College sports have completely transformed into professional sports. No genie can or will put this multi- billion-dollar industry back into the amateur bottle. But if these teams are going to continue to represent our institutions of higher learning, educators must restore a fundamental paradigm: athletes must be students first and competitors second. Congress will need to be a willing partner in this transition.
Congress is currently considering the SCORE Act and the Protect College Sports Act. Unfortunately, neither bill addresses the severed connection between athletics and education. Nor do they address the absurdity of current tax policy: wealthy donors can receive the same tax write-off for contributing to an athletic department to recruit a five-star offensive lineman as they do for funding cancer research.
Furthermore, both bills leave the future of college sports in the hands of the same institutional bureaucrats who presided over the over-commercialization and litigation failures that fueled this current crisis.
If Congress wants to help universities restore educational integrity, it must stop subsidizing the operations of major- college sports teams through the tax code. This industry neither needs nor deserves taxpayer-funded subsidies to pay players, coaches, and administrators. Like the NFL or NBA, media revenues and ticket sales provide billions of dollars to operate.
Responsibility for this resuscitation lies first and foremost with university presidents and educators, not sports executives. Faculty must regain control of every aspect of college sports that impacts academics. At its core, this means limiting athletic participation until a player has proven to be a successful student at that specific institution.
Universities could restore significant academic integrity with a few material changes. First, eliminate freshman eligibility—a standard that basketball and football successfully maintained until 1972. Requiring a full year of residency and academic credits before stepping onto the field would curb the farce of "one-and-done" performers and align the transfer portal with the actual goal of a university: education. Second, athletes must maintain a grade point average that keeps them safely off academic probation. Finally, universities must require in-person class attendance. Athletes are already on campus for grueling physical training; they should be in physical classrooms, not hiding behind remote-learning screens.
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Educators must also establish scheduling rules that eliminate mid-week games and reduce travel. Distant, weekday football and basketball games do nothing for the student-athlete except swallow vital classroom time. These schedules exist solely to feed the insatiable appetite of media networks and provide continuous content for sports-gambling operators.
To achieve this more educationally focused paradigm, Congress must grant universities a limited antitrust exemption. Academic standards, scheduling limits, and integrity rules cannot be left vulnerable to the whims of a single local judge or endless antitrust lawsuits.
At the same time, as we strip away the tax-deductible status of university athletic donations, the Internal Revenue Service must ensure that corporate payments made directly to players for their Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) qualify strictly for standard business deductibility. To be deductible, an expenditure must be ordinary, necessary, reasonable in amount, and directly tied to a business purpose. A company whose entire business is selling oil parts in Bolivia has no business deducting a $100,000 marketing payment to a defensive back playing in Montana. If businesses or boosters want to make non-deductible personal gifts to players, they face no barriers—but everyday taxpayers should not foot the bill.
Finally, universities must reassert ownership over their own brands. If coaches and players are making millions of dollars under the university flag, the institution deserves a financial return on that flag. Because college sports are now openly professional, athletic departments should provide a direct financial dividend back to the university's general fund. This revenue should be strictly earmarked to fund academic scholarships for non-athletes.
It is time to take college sports back from the broadcasters and brokers, and firmly return it to the hands of educators.
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