San Francisco Chronicle:
… This year, UC Berkeley’s Department of Intercollegiate Athletics – whose football team is in the Bowl Subdivision – is projected to run a deficit of nearly $6 million, rising to $6.4 million next year.
To make ends meet, Chancellor Robert Birgeneau expects to lend the athletes more than $12 million.
… The last time the athletes ran up a multiyear debt – owing the university $31.4 million by 2007 – the bill was forgiven…
[A] group of [Berkeley] faculty members who have dubbed themselves a Sports Grinch Club objects to the use of any university funds being spent on intercollegiate athletics.
“We ought to stop subsidizing this program,” said Michael O’Hare, a professor at Cal’s Goldman School of Public Policy. He and others say the loss to the school far outweighs any benefit because elite athletes generally have lower graduation rates and receive unfair benefits compared with regular students.
He said the Faculty Senate – the voice of tenured instructors in university governance – will consider a nonbinding resolution at its Nov. 5 meeting to end the subsidies.
O’Hare called “deeply depressing” the Knight Commission’s new report, in which university presidents acknowledge that they have little control over the escalating costs of their football programs.
[A] Cal spokesman … said, “There’s a reason that 10,000 students come to every home football game.
“They’re not just at Berkeley to attend class. They come to be part of a community.” …
And you know… you just know… with Berkeley’s notorious difficulty getting people to apply to that school, let alone decide to come, that without heavily funded athletics, the campus would have to shut down.
October 27th, 2009 at 9:08AM
Every NCAA bowl division school is required to prepare an annual financial report which is subject to agreed-upon procedures ("audit lite") and must be presented to the college or university president every year. This report pulls in all the money spent on athletics whether or not the expenditures are charged to the athletics department. It’s an eye-opener.
I think every tenured faculty member at every one of these campuses should demand a copy of that report from his or her president every year to see just how much money is being diverted from academics to athletics. "Deeply depressing" wouldn’t begin to cover it.
The Berkeley amount is peanuts. And I’d be willing to bet their NCAA report shows a larger number.
October 27th, 2009 at 7:27PM
Crystal if that is true, one would expect numerous example reports to be available posted online, having been obtained by faculty request (as you suggest) or by FOIA request. Instead we speculate endlessly on this blog and others as to the true cost of college athletics.
Can you offer any helpful links?
October 28th, 2009 at 9:18AM
The NCAA and the audit firms providing the agreed-upon procedures ("audit lite") prohibit the public release of these reports. Convenient, isn’t it? There are no examples posted online that I can find. I can’t even get other schools to swap me – my report for their report – to make sure our reporting is consistent with the norm.
However, the reports are prepared and sent to the president of each college or university and each president has the privilege of distributing the report *internally* if desired. The closest thing to a publicly-available version is the annual EADA report (gender equity) which omits a lot of crucial data. EADA reports are available at http://ope.ed.gov/athletics.
A FOIA request never occurred to me as I work at a private university. I’m not sure it would work. Take a look at the University of California policy for example:
"NCAA audit reports are addressed to Chancellors. The Regents’ auditors provide a copy of the each NCAA audit to the Vice President – Financial Management."
The omission of a public copy is not, I think, an accident.
I would like to see this information become much more public. As you say, the endless speculation doesn’t move the dialogue forward.
October 28th, 2009 at 4:50PM
Thanks Crystal, I’m intrigued. If one wished to make an FOIA request for a NCAA audit report from a publicly funded university, what is the reference NCAA bylaw or policy document that defines the requirements for such a report?
And if I understand correctly, you have access to the reports from your university? How much detail is included? Revenues and expenditures by sport? Offline costs such as donated monies? Revenues from merchandising and naming rights? Staff salaries and benefits? Allocation of overhead and facility costs?
October 28th, 2009 at 5:16PM
I have access to the report for my own university because I write it.
For an NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision (aka Division I-A), the report is called:
Independent Accountants’ Report on Applying Agreed Upon Procedures to the Administration of Athletics Department Funds in Accordance with NCAA Constitution 6.2.3
The guidelines for what to include in this report can be found at http://www.ncaa.org/wps/wcm/connect/3e11ed004e0d6250bd0afd1ad6fc8b25/ncaa_agreed_upon_procedures_9_4_07.pdf?MOD=AJPERES&CACHEID=3e11ed004e0d6250bd0afd1ad6fc8b25
If that web address gives you trouble, go to http://www.ncaa.org and use their search function to look up "agreed upon procedures".
The report includes all revenue and expense for the athletics department regardless of funding source and that information is separated by sport. All the stuff you mentioned is included whether paid for by the university or a related organization. The university expenses for athletics are included whether paid for by the athletics department or by some other department.
October 28th, 2009 at 6:56PM
This is fascinating. And while academic units may generate debt, somehow I doubt it would run to $31 million.
October 28th, 2009 at 7:52PM
I’m speechless and impressed. Those guidelines call for some very detailed reporting.
Assuming the universities actually do an honest and thorough job of compliance, disclosing these reports would dissolve a lot of the opacity surrounding the cost of college athletics.