The controversy of college athletes being paid has grown gradually over the years. This is due to more support for the athlete's side. This topic is interesting to me because I have been a fan of college sports my whole life and want to see the athletes I watch daily get what they desrve. The athlete's accept money from sponsorships and agents against NCAA policy but it wouldn't be a factor if they received income for their contributions to the school.  The question affects my values in the way I view college sports. When you realize the time and commitment put into playing at a big time Division 1 school and how many of the athletes do not even have a lot of money outside school. It also affects me because I almost decided to play college basketball before choosing to come to the University of South Carolina. This puts me in a position of a former athlete and current college business major to balance both sides of the argument. The surplus of revenue acquired through division I sports shows the major contributions of the athletes to their schools but also the bigger contribution to the NCAA. A few sources discovered support this.

The first source is "From Idealism to Pragmatic Detachment: The Academic Performance of College Athletes" written by Peter and Patricia Addler. This article is focused on how well college athletes do in school. It starts by bringing up how men's basketball has been the headline of many academic violations. College athletes are described as becoming less focused on academics. The lack of academic acheivement is also due to time constraints with their sports. The article describes studies done including one that shows most college athletes enter college with the mindset of doing well in school and then start to dwindle in mentality regarding grades. This supports the argument for the athletes being paid because it proves that student-athletes are more athletes before student. With the rigorous practice and travel, academics become a smaller priority. Many of the athletes also leave after a year or two to go professional and barely focus on academics. The author Peter Alder is a sociology professor at he University of Tulsa and Patricia Alder is a professor at Oklahoma State University. This gives them knowledge of the topic by studying and working at a university and seeing it first hand.  This article is more informative because it describes different studies on the academic performance of athletes in college. These studies conclude that athlete's academics dwindle due to sports. This means it is not bias of either side due to only the presentation of the information but no opinion.

The second source is "The Case for Paying College Athletes" written by Allen R. Sanderson and John J. Siegfried. This article starts with an overview of the income produced by College sports, specifically football and men's basketball. The median budget for these schools programs is $60 million, which is provided to show just how much money there is in the college sports markets. The article then goes into the view of how college athletes are "student athletes" but with all the travel the schoolwork is far less a priority. The "student athlete" perspective is important because schools argue athletes are there to be a student first. The view of the universities side is then presented through what the public would view the institutions as and would be viewed more as a sports program rather than a school. This article provides the economic point of the income produced by the athletes for the school and coaches. The argument is also brought up for the schools through defamation as a school and more as a market source. The author Allen R. Sanderson is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Economics at the University of Chicago and John J. Siegfried is a Visting Research Fellow in the School of Economics at the University of Adelaide in Australia. This article is informative because it gives a view of both sides of how the schools are educational institutions and athletes deserve compensation.

The third source is "Should College Athletes Be Paid?" written by John Brill.  This article was published on the Shirley Povich Center for Sports Journalism's website. The article starts by pointing out that college football and men's basketball bring in more revenue than the National Basketball Association. It is then explained how with this revenue NBA players get paid from the revenue they bring in and college player do not. Athletes are also required to play in college before going professional, which puts revenue that athletes could be making for themselves towards schools and the NCAA. The players are in a sense in a limbo to go pro and receive no benefits but gain them for the school. The article refers to it as a "plantation system". The "planation system" is described as the players doing all the work but the do not receive any of the money they're making. The article then explains how the NBA and NFL use the rules for themselves and not the players. The rule is to mature the athletes but that prevents the athlete from pursuing the profession. The argument is then brought up that the athletes receive scholarships and an education as their form of pay.  In response, the author describes how students still have to pay for travel fees and other out of school expenses but don't have any money to pay for it. Also that the athletes aren't much of students first due to rigorous travel and practice schedules assigned. John Brill is a writer for the Center for Sports Journalism at the University of Maryland. This shows he has studied this field and can give helpful insight. He wrote in bias of paying the athletes but gave view from both sides of the argument. 

The question of college athletes being paid is controversial because the athletes put forth a full commitment of their time and effort but the schools and NCAA rake in all the income. The students role in bringing the income in should be accounted for especially when most only use it as the best platform to go professional in their respective sport. All the sources agreed in many athletes are not student before athlete and also that the large amount of income received allows a certain income to be distributed to players if they were too. I support the view of the last source the most because it shows how the NCAA is using athletes to bring in money. To revise my project in the future a more direct approach to the economic view by researching where the monet goes. 1`
