by Matt Fredmonsky

Reporter

The drive to win college sports titles at university campuses across America — particularly in Ohio — comes with a growing, multi-million dollar price tag.

Rising expenses for stadiums, travel and coaching salaries at public universities came under fire last month when the Knight Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics — a panel of professionals in higher education — released its latest report calling for financial reform of college athletics spending.

The commission’s report, “Restoring the Balance: Dollars, Values, and the Future of College Sports,” focuses on 103 schools in the Football Bowl Subdivision conferences. 

The report includes some eye-opening statistics on the 12 schools in the Mid-American Conference. 

Ohio MAC schools include KSU, Akron, Bowling Green State University, Ohio University, Miami University and the University of Toledo.

In the MAC, universities spent on average four times as much on athletes as they did on academics for full-time students in 2008. According to the report, MAC schools spent $48,139 per athlete compared with $12,032 in academic spending per full-time student.

For Richard Vedder, a professor at Ohio University who runs the Center for College Affordability and Productivity, those numbers show the level at which universities are subsidizing rising athletic expenses with academic fees.

“Kent and the University of Akron are quintessential examples of what I’m talking about,” Vedder said. “The level of subsidization in the MAC is among the highest levels of any division in the nation.”

KSU is spending less on sports than Akron this year. But athletics spending at KSU has been on the rise in recent years. Nearly a decade ago, KSU athletics had a $13.6 million budget. Today, that budget is $19.6 million.

KSU currently spends about $39,207 per athlete — about 19 percent below the 2008 MAC average. 

Those athletics expenses are funded partially by student academic fees. 

Akron is among the biggest spenders in the MAC. 

This year, the university’s athletics budget is the highest of Ohio MAC schools at $24.3 million. 

Akron’s athletics budget is 5 percent of the university’s $484.4 million total university budget.

KSU Provost Bob Frank said athletics spending is in part based on an expectation from students, alumni and community members  that the university offer major athletics programs.

“It’s a little bit of, who do we think is like us and who do we aspire to match ourselves with,” Frank said. “As you look at large public universities, each and every one of them has a strong athletics program as part of its repertoire it offers to students.”

But comparing MAC schools to universities in the Big Ten and other major conferences is a futile effort, Vedder said. 

Schools in the Big Ten, which include Ohio State University, have budgets and enrollment figures as much as five times larger than MAC schools.

In the Big Ten, spending per athlete averaged six times higher per full-time student in 2008. Big Ten schools spent $115,538 per athlete compared with $17,025 in academic spending per student. 

Even schools with money-making teams still rely on institutional funds to balance their athletics budget, according to the commission.

According to the Center for Collegiate Affordability, only 19 athletic programs nationwide saw positive net generated revenue in 2006. The other 100 had to be subsidized using other institutional funds. 

However, a member of the Knight Commission and MAC president contend Vedder’s subsidization argument is incorrect.

Bowling Green President Carol Cartwright, the past president of KSU, served on the commission for its latest report. 

Cartwright said schools in the MAC do not subsidize athletics with academic funding.

“MAC athletic programs are funded with the revenues they generate and a portion of a student fee that also supports other areas of student life, like the student union, the student recreation center and health center,” Cartwright said. “We do not subsidize athletics with academic spending.”

Still, Vedder believes athletics budgets in the MAC are overblown.

“I see no problem with the way the MAC was 40 years ago,” Vedder said.

Back then, teams only had two or three coaches with smaller salaries and no special training facilities.

“It was on a much more lower key basis, but we still got 10,000, 15,000 people at the good games,” Vedder said. 

Athletics at its most basic level is rooted in competition.

And KSU has managed to stay competitive in the MAC — with the exception of football — despite spending less per athlete compared to its competitors.

KSU nabbed the 2010 Reese and Jacoby Cups, which represent all-sports excellence for MAC men’s and women’s teams. 

This month, Texas A&M’s Laboratory for the Study of Intercollegiate Athletics named KSU the “most economically efficient” athletic department in the nation.

The Excellence in Management Cup determined which Division I athletic departments won the most conference and national championships with the least expenses. 

The issue comes back to how the university chooses to spend its athletic dollars, Frank said.

“Again, it’s about balance, as the Knight Commission suggests,” he said. “We want to do better in football and our new athletic director has been asked to do that. But hopefully, we can do that without spending a ton more money.”

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