs not included in scholarships and subsequently advance in their careers of becoming professional athletes. Finally, the payment of college athletes would attract better athletes that stay longer in the program since athletes, when paid, would most likely stick to the college program, earn their degree before being enrolled in the professional league.

Why Athletes Students Should Not Get Paid

Payment of athlete students may also present some limitations like it would prioritize athletics over academics owing to shifts in priorities since student-athletes would be needed to maintain their positions in the team to benefit from income and to secure scholarships. That would make athletes channel their preferences where they are would be most paid instead of choosing learning programs. Similarly, payment of student-athletes would not be a better option since it would become a burden to taxpayers since revenues generated from sporting activities are used by conferences and host schools to conduct events. Public institutions would, therefore, be forced to ask for monetary support from taxpayers to pay athlete students.

Payment of student-athletes additionally would make some schools cut out some programs since funds from the list of athletics customarily fund most programs and activities in schools. That would subsequently degrade the quality of life available in many institutions of on-campus, depending on the programs cut (Martinez). Similarly, it would eliminate the line between amateur and professional sports that is since the links between college education, and college sports would be weakened, making athletes who do not advance to pros suffer following the fewer opportunities available for them.

Conclusion

In a nutshell, whether or not athlete students should be paid remains a subject of controversy, and the debate about it usually arises during the champions' sessions. The advocates of the same citing that it would provide relief for the families of athletes, encourage healthier students' athletes, and attract better athletes who would stay longer in the college programs. The opponents, on the other hand, assert that it would eliminate the difference between amateurism and professionalism in sports, it would prioritize athletics over academics, encourage schools to cut other programs and become a burden to taxpayers. It is, therefore, NCAA''s responsibility to decide on whether or not to break away from their current collegiate model of sports.

Works Cited

Hess, Abigael. "Majority of College Students Say Student-Athletes Should be Paid, SurveyFinds. Make it. Sept. 2019, https://www.cnbc.com/2019/09/11/student-athletes-shouldget-paid-college-students-say.html

Martinez, Madisen. "Should College Student-Athletes be paid? Both Sides of the Debate."College Express.Mar.2007, https://www.collegexpress.com/articles-andadvice/athletics/blog/should-college student-athletes-be-paid-both-sides-debate/