I had a pretty profitable birthday yesterday, netting a weed whacker, a belt sander, a square, a shirt (flannel, have to save that for winter), $25 in gift certificates to Culver's, a flash bracket for my Nikon Coolpix 995 camera, and several cards.

I normally don't get power tools for my birthday, can you tell I'm a homeowner now?
- posted by Seth @ 11:39 AM    

 
UNI has caved to the lawyers, and reinstated Women's Swimming & Tennis, even though the men's programs were cut. Here's a guest editorial/rant from my friend Jeremy Grimm:

Just another sign of bad legislation with a good intent. As I understand it, Title IX states that any federally funded universities must allocate equal amounts of money to both the men's and the women's athletic programs. Although it's a noble idea, it's certainly not a functional one. That fact of the matter is, men's athletic programs bring in much more revenue than women's programs.

The true, but not so ideal, reason for any university sponsored athletic program is to make extra money for the school. No school spends money to scout and recruit talented individuals just so they can play on the school's gridirons, basketball courts, and diamonds. They scout and recruit these individuals with hopes that they can outperform their counterparts from opposing schools, hence making the program more successful. With continued success comes extra fanfare and media attention. With the extra attention comes TV contracts and incredible amounts of revenue. Anyone who feels a need to argue that point should take a look at the Notre Dame football program and it's TV contract with NBC. Originally, the athletic programs at universities may have been made as a recreational outlet for the students. That was a long time ago, and things have changed. The cold, hard fact is, schools use athletic programs as a way of making money.

School administrators should be worrying about the budget and the students who are at the school to get an education. They should not be worrying about the legal ramifications of cutting a program which allows a few individuals to swim in a competitive atmosphere. I think the UNI administration originally had the correct idea. If a school cuts a women's program, it cuts the men's equivalent. But now, they have to keep all four programs, thus taking money away from the students, faculty, and staff.

Not meaning to sound sexist, but how is it fair to spend the same amount of money on women's programs when they make a third to half of the revenue the men's programs make? A much better solution, in my opinion, would be to allocate the athletic department's budget proportionally to how a program does financially the last few years. (Remember, it's about making money.) Of course, this would take into effect the fact that only a very select few programs across the country actually make money.

Regardless of the statistics, the financial hemorrhaging, and the lack of common sense, schools will continue to put money into their athletic programs in hopes of a return. Since the money will be there, why not use it wisely?

- posted by Seth @ 7:56 AM