The Real Value of an Athletic Scholarship [Infographic]
There has been a lot of debate about whether athletes on full-scholarships should get more money when they are on scholarship or even just get paid. While it looks like this won’t be happening this year it is important to remember how much a scholarship will be worth to an athlete over their lifetime as well as how rare getting a full ride athletic scholarship actually is. Here is a great graphic explaining how much an athlete will make over their lifetime with a college degree and how uncommon scholarships really are.
The values of an athletic scholarship are many, whether it is the fact athletes come out of college with significantly less debt, graduate at a higher rate or the fact they get into prestigious colleges like the Ivy League easier then the regular student body.
Most athletes will never get a full-ride scholarship and paying the full scholarship athletes in revenue sports more is only going to increase the number of athletes who aren’t on scholarship. The problem is not how much an athlete generates in terms of revenue for a school but the fact that an increasing number of college athletes don’t value the opportunity to get a college education. Such a few number of athletes will ever get to play major college sports and even fewer will ever making a living as a professional athlete. The role of organizations like NCAA and NAIA is to manage all college sports not just revenue sports. Adopting the policies sought by the NCAA of increasing scholarship monies will do more harm then good.
I’m glad colleges pushed back against the NCAA on this topic, the next step is getting student athletes to value education more.
*here is an update from the NCAA. The $2,000 increase to scholarships has been voted down by NCAA members.
A review of the recruiting services offered by the National collegiate scouting association. (NCSA).
What are your thoughts on being a scholarship athlete? Should you be allowed to get paid? How important is an education to you? Leave your thoughts in the comments below or connect on Facebook, Twitter, or Google+!