Compensation of College Athletes

Introduction

Colleges exploit college athletes economically as they pursue their mandates in extracurricular activities. This is due to the fact that they are not entitled to any form of compensation apart from the regular sponsorships, which are mandatory to even students outside this form of practice. This has elucidated debate on the nature, by which the college athletes need to be served in terms of greater compensation prospects besides the mandatory scholarships. Under normal circumstances, college sports form a major source of revenue through business endeavours putting the requirement for extra compensation from the participants of these events (Zimbalist 12). Furthermore, the resources that the college athletes vest in terms of time and energy for training need a form of appreciation of this vital effort, which would boost their morale and shape the standards of the game. This is through the increased participation since the remuneration of rewards could lead top attraction of new entrants in the training sessions through the need for recruitments.

Conversely, the college administration argues that the form of compensation through scholarships is a valid form of retaliation to the effort vested in display of standard games on the pitch. Moreover, the annual spending in colleges does not reach the stipulations that allow for more penetration into subsidized compensation that the athletes require due to meagre resources obtainable within the field practice. Moreover, compensation for the college athletes is a form of depreciation of the academic standards since the major goal for entry into colleges is purely academic. This implies that compensation through scholarships is a form of guaranteeing the students’ needs in career prospects as opposed to the co-curricular activities that are secondary to education. This puts the debate on whether college athletes deserve compensation at a crossroads, which elucidates the validity of this paper in correlation with the debate (Halberstam 49)

Firstly, the general standards of the game must be raised through compensation of the athletes in order to realize the benefits of training sessions. The general formation of standards through compensation is a form of boosting the morale of participants and a retaliation to the efforts vested in training session. The aspect of creation of fun is not ignorable by the NCAA that there is need for shunning ignorance for reward of talent, which is an important factor in instilling confidence in the sportsmanship (Mitchell 72). The issue for discussion is whether the event of sporting culminates to the increased revenue for the institutions, which in part act as the employer of the graduates. Such reasoning lowers the confidence of participants, thus reducing the probability of existence of the event. Being resourceful in terms of providence of fun puts the requirement for need of compensation to avoid treatment of participants as amateurs, who are burdened with the strain of continued work and education as a source of divided effort within the curriculum.

On the other hand, college athletes provide avenues for entry into public relations building. This is a form of sourcing out for the image of the institutions, which pride on the event of the career generation. The aspect of compensation builds an insight of correlation between the image building and source of revenue. Moreover, institutions pride themselves as being the talent holders, when in real sense; it is an individual effort that is coined in form of teamwork to provide the essential position in terms of co-curricular competition. Although scholarships act as a subsidy, it is evident that more compensation would culminate in a sense of belonging to the institutions build in the players through enormous reward. It is also a sense of reality since the players are part of the institutions of practice.

The other vital issue for deliberation on whether college athletes should be compensated lies in the aspect of the cover programs during incidences of accidents on the court. In the incident of injury, compensation through medical cover is a vital tool for the healing process. This shows that once the players are injured in the event of showcasing their talent, the best resolution is to seek the programmed medical services. This is also vital in taking care of athletes from poor families, whom after injury in the event of play have troubles with recovery, which results in a gloomy future in terms of the final career achievement. Moreover, the players, who fall victims of such circumstances, fall out of the education system due to poor health resulting from injuries sustained in the court. This proves the viability of a compensation program apart from the conventional scholarship, which does not guarantee health after injury.

Consequently, college athletes deserve compensation from the respective institutions since they form a source of revenue for the institutions through the increased income. The spectators, who storm to the courts, pay the amounts due for entertainment, which generates income for the schools and institutions of practice. The resources for revenue allocation do not consider this as a vital tool for running institutions through ignoring those, who participate in such gruesome events (Boyne 38). The college athletes in part consider themselves as the exploited lot since there is no reward for income generated to fund their peers and the mandatory education programs. If other students like those taking art as field of practice can sell out their valuables like paintings to obtain income, then the same needs to happen with the athletes, who also vest their resources in talent through practicing on the court and earning income for the respective institution. Earning from the talent is also a source of redefinition of the ability to generate more income by the athletes since it means more practice that culminates in better results.

The other reason why college athletes deserve extra pay apart from the scholarships is that it sounds ethical, which fosters towards an increased enrolment in the field events. This is because the form of compensation instils a sense of attraction to those willing to venture into the co-curricular activities. This implies that the more athletes are compensated for the effort vested in the court, the more willing to enrol as recruits and strengthen the lineage of future participation will be. The forms of compensation result in more participation since it draws a line between those, who are capably both academically and in the extracurricular activities that are well paying, and those, who do not portend such a skill (Crawford 62). Moreover, the compensation programs would become professional in the sense that in the event of prosperity in the job market, the field events might work as a subsidy to the career earnings.

Conversely, compensation is a source of double exploitation to the institutions since the athletes are guaranteed to obtain a scholarship program. An inclusive package of compensation with the incrementing cost of scholarship is a tragedy to the institutions as they try to stipulate the yearly budgets for the prosperity of the students. This shows that extra compensation to the college athletes is a source of strain on resources for running the institutions since they depend entirely on the funds accrued from the field events. This also proves the need for a system that only caters for the scholarship programs in order to create sustainability within the institutions.

On the other hand, the institutions that the athletes serve are the parent institutions for career formation. This implies that an individual under training pays for the costs of training. The institutions provide avenues for career prosperity, which is not only inclined to academic prowess but also co-curricular activities, where an amount of exploitations is sensible. Moreover, even if the talent is inbuilt, the athletes benefit from the resources of the institutions for future benefits, which guarantee their need for satisfaction with the scholarships since they reap from the event of profession, years after completion of the curriculum (Bognon 34). This also implies that after completion of the curriculum, the athletes benefit from the field experiences as qualified players, where they earn more income than the previous suffering at schooling level.

Moreover, the schooling athletes do not deserve more compensation due to the nature of the training sessions, where career achievement should be costly, in order to seek realignment with the quality standards of production. This implies that if by comparison, education systems that are geared towards career achievement require payment of fees to keep up the standards, the same should happen with the co-curriculum career programs, where the funds accrued from the affair would be used to hire the best coaches and facilities for training. This also means that athletes should change the notion of taking the game for fun as it also shapes the future career of the participant. This would also increase the income that can subsidize the academic standards within the institutions since it acts as resourceful to correlate the cost of production with the quality standards.

The other major reason why the athletes should not be entitled to a professional pay is that the stipulations of the education programs put the requirement of participation in physical activities, which are also the part of the curriculum. The stipulations of the curriculum justify the need for healthy students through physical activity. Moreover, for the sound functioning of body parts, there should be intensive practice. The need for compensation is a mind set, which could be eliminated through instilling the mind of inter-institutional competition. Once the practice of extra compensation is put in place, the monetary returns would compromise the original intention of defending the title of the institutions. Consequently, compensation for the athletes could lead to practices of corruption through incidences of improper rewards. The improper rewards come about as a result of poor compensation programs, which also create disparity in the student formation in terms of the highest rankings in payment versus the lowest rankings (Mitchell 47).

In conclusion, the compensation programs have the capacity to compromise the level of academic participation since the major goal of students would be on a basis of play and earn instead of a curriculum centred program. This implies that the vital goal for enrolment of students in schools is to seek the primary goal of career achievement through the excellence in the respective field of education. An element of extracurricular activities that are well paying could eradicate the need for this primary goal, which would lead to ignorance of participation in other relevant fields. If the athletes are to be compensated, then these programs should be aligned in a manner that does not create discriminatory rewards to the students’ fraternity, which would be vital in peer relationships. Moreover, if the compensation programs are to be effective, there is a need for levying of some amount for training sessions and branding of the event as an independent career, where students gain access to realization of their dreams. There lies no preamble evidence on the nature of compensation programs since the consequences are double sided.