It is on our (tax payers) dime, that is the fact. If you want to perpetuate the bull shit that they pay for it with their bodies I can't help you there. They could just pay for school like everyone else. The fact is it is a free ride financially for the ones with scholarships. I get your point they are sacrificing with time and effort and they aren't able to go out party every night like some of the other college students. Again financially it is a free education, my point is most don't think of it that way and waste it. Glad to see tre isn't one of those.
Anyone who has ever had any doubts that he deserved to wear 18, needs to read this. Every kid in a place like he was needs to read this. There is a lot of heart in that letter. Lessons for all of us.
I'm not sure that I would agree that "most" waste their scholarship opportunities. But I do think the guys should be able to get paid "spending money" because they have no time at all to take a job, and some of them come from family situations where spending money cannot be spared. Perhaps NCAA violations could decrease some with athletes taking money from boosters. When my dad was a college athlete in the early 60's, he was paid about $20 a month, which he thinks might work out to about $200 a month now. It's enough to go see a movie, to go out to eat. I don't think it's that crazy.
Slippery slope... $200 in BR or Tuscaloosa is not the same in Austin or LA. Rather I think all their basic needs and thensome should be provided for.
I guess so, but you do see my point about these athletes going into college at a disadvantage? The free education is huge and a great advantage. But for some of these kids coming from families where they are the first to go to college, that advantage may not be clear at the time. When my dad received an athletic scholarship in 1960, he was the first person in his family to even make it to high school, much less graduate and go to college. He didn't know how to succeed in college, though, and he didn't graduate until he went back and paid for his education himself. But the point is that he did eventually realize the value of a diploma and changed the trajectory of my family--where college wasn't the dream but the expectation. I still feel like that is a chief role of college athletics today, and it is the biggest part of the whole equation.
I guess we just define "Free," differently. To me, if it were free they would not have to practice/watch film hours a day, in addition to studying for classes. It's much more rigorous than a student job at the Rec but both get "paid" for time put in. They "get" a scholarship, sure but they work to keep it, trust me. Even being a college cheerleader is very demanding, time-wise. When something is free, you take it, walk on, and don't owe/have to do anything for it.
