Reply #109: Money is a function of our society

[Sgent]

I am a public HS graduate w/ a school that seats 8K on friday nights. I am an SEC graduate with a football team that brings in 10's of millions a year.

For what its worth, I don't see that eliminating the sports teams would add a single thing to the academics, and would likely hurt them significantly.

At the HS level, the football team not only pays for itself (including facilities), but it an basketball pay for every other sports related activity in the school system. They also pay for their coaches and the coaches of other sports.

My college FB team, after paying for all of its expenses (including multi-million dollar coaching staff, all athlete scholarships, facilities, etc), contributes over 10 million / yr to the other atheltic programs at the school.

In both cases, eliminating the sports teams would do nothing for academics. In fact, its my contention that it would massively hurt academics. The sports teams act as a draw for the Alumni, and keep the involved in both the academics and sports of their respective schools. 10's of million's of dollars are raised for our academic endowment annually, and that wouldn't happen w/o continually bringing a diverse and wide ranging alumni back to campus 5-6 times a year, for reunions, etc.