/ NEWS / TUESDAY, MAY 10, 2011 / THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN / KANSAN.COM
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KANSAS ATHLETICS 20
MISCELLANEOUS INFORMATION
Average Cost of Full Grant-In-Aid (Institution's total cost for tuition, fees room and board, and books)
In-State: $18,699
Out-of-State: $30,095
The "cost of attendance" is an amount calculated by an institutional financial aid office, using federal regulations, that includes the total cost of tuition and fees, room and board, books and supplies, transportation, and other expenses related to attendance at the institution.
Total Cost of Attendance
In-State: $20,122
Out-of-State: $31,104
EXPENSES
Athletic Student Aid
$8,727,303
Include the total amount of athletically related student aid awarded, including summer school and tuition discounts and
waivers (including aid given to student athletes who have exhausted their eligibility or who are inactive due to medical reasons).
Coaching Salaries, Benefits,
and Bonuses Paid by the
University and Related
Entities
$13,286.335
Include gross salaries, bonuses and benefits provided to head and assistant coaches, which includes all gross wages, benefitsand bonuses attributable to coaching.
Athletes (CONTINUED FROM 3A)
THE UNCERTAIN FUTURE
Originally from Myrtle Beach, S.C., Shelton Simmons decided to move farther away from his family to chase his dreams: to play for a Big 12 school and make it to the NFL. Playing for Kansas against teams like Texas and Oklahoma would give him a better chance to go pro than playing at Eastern Carolina, which also offered him a full-ride scholarship. He transferred to Kansas as a junior in 2003 after spending two years playing free safety for the junior college national champion, Georgia Military College.
At the Georgia Military College, life was structured and disciplined He would wake up at 7 a.m. a.m., march for an hour, go to class from 8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m., and then practice football from 3:30 p.m. through 5:30 p.m. He wasn't given much besides food and a bed. He was shocked with what was handed to him when he arrived at Kansas.
"When I came here, I didn't know
I was going to get paid," Sim n on s said about his full scholarship.
He said the money for books and additional expenses at Kansas exceeded the basic needs the junior college provided. His
"I had it good. I can't complain," he said.
"When I came here, I didn't know I was going to get paid."
Simmons was the youngest of a family of 12, and his nine older brothers were the only people in his life who could manage to send him some financial support. It wasn't much.
appreciation for everything Kansas offered him still lasts to this day.
"We were just thinking about all this hard work we were putting in, and all we were getting in return was tuition and room and board," Simmons said. "But you live and you learn. I'm 30-years-old and I'd kill to go back to college and live again."
The only thing that stressed his personal budget was when 9 p.m. rolled around and he wanted a snack of Little Debbie's desserts from the supermarket. The leftover money from his scholarship provided him enough pocket money to cover small expenses, but not much else.
During the 2003 season, he played in all 13 games and started in three of them. Simmons would joke with his teammates that they deserved extra money for all the work they did for football.
Today, working 3 to 11 p.m. six days a week at a Lawrence convenience store for a minimum wage, Simmons doesn't have any economic stability. Nor does he have time to fulfill the ever-present inner itch to play football.
SHELTON SIMMONS Former KU football player
Simmons has played for Topeka's arena football team, the Kansas Koyotes, for four years. His lean body still makes him look like a football player. But football is soon to be gone. He doesn't see himself playing for the Koyotes after this season, especially making next to nothing playing for them. It's too hard to schedule
"You are always going to have that itch," Simmons said. "You go to bed at night sometimes thinking about it like, 'What if I would've run this drill extra hard, maybe I wouldn't be in this position I'm in right now.'"
He experienced some culture shock coming to a university environment much less structured than a military school and being far from his family.
He lost focus. School came second to football for Simmons. "I just wanted to play ball."
His dream of playing in the NFL had disappeared.
Simmons
His free time began to fill with parties and socializing in place of early morning marching and 8 hours of class and studying.
On the field, a growing list of injuries his senior season, such as pulled hamstrings and groins, kept him out of practice and, eventually, off the playing field. The inactivity made him more homesick.
"I think during the times like that are when you need family," Simmons said. "You can call them but it's not the same as someone right there telling me that everything was going to be all right."
around work,
and, without
a car, he has
to hitch rides
with friends
to practices
and games.
Seeing no work opportunities in law, Lawrence he is considering moving back to South Carolina soon to be with his
family.
"They may get their wish after all" he said.
PAY FOR PLAY
The year after Darrell Stuckey and the lajawhaws won the 2008 BCS Orange Bowl, his coach, Mark Mangimo, gave a raise that made him the highest paid employee of Kansas Athletics.
Stuckey didn't see any pay raise.
For fiscal year 2008, Kansas Athletics brought in $35.2 million from admissions to athletic events, television and merchandise sold. Neither Stuckey, nor any of the other athletes that fans paid to see, received a cut of that money directly.
Critics complain about the inequity between the money universities and the NCAA gain and the amount spent on the athletes who attract fans and TV money.
Daren Rovell, CNBC's sports business reporter, says the NCAA is taking advantage of players. He says revenue-generating athletes deserve at least a cost-of-living stipend worth $2,000 to $3,000 per year provided by their university or the NCAA because of the time they invest and money they earn for their universities.
In 2008, Kansas Athletics earned $101,348 in gross sales from basketballs autographed by the NCAA National Championship team. The players who signed the balls wouldn't see a cent from those sales.
He argues one way to further compensate athletes is to give them a portion of what is sold that has a direct connection to them, such as a jersey or a signature.
Student athletics from needy families can potentially receive even more than Rovell's proposed cost-of-living stipend from Pell Grants, which were capped at $5,100 per year in 2011.
"The value of the education for the one percent of guys who are producing revenue is not enough." Rovell said.
However, Pell Grants are need based and only 43 out of 122 Kansas football players currently receive Pell Grants. Seventeen out of 34 men's and
Kansas' Student-Athlete Opportunity Fund, which totaled $262,789 for 2010-11, comes from the NCAA and the Big 12 and can be spent for travel home in case of family emergencies. Two other Kansas sources, the Margin of Excellence Fund and the Unparalleled Excellence Grant, are distributed to men's and women's sports for needs they have outside their budgeted funds, including travel and equipment.
Kansas' total grants and other assistance in aid totaled more than $8.7 million for 2010.
The NCAA has loosened the rules to allow universities to create other funds for special needs of players from poor backgrounds.
women's basketball players get them this year.
Sitting in her office, Theresa Becker, KU associate athletic director of compliance, can look out wall-sized windows at the Burge Union where student-athletes get one free meal a day. Across the street are Jayhawker Towers, the living quarters for many KU student-athletes.
EVOLUTION OF "AMATEUR"
From her desk she can watch athletes enter and leave her building where Kansas Athletics offers them free computers, tutoring, rehabilitation services, and career counseling. Her job is to make sure none of these benefits go beyond what the NCAA deems as amateur, and into the imprecise world of professionalism,
where players receive extra benefits
She went straight to Becker's office and asked, "Coach Becker what do I do with this? Will you take care of it for me? Will you put me on a weekly allowance?"
Becker said the NCAA has made strides to be sensitive to the needs of student-athletes.
The student was mature enough to recognize what her temptations would be, so Becker took her to a bank to learn how to manage the money afforded her at school.
"The NCAA recognized that there are kids on full scholarships who are training and going to school full time, and don't really have an opportunity for employment," Becker said. "They don't come from backgrounds where they have parents or family supporting them."
Despite the recent efforts by the NCAA to accommodate needy athletes, she would still like to see more done.
"In her whole 19 years of living, she had never had, even collectively, $2,500." Becker said.
When one young woman on her team received her first Pell Grant, it came in the form of a $2,500 check.
As a onetime women's basketball coach at Iowa State University, she has seen the positive effect legal benefits can have on a young adult coming from a poor background.
In her mind, if athletes were given some compensation, it would provide a valuable opportunity for the Uni-
Paul Bushirk, associate athletics director for student support for Kansas Athletics, whose student support unit provides degree and career counseling, a strategic tutoring program and life skills education, has witnessed the success, on and off the court, of the talented players Self has recruited. Despite the talent and a list of players who left early for the NBA, the graduation rate for his players is one of the top in the nation.
Today's NCAA rules, fair or not,
declare that the moment a student-
athlete receives extra benefits or
payment for athletic skills, their status
as an amateur — and eligibility — is
terminated.
While basketball coach Bill Self says it would be virtually impossible to pay just one group of athletes a salary, he advocates that programs emphasize being paid what all scholarships should lead to — a degree.
"It is a product of Bill Self," Buskirk said. "The types of students he's recruited, the types of students he wants to represent our program, it's been extraordinary."
Buskirk and his staff work with Self and each of his players year round to help ensure the numbers stay high enough to serve as a model for other athletic programs.
versity to instruct young people on how to responsibly manage money. Similar to their career counseling, advisers could teach athletes how to invest, save, and build a foundation for economic stability.
Academic success comes at a cost.
Because of the costs per athlete, Jim Marchiony, KU associate athletics director, says athletes are already being paid simply because of the value of their scholarships.
"I think the notion that student-athletes don't get paid is false," said Marchiony, who spent 18 years with the NCAA before coming to Kansas in 2003.
and academic spending keeps rising.
"The definition of an amateur is changing, year to year, decade to decade," Marchiony said. "It's not changing for the better or for the worse. It's just changing."
All too often, players leave college early for what they believe will be a long career in the pros. That's why former KU football player Joseph Vaughn left after only two years for a shot at the NFL.
FALL BACK PLAN
Vaughn garnered a spot on the All-Big 12 Second Team and was named KU Offensive MVP in 2004.
"I't hard when every day you're wanting that car or those shoes but your family can't afford it." Vaughn said. "The quickest way you get that is to go play two or three years at a college and go make that six figure money"
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Vaughn didn't make it in the NFL. He tried out for the Chicago Bears where coach Lovie Smith told him he was two inches away from a million dollars. He was too short. He tried out for the Buffalo Bills, only to suffer the same fate.
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