Athletes Being Compensated

Working through exhausting workouts, practices and games every week, combined with difficult college courses, student-athletes are known to be some of the hardest working people in the country. But the true question is how much are we willing to allow these athletes to be compensated for? Collegiate athletes being paid to play has become a heated debate in the past few years following the many scandals such as Cam Newton’s. What has been to be one of the most pressing issues in the world of sports has become a huge matter the NCAA cannot afford to ignore. The service college athletes provide to the institutions, both sides of the arguments and how education should come before sports are three main topics which will explain this issue thoroughly. There are two major arguments from those who oppose paying athletes. First, it is believe that university athletic departments would accumulate a debt. Although just college football alone has become a multi-million dollar business many less profitable programs would not be able to afford to pay athletes. As stated in the article, pay for Play: Should College Athletes Be Compensated? Brennan Thomas states, “If school added a $100 a week stipend to all 200 athletes’ scholarships, it would cost the university $800,000 a year.”(Brennan Thomas, Play for Pay, pg. 1) The number used in the article is also just an average, where bigger universities which cost more would be compensating their players for much more. The second reason is it will be very hard to set a specific pay scale, because each sport brings in a different amount of profit to the universities. For example would a starting quarterback be paid the same salary as a starting center-fielder softball player and this also has an effect on the Title IX which bans sex discriminate in school, whether it is in academies or athletics. (Thomas, 1) However, on the other hand there are many people who support the athletes being paid or deserve more compensation. On this

Cited: Thomas, Brennan. "Pay for Play." Bleacher Report (2011): n. page. Print. "Cam Newton Scandal: Rep Sought Cash from MSU." CBSNews. CBS Interactive, 9 Nov. 2010. Web. 19 Nov. 2012.