The Financial Side of Athletics/Academics

[kevinfootes]

Geez, Doc! I put in about 9.5 hours in the office yesterday and another 3.5 at home. That's how it goes sometimes. You get asked to do more.

What do you teach, 3 classes per semester? 9 hours in the classromm per week? I don't know your subject, and I'm sure there's a heck of a lot of work outside the classroom. I just don't think you'll get too much sympathy from people who also work.

I agree that Fr. Larry could have spent some of his fountain money and arena money on better salaries for teachers...or maybe even (dare I mention) cheaper tuition!!!!!

[dmeno]

Getting back to the basic proposition: Fully funding all scholarships would not add any students to the U--Fact

Scholarships for those student athletes would cost the U only for room and board,books and fees--Fact

The athletic programs of a university are the cheapest and best public relations tools and generate added alumni contributions--Fact

Additional alumni giving allows for salary increases for the staff--Fact

Trying full athletic scholarship for all sports for a 5 year trial would be considered a low cost low risk stategy with potential high returns in any normal business setting--Fact.

If anyone is close to Fr.B, please propose this as a good business strategy and a sign to the loyal alums that he is committed to the athletic department. His rewards shall be ten fold.

Absolute final rant!

[Billsboys]

Dmeno, you are 100% correct! All the points you made were right on the money. The only other problem you would have is that the operating budgets are way behind along with the scholarship money. Along with that you would need more money for coaches salaries to improve the staff. Other than 2-3 coaches in the department, you would need more money to attract good coaches to enable a sport to recriut correctly. You can have all the scholarship money in the world, but if you don't have an aggressive coach that knows how to recruit you will have a bunch of scholarships taken with DIII talent. There is a reason SLU hires young coaches with limited backgrounds. The reason is the salaries are laughable for most sports at SLU. If you want to make a true commitment you would need the full package.

1. more operational money in every budget

2. better coaches salaries, "new coaches in the department"

3. scholarships

[StLouBlue]

>Getting back to the basic proposition: Fully funding all

>scholarships would not add any students to the U--Fact

Actually, I believe most sports allow partial scholarships being given out. Baseball for example is only allowed 15(or a number around that) full scholarships, but these scholarships can be divided into quarters, halves, thirds, etc. The point I am making is that some sports like our new track & field might see an increase in participants since they would now be more likely to get a partial scholarship. I wouldn't expect a large increase but still somewhat of an increase.

>Scholarships for those student athletes would cost the U

>only for room and board,books and fees--Fact

Not sure if these costs would be included for partial scholarships or not.

>The athletic programs of a university are the cheapest and

>best public relations tools and generate added alumni

>contributions--Fact

I would say some of the athlete programs fit this while others I doubt add much to the public relations.

>Additional alumni giving allows for salary increases for the

>staff--Fact

Not sure I would call this a fact, I will just say don't know.

>Trying full athletic scholarship for all sports for a 5 year

>trial would be considered a low cost low risk stategy with

>potential high returns in any normal business setting--Fact.

I don't really agree with this because I am not sure what these "potential high returns" are that you talk about. I doubt fully funding scholarships for swimming and diving, women's field hockey, track & field, tennis, etc is going to net much in the way of alumni donations or good press in the community. I think it is important that our athletic department is competitive in all sports that are offered. The switch to the A10 was probably the best thing that could have happened to our athletic department. We are now competitive in sports like baseball, VB, WBB, etc that we had almost no chance of ever being competitive in CUSA. The baseball team is an excellent example of this and the success they had was mostly due to switching conferences, not because of number of scholarships given out.

Now don't get me wrong either though I would like to see SLU expand the number of sports offered and fund as many scholarships as possible. I think the only way this happens though is if our MBB is making enough money itself and through alumni donations to fund these extras. With our attendance slipping for 5 or 6 years in a row for MBB, I doubt the athletic department was even thinking about funding more scholarships. I don't want our athletic department to be a drain on SLU. Student fees, MBB revenue and donations should pay the majority of the athletic department budget.

>If anyone is close to Fr.B, please propose this as a good

>business strategy and a sign to the loyal alums that he is

>committed to the athletic department. His rewards shall be

>ten fold.

>

>Absolute final rant!

I am not one to really question Fr Biondi's commitment to sports, simply because I have seen how it has improved under him. An on campus soccer stadium, on campus baseball and softball stadiums, new tennis courts--that also seem to get tore down every few years, groundbreaking on new on campus arena, conference jumping with an eye to improve our status each time, I am sure there are other successes and I am also sure you could make a list of setbacks as well. Overall though I think he has shown a true commitment and will not take him to task over a few scholarships for the smaller sports.

[cheeseman]

Dr. B - I have read your comments about admitting extra students and the impact on the school and teachers. Your response is what I usually heard every year from the teacher's union/organization about admitting additional Desegregation Students. All the points you raise are technically accurate but within the overall budget framework, they do not play out. I oversaw the admittance of desegregation students for a school district for years and I can tell you that through careful placement, I was able to not impact class sizes that did not met the Board and State guidelines. What was often lost with the teachers was that I was also able to increase revenue for the district by a $1 million dollars annually. While there were some basic costs to having the extra students - books and supplies for the most part, the facility costs were fixed, the furniture existed already, the teachers were hired already and the extracurricular costs were fixed. The costs of books were partially refunded by the State - all districts receive this so the money simply followed the kid. So, while having an extra kid or two did add time to the teacher's work load - it was minimal at best and there was never any assurances that they would never have that number of students in their classroom anyway - scheduling determined that. Now, whether SLU can just add kids to schollies or not I am not sure what the rules are but to not do it because of costs is simply not accurate.