Summary: College Athletes Should Be Paid

According to New Direction in Public Opinion, Ideology can be defined as, “shared belief systems that reflect some groups understanding of the social world and its vision of what that world should ideally look like” (Berinsky, A., 2012). Ideology relates to the issue of college athletes being paid in several ways, one side being, political elites such as the NCAA’s ideological views on the topic and one side being the college athletes of the NCAA. The NCAA is the political elite of college athletics..The NCAA holds the position that collegiate athletes are considered amateur athletes and it should be illegal to receive compensation for their actions on the field. NCAA President Mark Emmert echoed this in 2014 when he said “The overwhelming majority of student-athletes, across all sports, play college athletics as part of their educational experience and for the love of their sport — not to be paid a salary.” On the other side of the spectrum, some college athletes hold the position that NCAA athletes deserve to be compensated for their respective revenue-generating sports. Kain Colter of the Northwestern football team reflected this view. “between 50-60 hours a week are devoted to football-related activities...there's no way around the fact that football is a ‘job’...we're brought to the university to play

On the other hand, athletes have the needs of financial security and equality so, therefore, they advocate to be paid. With these two opposing views on the issue, one could pose the question, “how polarized is the public on the issue?” The public appears to be semi-polarized. According to the Washington Post, 64% of the public believes that college athletes do not merit payment for their services. (Washington