Ncaa Scholorships

NCAA Scholarships

The world of college sports has recently been up in arms over a debate when it comes to colleges and universities giving out scholarships to athletes. The subject specifically is whether to let these schools administer four-year scholarships to their athletes or one-year renewable ones. The reasoning behind the renewable scholarships is that if the respective coach at a school deems a student unworthy to continue play there, he or she can simply drop the student. I submit that this is morally and ethically wrong and hope that the NCAA feels the same way.

The standard practice for the last few decades has been the one-year renew method. But the NCAA has recently been debating changing this method that's been in practice for so long. The president of the NCAA, Mark Emmert, recently has been pushing for reform. He wants colleges to be able to offer multi-year scholarships. But, over 80 schools have rejected this plan and as a result, voting by college presidents to overturn it will begin this week. According to NCAA rules, for the overturn to take place, of the 355 schools that are voting, five-eighths of them must agree to cancel it.

I believe that this puts much unneeded pressure on the athletes and can really cause hazard to them. I do not think it is fair that an athlete can make plans to go a school for the entirety of their college career only to be denied a year or two down the road. We can look to an example of what occurred at Rice a few years back. Rick Geenspan, was a student athlete at the time of a coaching change that resulted in him losing his scholarship to Rice. I think that this is an unfair practice and hope that we see a change come to this soon.

Something else to consider is another policy that is being pressed through with the scholarship debate. This is the new idea of allowing colleges and universities to award up to $2,000 in "spending money". The reasoning behind this is that they are receiving some form of compensation and scholarship money doesn't full cover every expense that athletes may encounter. I believe that this is a good idea; it will better allow student athletes to focus on their studies and their athletics. This way, they won't have to look to alternatives to make some money to pay for thing other than room and board. We will probably see a reduction in student scandals, for instance, when students sell off their sport memorabilia that they receive for free from their school for spending money.

I sincerely hope that these reforms pass through the NCAA so that we can see a better an environment for the student athletes that provide so much entertainment for us.