Rutgers athletics subsidy was $36 million for 2014

[Tango Two]

The subsidy needed to sustain the Rutgers athletics program in Fiscal Year 2014 decreased by about $11 million over the course of one year but remains in line to be one of the highest in the nation, according to a report filed by the school to the NCAA.




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Rutgers athletics subsidy was $36 million for 2014

 

[LadyRU09]

At least it's decreasing. JH is trying to eliminate it all together once we get our full B1G paychecks.

 

[retired711]

Do you know how much of that subsidy is student fees? To me, that's not entirely a subsidy -- it's just additional support from the student body.

 

[Upstream]

Originally posted by camdenlawprof:

Do you know how much of that subsidy is student fees? To me, that's not entirely a subsidy -- it's just additional support from the student body.

The article says that over $26MM came from Direct Institutional Support, which means about $10MM came from Student Fees (since the other potential parts of the subsidy, like state aid, are negligible for Rutgers Athletics).

Regarding whether student fees should count as part of the subsidy or not, I can make arguments for both sides. You could say that students get benefits for the fees, like free admission to games, so student fees really aren't a subsidy. On the other hand, the student fee is mandatory, whether the student wants to take advantage of the benefits or not, so it is really just a form of tuition with a different name. Since almost all of the direct institutional support comes from tuition payments (since that is one of the few major revenue sources that can be used for essentially any purpose), there is not really a difference whether you call the student payment a fee or tuition. Either way, it is money from students that is paid as part of the term bill that goes to support athletics.

Note that when you eliminate the 2013 and 2014 one-time fees associated with the Mike Rice affair and the switch from the BE to B10, the subsidy has decreased.

 

[RuRoman]

I wrote a length response to a poster regarding RU's financials.....see attached thread!

Discussion on Subsidy

 

[RuRoman]

One, if not the primary reason, for RU to have one of the highest subsidies to athletic has to do, in large part too (in addition to the RIce, AAC, and other one time charges) to RU's accounting methodology.

 

[RuRoman]

Originally posted by Upstream:

Originally posted by camdenlawprof:

Do you know how much of that subsidy is student fees? To me, that's not entirely a subsidy -- it's just additional support from the student body.

The article says that over $26MM came from Direct Institutional Support, which means about $10MM came from Student Fees (since the other potential parts of the subsidy, like state aid, are negligible for Rutgers Athletics).

Regarding whether student fees should count as part of the subsidy or not, I can make arguments for both sides. You could say that students get benefits for the fees, like free admission to games, so student fees really aren't a subsidy. On the other hand, the student fee is mandatory, whether the student wants to take advantage of the benefits or not, so it is really just a form of tuition with a different name. Since almost all of the direct institutional support comes from tuition payments (since that is one of the few major revenue sources that can be used for essentially any purpose), there is not really a difference whether you call the student payment a fee or tuition. Either way, it is money from students that is paid as part of the term bill that goes to support athletics.

Note that when you eliminate the 2013 and 2014 one-time fees associated with the Mike Rice affair and the switch from the BE to B10, the subsidy has decreased.

Upstream your argument about Student Fees being both (a subsidy and a direct athletic contribution) is persuasive....but I think, for accounting purposes only and for the sake of accurately determining that a subsidy is, that student fees are actually direct payments to the Athletic department...if the Athletic department did not exist, or it was smaller (or to a large extent less successful) fees would be lower (in theory)....

 

[NotInRHouse]

Originally posted by Upstream:

Originally posted by camdenlawprof:

Do you know how much of that subsidy is student fees? To me, that's not entirely a subsidy -- it's just additional support from the student body.

The article says that over $26MM came from Direct Institutional Support, which means about $10MM came from Student Fees (since the other potential parts of the subsidy, like state aid, are negligible for Rutgers Athletics).

Regarding whether student fees should count as part of the subsidy or not, I can make arguments for both sides. You could say that students get benefits for the fees, like free admission to games, so student fees really aren't a subsidy. On the other hand, the student fee is mandatory, whether the student wants to take advantage of the benefits or not, so it is really just a form of tuition with a different name. Since almost all of the direct institutional support comes from tuition payments (since that is one of the few major revenue sources that can be used for essentially any purpose), there is not really a difference whether you call the student payment a fee or tuition. Either way, it is money from students that is paid as part of the term bill that goes to support athletics.

Note that when you eliminate the 2013 and 2014 one-time fees associated with the Mike Rice affair and the switch from the BE to B10, the subsidy has decreased.

Unfortunately the media just has another opportunity to make hay of the whole Rice thing with that. And knowing RU, unfortunately, it would not shock me for there to be more buyouts going forward.

Apparently the buyout was the reason the soccer coach was not fired and I think the buyout was 100 or 150k...

 

[RU-ROCS]

At least Football is not the problem. According to today's SL, RU football made $2 mil.

 

[TonyLieske]

Originally posted by RU-ROCS:
At least Football is not the problem. According to today's SL, RU football made $2 mil.

TO be fair though, that 2 million profit doesn't include the $4.9 million in stadium debt service. The stadium is used by other programs for sure, but its hard to argue the expansion was done for anything other than the football program.