The Big Five Power Grab: The Real Threat to College Sports
It is hard to see the forest for the trees in college sports these days. Antitrust lawsuits and the debate over whether college athletes should be compensated as employees have obscured that fact that only a small group of highly commercialized athletic programs are controlling the NCAA. Follow this link to read the Chronicle of […]
Drake Group Questions NCAA Division I Governance Restructure
During the summer of 2014, the NCAA considered a proposal to give the five richest conferences (Atlantic Coast Conference, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12, and Southeastern Conference) within the Football Bowl Subdivision of Division I legislative autonomy. In response, the Drake Group, a national organization of college faculty and others released a position statement that […]
Collegiate Athletics Reform: A Call for Federal Intervention
The American public’s seemingly unbounded love of college sports entertainment at any cost can be readily exploited by skilled marketing professionals to the long-term detriment of the integrity and health of higher education in America. The incremental cost of such exploitation to build an ever bigger college sports entertainment enterprise amounts to the cost of […]
Collegiate Athletics Reform: A Collection of References from the National Catholic Reporter
As suggested in “Telling the truth on campus,” the presidents of our Catholic colleges and universities could be moved to solicit advice from their faculty and others on the place of the value-distorting, sports entertainment business in their schools. They might even go so far as to provide independently verifiable evidence that their athletes are […]
Collegiate Athletics Reform: Ever More Likely Up to the Courts
“Washington should stop subsidizing millionaires,” Obama said in his State of the Union address—no doubt unaware of tax subsidies for numerous millionaire coaches and NCAA cartel as well as conference officials. »Read more
Collegiate Athletics Reform: Trilogy III
It is my view that the probability of an academic body emerging to rein in the runaway college sports entertainment industry is extremely low. Academic officials will most likely avoid taking on the powerful NCAA cartel and their governing boards so will continue to deal with related problems by looking the other way—muddling through will […]
“Academically Adrift” in a Sea of Sports and Mediocrity
At many state universities and more than a few private ones, head football and basketball coaches earn millions and their assistants hundreds of thousands for running semiprofessional teams. Few of these teams earn much money for the universities that sponsor them, and some brutally exploit their players. »Read more
Collegiate Athletics Reform: Do-nothing feds complicit in reckless endangerment of institutions of higher education
Question: What can be requested of a congressional representative that will almost assure no response? Answer: Consideration of the tax-exempt status of the NCAA cartel’s entertainment businesses to help curtail its reckless endangerment of America’s institutions of higher education. »Read more
Collegiate Athletics Reform: Trilogy IV
Most likely the public is unaware of its sports-entertainment induced coma that effectively inhibit critical thinking and discussion of issues. There will be no complaint from government officials. From a political point of view it is much better to have the public discuss football and basketball games than it is to have it troubling these officials […]
College Sports Reform: It’s Time to Expose the Big Lie
Stripping the NCAA cartel (the NCAA and its member colleges and universities) of its tax-exempt status by the Congress would certainly help limit the seemingly uncontrolled growth of professionalized big-time college sports entertainment by putting a break on what appears to be a runaway financial train. However, this stripping would require a great deal of […]