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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Is there any data on how much money say, Princeton Men's Swimming, Stanford Women's Rowing, Harvard Fencing, Yale Baseball and the like bring in to their respective institutions?  I am trying to determine what is the benefit that these sports provide to the schools.  I can't see ticket sales or merchandise making money...[/quote]

It's not the money, it's the Olympians.  [/quote]

It's both, really, plus a few other factors.  Good sports programs can draw positive national, regional, and/or local attention and additional applicants to the school.  This is true for both football and basketball and for the sports that are non-revenue producing.  We were in Palo Alto a couple weeks ago and got to watch a tennis match, water-polo tournament, and a soccer game at Stanford.  It's incredibly cool to see so many kids and families come out to watch the games, and I've seen a lesser version of this phenomenon at the D3 level as well, including with teams that aren't top performers.

I've read admissions articles that talk about probably the most important factor, which is the relationship of athletics to school fundraising.  Athletes as a group are much more loyal to their undergrad institutions than non-athletes, and more likely to donate post-graduation.  They also, on average, will earn more in their post college careers than their non-athlete peers, so have more money to donate.  The stats on female CEOs and college athletics in particular are stunning (see https://fortune.com/2017/09/22/powerful-women-business-sports/).

In modern times, little to none of the focus on college athletics by the colleges themselves has anything to do with the ideal of the "scholar athlete," nor is the amount a particular sport (other than football, and for some schools, basketball) brings in vs. its cost of any relevance (other than for Title IX purposes).[/quote]

We're talking about Harvard.  Harvard could have no sports teams and still attract applicants and fundraising.  This is a strawman argument.[/quote]

Oh.  I thought we were talking about "Princeton Men's Swimming, Stanford Women's Rowing, Harvard Fencing, Yale Baseball and the like," and that I was offering helpful information for a poster who seems to think that ticket sales are the justification for colleges (virtually all colleges and universities in the US) providing athletic preferences.  [/quote]

Fair enough, does anything think that if any of the four schools named eliminated sports that their enrollment, applications and fundraising would suddenly dry up?[/quote]

These schools just like having sports available, both for the athletes and the students who like to watch and support their school teams. It is part of the culture that they believe is worthwhile as part of the college experience.

There are plenty of schools out there for kids who don’t value athletics. We have a variety of schools in the US with different cultures so that students can make choices about what they want in a school and then apply accordingly. Every college does not need to be just like every other college.

If a student likes the MIT and CalTech model with a focus mostly on academics, then they should apply to those schools and schools like them. If they like schools that combine high level academics with other high level activities such as sports or music or theatre as some examples, then those are the schools they should apply to.

Harvard would be a different experience for their students if they decided that they no longer valued high level sports. It wouldn’t be a bad experience, but it would be different. Harvard does have the right to decide on what kind of an experience they want to have available for their student community. [/quote]

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