Did you know that the average division one college brings in over $50 million every year from their sports programs? Colleges are bringing in more and more money every year from their athletic programs, but none of that is going to the players, which is where it should be going. Many people believe that college athletes shouldn’t be getting paid, but that is just taking advantage of these kids. These college students need to have a salary and here is why.
Participating in a college sport is as long as a full-time job. The average NCAA player spends over 43 hours a week participating in their sport (Strachan). This doesn’t even include the time students spend taking their classes. Then on top of that, the average student spends about 10 hours
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Just this past March Madness, the NCAA signed a contract with the TV providers for March Madness for eight year $8.8 billion deal.(Sherman) That doesn’t include the money they will make off of ticket sales, merchandise, and other sponsors like Gatorade and Wilson. There are other ways colleges get money. For example, Oregon gets paid 2.2 million every year by Nike, just to wear Nike uniforms.(Fusfeld) Where does that money go? To the coaches, staff, and the school. I agree that the coaches and staff deserve to be paid, but not as much as they are making. For example Alabama’s head football coach, Nick Saban, makes about $8 million every year. There are NBA players, who make only $500 thousand every year. If colleges were to pay their players, the top players on each team could make about $210 thousand a year. That’s pretty good pay. A lot of people will say, that athletes already receive scholarship offers so they don’t need it. There are lots more costs that their scholarships do not cover. Like if the student has a banquet or some other formal event that is mandatory, and they need to rent a suit for it and suits are really expensive. And as I said earlier, they don’t have much time to find a job. Some people may believe that this isn’t a hard cost to cover. But for many of these kids, sports are the only way that their family can afford him or her to go to