Universities paying student athletes

Student Athletics - Just another On-Campus Job

Attending college can place a daunting financial burden on students and their families . The cost of tuition , books , room and board and other necessities is often more than the average family can afford . Many students take on-campus jobs which allow them to ease the financial burden of getting an education . Universities offer athletics programs in which students can participate for fun or as a stepping stone to professional athletics . Football and basketball games tend to bring in a staggering amount of revenue from ticket sales , concession

sales , and donations from alumni . For example , The University of Notre Dame boasted nearly 40 million in revenue in 2004 (Donahue , 2005 . Due to rules that do not allow amateur athletes to be paid , the individual members of Notre Dame 's football team did not receive any payment , even though the football players were doing all of the work . Student athletics should be considered a campus job and players should be compensated accordingly

Opponents of paid student athletes often cite fairness as a reason for their disapproval . Wealthier schools would be able to pay top dollar for student athletes , which would prevent other schools from becoming contenders . In his article , The Other Side : College Athletes Shouldn 't Be Paid ' Dan Cassavaugh states that , Big name schools like Duke Texas , North Carolina and USC would be able to pay exorbitant amounts of money to get the best athletes to play (Cassavaugh , 2006 . However if pay for student athletes was...