At the time when NCAA was formed, it committed itself in salary to learners who participated in its operations. With time, NCAA was no longer recognizable as before. Nowadays, the organization has reverted in taking full advantage of emerging trends in sports e.g. new media. As per today’s figures, sports draw up to $11 billion annually to the organization (Brown, 1999). Its coaches go home with heavy pockets. Yet, the players who make the organization realize these huge profits aren’t recognized at all.
The organization usually argues that there is no need to allocate some of the realized profits since the students are provided with full scholarship by their learning institutions. In fact, there are regulations that hinder them from realizing their dreams of becoming great athletes. Despite the fact that there is great motivation to work towards realizing their dream career, the huge gains seem to be ever making quick disappearance into unknown destinations. Some of the many reasons why college athletes should be paid are:
Their dedication to sports:
They usually allocate 43.3 hours in a week in sports. The athletes spent more time in training than in scholarly activities. The many hours spent shows that they are really dedicated in sports. In other words, they usually do a full time job in sports. In America, for one to earn salary in a month, the person should work an average of 40 hours per week. Since the athlete time surpasses that set by national standard, then they should receive their due payment for the work and time they spent in sports. If an athlete in NCAA spends an average of say 40 hours in a week, then the latter is supposed to be treated just like full time workers. The 40 hours comprises of time spent during training, playing and even travelling. Applying justice and equality for all, then they deserve a pay (Hawes, 1999).
Some of them struggle a lot to achieve
Most athletes are broke. Some are even broke to an extent that they cannot afford to pay attention! What they are provided with is free meals in the institution. To greater extend this is not enough since there are other basic needs one need to have apart from food. They need to be paid to afford them. After a hard work, full dedication of their golden time in spots they end up being miserable in life. If their efforts are not recognized then why waste their time in it? In most cases, we find that these students do not come from well off families hence their guardians are not able to provide for their basic needs. To make both ends meet, they are forced to take part time jobs. This interferes with the learning capabilities of the students (Meggyesy, 2000).
The need to have a competitive environment
In its statement, NCAA claims that when it pays its athletes, the competiveness of the game will be destroyed. However, this does not make sense at all this is because NFL normally pays its athletes on basis of performance. Due to this scholars normally work tirelessly to meet the standards of performance so that they can earn that extra coin from their colleagues. In case NCAA pays its athletes, the scholar would not be worried about where they will get money from. This would translate to focus both in class and sports (Brown, 1999).
Efforts of top performing coaches are rewarded
If coaches to best teams are being rewarded, then why not also the players? In average, coaches usually earn up to $100,000 per year. Basing argument on the fact that they have assistants, they do not do much of the work, and then this is a high figure. This figure is even higher than that of professors in the same institution and yet these professors usually do a lot of work. For it to be called a team there must be players together with their coach. If they have achieved something then they achieve it as a team, now the question arises when the coach is the only one rewarded when the team wins. Why the coach alone, schools having developed sports programs do pay their head coaches and forget about players who fought through thin and thick to win? This sounds unfair though.
If paid they will know how to manage their funds. Proper management of funds is a vital practice for any young person to acquire. When paid even if it is a small token they will learn the proper ways of managing the hard earned cash. When they acquire good managerial skills of their small amounts of money, they will be in a position to manage a large amount when they get it hence avoiding extravagance.
