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<p>I won’t disagree with that. But there are A LOT of people who are overpaid. Politicians, CEOs, athletes, actors, music stars, etc.</p>
<p>Facts from the President of UT:</p>
<p>[A</a> Self-Sustaining Athletics Program Tower Talk](<a href=“http://blogs.utexas.edu/towertalk/2009/12/23/a-self-sustaining-athletics-program/]A”>http://blogs.utexas.edu/towertalk/2009/12/23/a-self-sustaining-athletics-program/)</p>
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<p>"Question: The Athletics Department makes a huge amount of money through football tickets and merchandising. Why can’t this money be used for academics?</p>
<p>Answer: Like Housing and Food Service, Athletics is a self-supporting unit at the university. Intercollegiate Athletics pays all its expenses at UT, including $8.5 million in scholarships, $2.3 million in central administrative services, $16.5 million in debt service and an average of about $3 million each year in capital expenditures. Athletics contributes millions of dollars each year to academic programs and initiatives.</p>
<p>UT is one of only a handful of schools in the nation where Athletics is self-sufficient and not dependent on financial resources from the university. Not too many years ago UT was required to subsidize Athletics, and we need to strive to keep Athletics self-sustaining."</p>
<p>LOL, I guess you can tell this subject is a sore spot with me. I just wish folks would do a little research before making statements.</p>
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<p>For those think who athletics and academics never mix. Oh, I forgot Paterno is just arrogant and deserved to be fired.</p>
<p>Oops, the links I posted are outdated. Here are the latest figures (higher than I quoted):</p>
<p>[Football</a> slump in 2010 didn’t hurt Texas’ bottom line | Big 12 | Sports News and Videos on th…](<a href=“http://www.star-telegram.com/2011/11/18/3537659/football-slump-in-2010-didnt-hurt.html]Football”>http://www.star-telegram.com/2011/11/18/3537659/football-slump-in-2010-didnt-hurt.html)</p>
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<p>Yes. Indeed. </p>
<p>There are plenty of kids who play all kinds of sports that are being subsidized in large part due to the strength of the football program. Sometimes the money can fund every other sport. Other times, the school spends so much renovating a - ahem- football stadium and luxury seat boxes when they should be focusing on other things.</p>
<p>Just a week or so ago, U Maryland has announced the cuts of up to 8 varsity level sports (5 mens, 3 womens). Think of all those committed athletes from all over the country and Maryland, who want to play or compete for this school.</p>
<p>I have a kid who will be playing Div 1 sports next year. And there is no way she would be able to do it without the powerhouse football team helping to paying those bills, not only for the travel/equipment/coaches/scholarships. Her sport is an equivalency one, which means that there are a limited number of scholarships available for the sport and it’s not a full ride. Even so, the sport would likely not be there if it wasn’t for football.</p>
<p>Hops_scout. No he was fired at the least looking the other way when a child rapist could have been stopped. How many destroyed lives is a library worth? And can you be sure it would not have been done without him?</p>
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<p>There’s very few sports that are full rides. One thing people don’t understand when they talk about athletic scholarships…</p>
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<p>WOW… so now it’s his fault he has been generous with his money? Really? Sounds like jealousy to me…</p>
<p>Hops_scout. reread my post. No objective reading can come up with that conclusion. It does not fault him for his generosity. It states that it is no redress for his actions in this case. A man’s character is shown in what he does when no one is looking. He failed that test miserably. And one more point, the lawsuits that are going to come out of this is going to dwarf all his contributions many times over.</p>
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<p>You just won’t give the man credit due. He didn’t have to donate that money. </p>
<p>He has been found guilty of NOTHING. Guess what-- there are plenty of things that I think back and wish I’d “done differently.” That doesn’t mean I did anything wrong. I’m sure you’ve done the same a time or two.</p>
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<p>So how is it that schools that do not have big-time football programs manage to fund both male and female sports? Because they certainly do.</p>
<p>BTW, as a matter of curiosity, who pays to build and maintain the stadium and attached facilities?</p>
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<p>What schools participate at the national level without football? At the Division One level?</p>
<p>Could you clarify that question?
Isn’t the point that Consolation is making that there are many opportunities for student participation in sports at many schools without the presence of the nearly professional level college football?</p>
<p>Although I have a feeling this conversation is going seriously off-topic…</p>
<p>Hops_scout. In this case how much he donated is irrelavent, especially as far as his firing is concerned. He did the barest minimum, and allowed an accused child rapist to keep on perpetrating his crimes. What is damning is the persona that he assumed as being the one who did things right. When he was once asked why he hadn’t retired his answer was “It would leave college football in the hands of the Jackie Sherrills and Barry Switzers” Well, I dont think that there were any reports of children being raped at either of those two coaches venues. If you are going to be holier than thou, then you better live up to that. This is his new legacy, being in charge of a program linked to the worst scandal in us sport history.</p>
<p>No. I don’t think this question is off-topic, not really, not when we are grappling with the question of “how did this go on for so long?”</p>
<p>There is no question that the reputation of the Penn State football program is a part of what allowed Sandusky to continue in his criminal behavior in the locker room. But, Sandusky is a pedophile, and as can be seen from the young man who came forward in 2009, he continued to practice his conpulsions outside of Penn State. These predators are always around places full of kids. Boy Scouts, Parochial Schools, Middle Schools, whatnot.</p>
<p>What is surprising about Sandusky is that he was coaching in college. His compulsions should have led him to children’s programs, which is, I’m sure, why he began the second mile, to begin with.</p>
<p>But, powerful organizations which lack outside oversight are prone to abuses of all sorts, and this us just one more example of how this can occur. So, that is the main issue, imho, the lack of oversight. I mean, the caotholic church, which was also shielded from outside oversight for so long suffered the same problems, as far as I can see. It’s a question of giving too much power to an organization. In my opinion, Paterno would have been served much better and far better protected from his instints to hide from the truth, if there were an outside orgainization in charge of policing the university.</p>
<p>Woody,</p>
<p>You are correct. My DD goes to a Div III school, and they have good participation in all the sports. Closer to that image of the Student Athlete</p>
<p>But what is the solution for the truly gifted athletes?</p>
<p>I mean, if my daughter were to play her sport at a DIII level, it wouldn’t be fair to the other kids, really. So, what do you do about that?</p>
<p>Ivy league athletes are D1 without athletic scholarships. Occasionally, they have pro level athletes, though they usually get smoked by the top D1 teams. However, their priorities are straight, as are the priorities of DIII liberal arts colleges that have good sports programs without sports scholarships. I doubt that the athletic coaches in the Ivy league or at the DIII level have anywhere near the same clout that Paterno had at Penn St.</p>
<p>That said, Ivy league schools and top LACs are just as jealous of their reputations and therefore have similarly strong incentives to protect the institution rather than to do the right thing by the victim of an employee or representative of the institution. This type of thing can happen at any institution where the gravity of institutional reputation is strong enough to pull morality out of its proper orbit.</p>
<p>Poetgrl:</p>
<p>Depends on the sport. Some DIII sports are quite advanced. Amherst men’s tennis is competitive with top 100 D1 tennis schools until you reach the Virginia, UCLA, Stanford level. Claremont, Williams, Middlebury, Emory, Wash U, and others are getting four and five star recruits that could easily play D1 tennis.</p>