The counter-argument is that they (at least football and basketball players) are being paid through their scholarship. They may not feel that is enough compensation, but that’s not the legislature’s problem
Williams & Blum: Recapping a crazy 10 days
- Thread starter Aiden Wyatt
- Start date
That is a good example and reminder (colleges).
The economics of it all really is a fun exercise though, but tough to truly measure. I'm only counter pointing as part of this exercise.....ISUs highest enrollment was in an "average" athletic season, where arguably highest athletic success (last few years?) enrollment has been stable. Discussing on a fan site also probably will always have an "athletics is important" lean (and truly I agree with having a vibrant/successful athletic program has SO many benefits)
I think the point I'm making is the game has changed so much (i.e now having to find $20million to give to athletes.....each year moving forward) and that is a total new variable....where 10 years ago it was facilities.
I just think it is fair for the average Iowan to question where funding goes. I'm a big believer in having all ISU be robust (for the kid who wants to be an engineer, who wants to get involved with Dance Marathon, who wants to go to games, etc).
I do also wonder if former student athletes (and future ones) give back? I know some clearly do, but just thinking the age old model of "you got a scholly in Business and now as an alum you give back" happens when kids are getting LOTS of money as current athletes (and some then getting very healthy pro salaries vs a standard ISU grad).
Of course there is value to high end sports to the university, but I think this is an overstated influence. SDSU has an enrollment of 12,000 in a state with 900k people. ISU has an enrollment of 30k in a state of 3.2m. We have also not seen a correlation at ISU between enrollment and sports success.
There’s a synergy for sure, but in a school like ISU the fan base and ultimately donors are driven heavily by people that went to ISU and weren’t part of athletics.
As long as there are sports being operated beyond the minimum for Big 12 or NCAA requirements, I would prefer the university require a plan to transition out of those and have a gameplan to self-fund the max allocation. I'd be OK with the University bridging for a short period while that transition gets implemented. But otherwise, it's a business and needs to be run as such. Supporting money losing operations that aren't required is bad business. Give them time to transition, but it needs to happen.
The state turned against this idea of the school helping the athletic department, once EIU became self funded by their TV deals. Bills were brought in up the legislature that were going to tell ISU to also become self funded or drop down to a lower level conference, but before they could get traction and become law, ISU was also self funded, the bills died, because they knew UNI would never bring in enough money to cover expenses and they did not want to hurt them. Its OK to hurt ISU if EIU profits from that occurring, there are many in state legislature with that attitude, that would love nothing better to see ISU drop down and most of the revenue going to EIU.
I started to think that it was Gordon Eaton posting but he is dead.
Loss of AAU standing had more to do with not having a medical school and agriculture being a large part of Iowa State's research (AAU: Ag research largely doesn't matter and doesn't count).
Yes, Iowa State is a leader in Ag research, but the AAU largely excludes Ag research from it's formulas because the elite institutions don't want to associate with "dirt farmer colleges".
I am a fan of ISU women's basketball. They average 10k in attendance. 3rd in the NCAA. it should be possible to generate some more income. With 17 home game we sold 170k tickets. Hate to lose Wbb but I can see changes need to be made.
but "their scholarship" is actually being paid by athletics. It's not like they are just going for free. In addition, out of state/international tuition is paid for many.
Don’t know why you’re comparing Iowa State to Ivy League schools. We are a public land-grant university and our purpose is to provide education for the “working class”.
They are at least raising the price of WBB season tickets to $250 and adding sales tax which is a 33% increase, but really only adds like $350K on a sport that loses $4 million.
This is just silly. If sports don't matter to incoming students, then why TF do you think so many kids choose to go to shiate hole schools like Texas or Ohio State? Because they want to "be associated with" a winner (whatever the hell that means).
Exactly. Not the first time.
Great chance the Iowa AD never pays off those liabilities they’re dealing with, despite the huge welfare check they’re going to get from Ohio State and Michigan football. The University is going to absorb most of it.
But allow Iowa State to invest in athletics to keep up? Little chance
Many of the biggest brands and most profitable got there from having more State support last century
Last edited:
UT is an elite public school and OSU good. Flagships of big population states
They became so large and good because of many reasons external to athletics
But they compete for students of equal or better stature because of their athletic brand, particularly UT.
UT, UVa, Michigan NW, UNC Duke etc all have closed the gap on most Ivies in part because of their athletics
No school make money from the WBB team, the tickets are dirt cheap compared to the mens game, and right now they just do not get enough media revenue to make up the difference. Over to the east, the EIU women sold out very game, and had a decent season, while the mens team was horrible and fired its coach, playing to crowds that on average were around 4/5,000 in attendance. The men made a profit of around $4 million while the women lost $2 million, the year before, it will be worse this season.
Is this serious? You ever been to either campus?
The med school and research center at OSU is something to behold.
He's getting compensated very well for the size of org. he's running
Idk how confident I am that this actually changes, but I do believe food science is the next big puzzle piece that will need to be researched more wrt health care.
If we’re serious about solving health care and health issues in this country, food and ag research needs to be just as important for medical research. There’s so many diseases and chronic illnesses that can be managed if not prevented by better nutrition instead of inventing another pill.
I'll preface by saying I love Coach Campbell and Coach Otzelberger and I want to give them everything they need to succeed and to retain them. That said, if you're framing the ROI picture for not fully funding the AD as merely becoming a lesser P4 program which can't retain players and coaches, the downside is actually much larger than that. Failure to keep up could see Iowa State left out in future realignment. The difference between being an under-performing P4 program and being outside the P4 is stark and makes a few million external dollars per year seem like a pittance.
Of course the AD needs to maximize its own revenue streams, but there are plenty of avenues for external support. Iowa has one of the lowest tax rates on the gambling industry in the country. I'd start there. The state and people of Iowa get far more benefit from ISU Athletics than they do online gambling.
Of course the AD needs to maximize its own revenue streams, but there are plenty of avenues for external support. Iowa has one of the lowest tax rates on the gambling industry in the country. I'd start there. The state and people of Iowa get far more benefit from ISU Athletics than they do online gambling.
