Essay Sample on College Athletes: To Pay or Not to Pay?

Introduction

Contemporary society has been dominated by contradicting and conflicting views about the remuneration of college athletes. For many decades, college athletes have continuously dedicated their lives, time and sweat to develop their sporting talents in many colleges and universities without any significant remuneration respite generating billions of dollars to universities and other interested stakeholders (Cook, 10). With the rapid advancement in the technological and economic and capitalistic spheres, the American sports industry has continued to generate massive profits and revenues from the college players. However irrespective of accumulating approximately $1 billion revenue for the recent financial years, the National Collegiate Athlete Association has adamantly prohibited the college athletes from benefiting from the use of their names, and images utilized in advertisements (Hruby, np). The National Collegiate Athlete Association has also utilized the amateurism ideology to justify their position of denying the college a share of their revenue. Is denying students a share in the revenue really ethical which other involved stakeholders are reaping from college and university sports? Nevertheless, many former athletes, fans and government official has spearheaded campaigns to overturn the rule to allow college students to benefits from their sacrifices and struggles to participate in the co-curricular university activates which continues to generate massive revenues. Therefore, the investigation critically analyses vital and fundamental reasons why college athletes should be paid.

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The recent federal lawsuit filed by the former UCLA basketball player Ed O'Bannon against the National Collegiate Athlete Association over whether the football and Division I men's basketball players should be compensated for the commercial utilization of their images likeness and names has revealed massive oppression and depression that has consistently dominated the student-sports industry (Hruby, np). According to the National Collegiate Athlete Association, the college students are generally viewed as assets of the schools who should only benefit from the lucrative scholarships that they attain in diverse universities because of their talents. The NCAA together with the associated universities and colleges consider the scholarships as an ultimate compensation to the college athletes as it provides an opportunity for exposure to the young players to continue developing their unexploited talents (Dobson, 29). Further, exchanging scholarship with the exploitation of the young talents is adamantly considered a symbiotic relationship between the universities, colleges and the concern students. In 2013, the International Association of Athletics Federations affirmed that approximately 65% of the Americans are opposed to paying student-athletes as they contained that replacing the full scholarship with the student compensation would significantly ruin college sports (Hruby, np). For instance, if salaries and wages were allocated to the students, they would be forced to pay taxes, which can limit their academic activities. Also paying students would immensely result in misuse of money utilizing their salaries into unnecessary commodities such as drugs and alcohol consumption rather than investing the salary in developing their talents. Therefore, as affirmed the National Collegiate Athlete Association, limiting the students from directly benefiting from the commercial utilization of their names, images, and likeness while utilizing the funds in their scholarships is more beneficial and avails massive opportunities for exposing and preparing the students both academically and politically for future expeditions.

Additionally, student-athletes have also been condemned for not being professionals to be paid as the scholarship covers enough. The period in college is a time to learn and for every individual student to develop their knowledge and skills, whether a student yearns to be an accountant, a lawyer or professional athletes (Dobson, 49). Though everyone's dream to get into the school team, only 7% of students get the rare opportunities to showcase their talent in a nationwide platform giving them more opportunities after schools. However, demanding payment will definitely change the nature of sports propelling both colleges and students to develop a capitalist's attitude and not display their full potential (Dobson, 78). Despite playing on an advanced level which generates income for the schools, colleges, and universities, they are neither professionals nor employees under the federal law as sports in colleges is only an extracurricular pursued while pursuing higher education. Hence paying them will not only affects their commitment to sports but also their motive as students at the colleges and universities have offered them a rare privilege of attaining knowledge while pursuing their dreams, a change that only a few individuals can be offered and they need to appreciate(Cook, 10). Nevertheless, despite the elusive arguments of denying students a share into the lucrative revenue colleges and universities attain from exploiting their talents, many Americans has disputed such justifications as hogwash that should be eliminated from the contemporary society. Many Americans continue to ask a vital question, why should schools and the National Collegiate Athlete Association benefit from college sports without compensating the students?

However, remunerating the student-athletes is logical and should be advocated for. As confirmed by Forbes, the National Collegiate Athlete Association accumulated more than $1 billion revenue in the 2016-2017 financial year, while distributing the profit among the involved stakeholders such as schools, universities, and coaches, the students received nothing (Hruby, np). Is it really logical, ethical and socially acceptable to reap over the sweat and struggle of others? Many university athletes sacrifice numerous hours training and engaging in games which sometimes involves sacrificing classes. For instance, a typical Division I player in both basketball and football dedicate more than 43.3 hours per week. Despite only being considered as extracurricular activities, the schedule of the National Collegiate Athlete Association tournaments often forces students to miss classes for nationally televised games which immensely contributed to income generation (Cook, 10). Moreover, the annual National Collegiate Athlete Association men's basketball require students to miss more than six days of academic classes which also generate a substantial amount for the NCAA which the institution pockets all the benefits at the expense of the students terming them amateurism and non-professionals. As a gratitude to the student effort, substantial remuneration like all the other stakeholders would greatly make players feel appreciated and motivated rather than subjecting them under intensive training pressure and gaining nothing while coaches pocket millions of dollars. For instance, the University of Alabama football coach, Nick Saban's new contract is geared to pay him more than $7 million while his players get nothing (Hruby, np).

Additionally, most of the revenue earned from sports activities do not go to the improvement of academics but remuneration of athletics directors, coaches, and some administrators who are often not linked to the student's scholarship. While NCAA is nationally considered a non-profit organization, it recently signed $10.8 billion televised agreement with the CBS for over 14 years (Dobson, 21). The agreement to geared towards generating massive revenues on top of the $11 billion annual revenue the NCAA generate from the college sports which is more than the revenue generated from both National Hockey League and National Basketball Association combined. It is illogical to argue that colleges offer a scholarship to the students, a $25,000 scholarship which is insufficient to take learners through a semester forcing some college athletes to juggle between training, part-time working and attending classes (Dobson, 30). While the scholarship is often viewed as good opportunities to players, it is insignificant and insufficient to sustain the players such as covering players' injuries and other extra sportish needs (Cook, 10).

For instance, the scholarships only cover the tuition fees, mysterious university charges, housing, and textbooks. According to Murphy's report titled Madness, Inc., the college sports programs revenue has constantly risen from $4 billion to $14 billion from 2003 to 2018, but despite the awesome and constant growth in revenue, only 12% goes to the athlete grant aids while more than 16% is consumed specifically on coaches salary, with different allowance packages (Dobson, 49).

Conclusion

In conclusion, athletes have been constantly oppressed, marginalized and discriminated by the individual's who promote unfairness. With many African Americans dominating the college sports, the NCAA has been viewed as a violation of basic human and civil right, for instance, while student-athletes keep suffering in colleges to balance between academic life, social and sports life, the fat cheques only goes to the coaches and specific administrator which is unethical as players should also be paid for their dedication and sacrifice and contribution to the revenues. Moreover, when in other scholarships like music scholarships students are allowed to perform and be paid for their expeditions, only the athletes are forced to sign a contract to limit the players from benefiting from their names, images or likeness, which deters athletes from enjoying economic opportunities like their colleagues in other fields. It is evident that the leaders and administrator overexploit young talent to enrich themselves while making college student to suffer as broke individuals who cannot even afford health insurance over their sports-related injuries (Dobson, 49). Therefore, payment of college athlete should be affected and implemented to allow students to benefit from their talents and abilities like all Americans irrespective of their differences.

Works Cited

Cook, Justen. "The Issue of Compensation: Should NCAA Athletes be Compensated Above Their Scholarships." (2018).

Hruby Patrick. Paying college athletes gaining a bipartisan consensus as new report slams NCAA. Los Angeles Times. 2019. Available at https://www.latimes.com/sports/more/la-sp-paying-college-athletes-20190327-story.html

Dobson, Brittany. "Pay-for-Play in College Athletics: A Phenomenological Study of Former and Current College Student-Athletes' Perception of Pay-for-Play." (2019).