By ALBERT CANO
Staff Writer
Have you ever worked so hard for something then got nothing out of it in the end? Many student-athletes end up getting nothing out of college athletics because of injuries or they drop out of school because they can not afford all the common expenses presented to them. Student-athletes should earn money for the hard work they put in.
Student-athletes put their bodies on the line for their sport. The author states“Grinding through grueling workouts, practices, and games every day of the year, combined with rigorous college courses, student-athletes are some of the hardest working people in the country.” (Source B). This explains how an athlete puts their body through tons of pain and sacrifices their body for the sport and sometimes gets nothing in return other than pain. According to the text “when the widow of Fort Lewis football player Ray Dennison took the college all the way to the Colorado Supreme Court in an effort to collect a death benefit after he was killed playing football.” (Source E). After being killed there was no immediate help or support from the college and they were forced to be taken to court which shows they don’t really care about the athlete and is one of the reasons they don’t pay them for the work they do.
The athletes make most of the money for their school. The graphic is the money made by college football coaches compared to the students (Source C). The graphics show the difference in the money made by coaches who aren’t performing on the field or court like athletes but are getting way more money and not risking as much. The author explains the financial part of college sports when they say “A testament to the disparate allocation of funds generated by college sports, of the $18.9 billion in athletics revenue in 2019, $3.6 billion went toward financial aid for student-athletes,” (Source E). The schools are being selfish because most of the money they make from the athletes should go towards them and they are using most of it for the school.
There is a higher dropout rate for student-athletes. This text explains the struggles of student-athletes when they say “Football and men’s basketball players already report the lowest graduation rates of all student-athletes and non-athlete students; a lack of compensation while competing at the NCAA level creates difficult economic and educational paths in the future.” (Source D) Student-athletes have a very hard time balancing sports and schools, especially ones in college where the sport takes up so much of their time this causes a higher dropout rate which means they get nothing out of playing for the school. The author states how much time the athletes devote to sports when they say “As mentioned before, college athletes can put in upward of 40 hours a week practicing, training, and competing—being a “student-athlete” is a challenge when you’re devoting full-time hours to athletics.” (Source E) When you are putting so much time into one thing it would be frustrating to not get paid for how many hours you are putting in.
The counterargument to why student-athletes shouldn’t get paid is the school is paying them with scholarships. The text states “According to the NCAA, the organization provides “more than $3.6 billion in athletic scholarships annually to more than 180,000 student-athletes.” (Source A). This should be the bare minimum when an athlete comes to your school to play a sport. Another part of the argument is when the author states “However, there is a large assortment of people who support the athletes being paid stating that athletes are often exploited and deserve more compensation. Some argue that they receive free education, but many of the athletes, especially on the basketball and football team, make a large amount of money for the school and spend much of their college life training.” (Source B). They are making the money for their school. They deserve the chance to get some of it back or at least use their name to make money. Explain why your side is better: With this being said they are still playing a sport for the school and putting their body on the line for people’s entertainment. People watch this because of the athlete so they deserve the revenue they bring in and it should be for them not all for the school.
In conclusion, student-athletes put in way too much work to not be paid. They put their bodies on the line, risk their education, and they somehow balance school and sports. Not many people are capable of doing this but they do and should be paid for their efforts.