Recently a huge controversy in the National Collegiate Athletic Association, NCAA, has been brought to light. Throughout the history of the NCAA scholarships have been promised to high school athletes to bring these players to universities all over the country. These scholarships permitted athletes to attend college, with tuition, housing, and meals all paid for by the school they attend. "Full Ride" gives college athletes a top-notch education free of charge. In exchange for free education the "student athletes" remain obligated to the school's athletic program for which they were recruited . It now seems to college athletes, and many in the sports world, that a free education is no longer fair payment for their services. Many players are now asking to be paid by the NCAA. How dare these "students" take a free college education for granted, right? On the other hand is it completely justified for them to ask to be paid as employees of the NCAA. Many around the nation not only see where these athletes are coming from, but also take up for them; standing on their side.

One of the fundamental issues with the NCAA is that they consider college athletes to be amateurs. With the label of amateur these athletes are not allowed to receive any payment for their playing. In addition, players are not allowed to profit from their name. With the way the NCAA operates, while a student is playing collegiate sports, the NCAA not only owns the players athletic ability but their name as well. The NCAA has recently brought many cases against athletes for receiving profit using their names. In the past two years in collegiate football alone two high profile players have been investigated for their monetary gain through their athletic involvement. Reggie Bush, former Heisman running back at the University of Southern California, recently had his Heisman taken back for receiving payments during the 2005 season. Accepting payments left Bush ineligible, by NCAA standards, for said season, resulting in him being ineligible to receive the Heisman. In addition to stripping Bush of his Heisman, the NCAA also punished the USC football program for their "lack of institutional control" (Heisman). USC received probation and two year ban from any bowl games. Additionally, USC lost potential scholarships for the upcoming season. Another incident in collegiate football is the half game suspension of Johnny "Football" Manzeil. Johnny "Football", as he is commonly called, is the star quarterback for Texas A&M. In 2012 he became the first freshman to ever receive the Heisman. Manzeil was investigated for months for his signing of autographs. The NCAA suspected Manzeil of making a five figure profit for the autographs (Sports). Information came out that Manzeil met with a sport memorabilia broker on multiple occasions and was receiving payments for his signing of hundreds of pieces of merchandise. More information later came out that Manzeil was not paid in anything monetary but rather received his payment in modifications to his truck, including new rims and a sound system. After months of investigation the NCAA and Texas A&M agreed on the punishment of a half game suspension for Manzeil. Many believe that the NCAA had "no evidence" (Sports) of any wrong doing by Manzeil, the lack of proof led to the minor punishment. Even though Manzeil was let off easy, if any information found in the future would lead to a reopening in the case. Unlike Reggie bush and the USC Trojans, Texas A&M was left un punished, because of their corroboration in the case.

In the cases of Bush and Manzeil the NCAA was very clear, college athletes can not profit from their involvement in their sport. However, the NCAA is a billion dollar industry. Ever year the NCAA pulls in billions in ticket sales and merchandising alone. Both are sold on the blood and sweat of their athletes. That does not even include the billions of dollars the NCAA makes on television contracts (Hartnett). The annual NCAA basketball championship tournament called March Madness rakes in more than a million dollars per game (Should). Meanwhile NCAA executives make close to a million per year (Hartnett). With all this money floating around, why is it that the players don't see a single penny of it. Being amateurs leaves college athletes to be like to many interns in the nation. The way businesses use interns is very similar to the way the NCAA treats their athletes. Interns do work that is very vital to the company's success, they take care of all the grunt work, and secure the happiness of the highly paid executives they serve. In return, interns are paid in "experience" (Edelman). The experience interns get is comparably similar to the education student athletes receive for their role in college athletics. Without the players the NCAA and college athletics as a whole would be nonexistent. Their work on the field, court, and ice fuel the huge revenue that fills the pockets of the NCAA executives. Top caliber players not only fuel a competitive completive playing environment, but also fuel a large fan following, and who would the NCAA be if they did not capitalize on this marketing opportunity. Much of the NCAA's revenue comes form the player merchandise they sell. Jerseys, T-shirts, and memorabilia come as a premium to fans of the NCAA. The NCAA pushes the sales of jerseys using the player's name. Anyone who pays close attention to the NCAA or is a fan of a particular school knows what number players wear. Jadeveon Clowney is the number seven South Carolina jersey, the number five Florida State jersey is Jameis Winston. These players can't make money or sales using their names, and yet the NCAA uses these athletes names as a life line to produce wealth for their executives. During the 2013 NCAA March Madness tournament Louisville guard Kevin Ware had a terrifying injury mid way through the game. Ware had a gruesome compound fracture that left his teammates and fans in shock. Ware was carted off the court leaving his teammates with a single message "just win". His teammates took the message to heart and continued to advance through the tournament eventually reaching the NCAA championship in which they won in close contest with Michigan. Following Wares injury the NCAA in partnership with Adidas designed Louisville T-shirts with the slogan "Rise to the occasion" in which the "s" in rise was replaced by Ware's number "5" (Services). Not only did the NCAA profit using one of its athlete's names and numbers, but took advantage of a career threatening injury in the process.

Eric Legrand, A defensive tackle for Rutgers in 2011, faced maybe one of the happiest moments of his life earlier this year when he graduated from the university. In 2010 Legrand's life was changed forever because of the sport he would die for. During a routine kick return Legrand flew to the ball to make the tackle, however, he would never return to his feet after that tackle. On that day Legrand became paralyzed from the neck down (Haskell). Since that day Legrand has spent countless days in rehab with one dream, to one day walk again. Although that goal has not yet been reached another has been achieved. Nearly four years after his devastating injury Legrand graduated from Rutgers. With extreme support from the University and his community, Legrand received his Bachelor's degree in labor studies. Sadly, it is not always a happy conclusion for those in similar situations. More times than none when a player faced a serious injury, the University will take away the athlete's scholarship. Not only will the student's dream of playing college sports end, but also going pro becomes impossible, and more importantly individuals find it extremely difficult to receive a college education. College athletes put their bodies and livelihood on the line for their schools and yet see no support back from the university or the NCAA, and when things get bad their only compensation gets taken away from them.

Recently athletes at Northwestern university have filed for unionization. Their hopes were to be considered employees athletes rather than student athletes (Munson). The file for unionization not only goes against the NCAA but Northwestern itself. The school does not support their students in their efforts and issued a statement saying that their "student-athletes are not employees but students." and that athletics is "part of the overall educational experience and not a separate activity," (Munson). The case has made its way up to the supreme court whose decision could turn the sports world upside down. Being considered a union does not automatically mean the Northwestern athletes will be paid, but rather will have the ability to negotiate with the university and the NCAA for better conditions and treatments.

Many in the United States do not side with college athletes however. Their argument is that the NCAA is already paying these athletes with a college scholarship. The NCAA website says that scholarships cover tuition, housing, textbooks, and other fees, many argue that with these payments athletes "receive exceedingly more aid than the average student." (Block), but are college athletes an average student. The everyday, average student has to worry about classes, grades, and workloads, along with balancing their social life. College athletes do all of that but have to throw in numerous practices and film sessions, not to mention games; and what happens when the team has to travel. That is no average student.

Countless others, however, stand up for college athletes. Earlier this year Forbes magazine released an article on their website listing 21 reasons why college athletes should be paid. The author explained that most athletes devote 43.3 hours a week to their sport. 3.3 hours more than the average American work week (Barry). With so much time devoted to athletics student athletes have nearly no time for classes. Athletes are left with a continually loosing battle with their studies and homework which gets left on the back burner (Barry). This year alone the University of Alabama's athletic program profited 143.3 million dollars. Most of that profit does not go back into the classroom, but rather into the hands of the university's administrators and coaches (Edelman).

With so much money being made in the NCAA why is it that the athletes, whose work fuel the program, do not see a single penny. Too much of the money goes into the already stuffed pockets of NCAA executives and university administrators. Former professional basketball player and writer for the Huffington post Tyson Hartnett believes he has a solution to this issue. He believes that if colleges paid their athletes 2,000 dollars a semester, it would alleviate any issues between athletes and the NCAA. Hartnett explains that 2,000 dollars to the athletes would make up for their inability to work, and give them some spending money to go out (Hartnett), and with so many athletes today falling into money issues, this lends the perfect opportunity for college athletes to learn ho to manage their money. The job of a university is to prepare all of their students, so by that rule shouldn't the NCAA be preparing their athletes for life after college athletics, and any professional sports they may be headed to.

With all of the issues surrounding the NCAA it seems like college athletics could be forever stuck in a flawed system, however, few slight changes could be made which could once again right the ship. The most obvious solution is to just pay the athletes outright. this responsibility should fall upon the NCAA as the school filled it own duty of giving the athlete a scholarship. The NCAA needs to get together with colleges across the nation and meet with players and decide on a fair rate of pay. The one slight problem this could bring up is the wide range of sports that there are in the Nation. College football is the biggest money making concept for the NCAA but what about the minor sports like rowing as well as tennis. All athletes need to be paid equally in order for this strategy to work with the desired effect. That means the stars of college basketball and football will make the same amount as those who walk on the team as well as the no name athletes who play golf at a university no one has ever heard of. Another solution which may actually be the simplest is to just allow college athletes to profit from their own likeness. The NCAA believes that because these athletes play for them that they own the person, including name, looks, and all highlights. Because of this, athletes cannot make any money using their own name. But what if we just allowed student athletes to do just that. If some big name broker wants to pay someone like Jadeveon Clowney thousand for a few autographs, why don't we let him. It will give Clowney some spending cash, and give the broker plenty of top quality merchandise to sell, and by the way, isn't that what the American economic system is based on. Everyone knows that as soon as Clowney gets drafted he will be approached by every sport memorabilia broker in the nation, why not let him get used to it now. This idea doesn't just go for Clowney obviously, but rather every top quality, household name athlete who still plays college sports. We know from incidents with Johnny Manzeil and Reggie Bush that players are already doing it, and they've been doing it for a long time, why not just let them come out with it. One thing is for sure If changes aren't made, and made soon, the rest of the NCAA will follow Northwestern's lead and unionize (Munson). Unionization could be the greatest thing to happen to college sports. It would allow athletes to bargain with the university and the NCAA as employees for better conditions both on and off the field. However, unionization could also lead to disasters. With unionization comes collective bargaining where both athletes and owners would collaborate on a deal which best suits them, but what if the deal doesn't suit the players. In that situation college sports could face a lockout similar to that the NBA had back in 2011 (Stein). A lockout would completely backfire on the NCAA. Merchandising, ticketing, all forms of profit would stop. College programs would stop and recruiting new players would be impossible. Unionization has the potential to change college sports forever; the only question is how.

Much controversy surrounds the NCAA and their treatment of their student athletes. Many believe that the athletes are being unfairly treated by both their university and the NCAA. It seems players are stuck between a rock and a hard place during a time where players seem to be owned by an organization and loose everything when something goes wrong. In a time like this not much is going the way college athletes hope for. One hope for student athletes remains however, unionization. It is clear that the NCAA and college sports has reached a critical period and whatever happens could change the course of college sports forever.
