Student Athletes Should Be Paid

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Pay for performance is common compensation for doing a job well. Should this same compensation apply to student-athletes that participate in college sports, as has recently been a topic of debate among athletes, colleges, and the NCAA. Athletes are requesting payment for performance. This ignites several questions. Will athletic scholarships still exist? Will athletes be compensated when their names are used as endorsements? Will athletes, male and female alike, make the same salary? In the term student-athlete, student comes ahead of athlete because ultimately its the education that will be frame the future. Students are pursuing an education – first and foremost – and simply playing the sports they love in the process. Student-athletes…show more content…
Sack believes that “they are already essentially paid to play, they deserve the same rights and benefits as other employees, including medical benefits, workers' compensation when injured, and the right to use their God-given talents to build some financial security for their families while still in college. The denial of these rights is morally unconscionable.” (Sack, Allen) If the NCAA would move in the direction of paying athletes, it should apply to all sports – men's and women's alike. How can more value be placed on one sport over another or one gender over another? If the student is backed with a scholarship then the scholarship should cover all expenses including tuition, fees, room and board, textbooks, and enough leftover for sport events. Health bills from injuries and wear and tear on an athletes body can not be avoided and will be encountered sometime in his/her lifetime. Athletes' bodies experience injury and agony in high school sports as well, but nothing is thought of during this point in their career because there is not enough money associated with high school sports for any sort of compensation. College athletics have been going on for plenty of years, they have never needed payment and that should carry…show more content…
At the University of Arizona, a football or men’s basketball scholarship typically includes about $41,000 per year in tuition and fees for regular classes, summer school, books, room and board, and some medical costs. That’s in addition to intangible benefits such as top-flight coaching, access to world-class athletic trainers, academic tutoring and abundant networking opportunities. But it doesn’t cover the actual cost of attendance. A student who comes to Arizona from another state can expect to pay around $28,400 in tuition, fees, books and supplies for an academic year. Adding in an off-campus apartment and other expenses brings that to around $47,500, the National Center for Education Statistics says. Making up the $6,500 difference is no small task because the demands of athletics and the restrictions on athletes make it nearly impossible for them to hold down a job." (Pallack, Gold) Athetic director of Perham High School, Erin Anderson, believes that division one athletes only, deserve a small stipend because there is people profiting off of their last name and athletic abilities. Anderson says that there should be some sort of tier system, which allows the top players to receive more money than the players sitting on the bench (Anderson,
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