Schools like Lafayette, Lehigh should offer football scholarships

[Lehigh Football Nation]

http://www.mcall.com/news/opinion/anotherview/all-c.6676939nov20,0,6192770.story


By Chuck Burton
November 20, 2008

The third weekend in November is always special for the folks in the Lehigh Valley. Whether you want to see Lafayette's football team throttle the Mountain Hawks for the fifth straight time, or you're a patient Lehigh fan who has waited five years to taste victory against the Leopards, it's a fantastic rivalry.

Not everyone may know, however, that there is a significant difference between the teams lining up in Easton this weekend and other schools in the Football Championship Subdivision. Almost all of the schools in our subdivision are allowed to offer full scholarships to football players regardless of their ability to pay. But not the schools of the Patriot League.

[Tim James]

Well if they dont want to offer scholarships then its their choice, however, if they dont want to comply with everyone else then they should be forced to drop down to Division II or form their own "non scholarship" sub FCS with the Ivy and Pioneer leagues and whoever else and seperate from the rest of the FCS teams and only play games with each other.

[Pards Rule]

Tim, disagree. I think we have fared well in our our playoff games with non-scholarship athletes.

[Tim James]

Since Colgate's magical run you havent faired well though.

[DetroitFlyer]

Let's be clear here.... The Patriot League is a scholarship conference according to the NCAA. Only the PFL and the Ivy League are non-scholarship in the eyes of the NCAA.

[Mntneer]

Good article. As someone who's only really started to follow the FCS on a national level in the last year or so, I truly don't understand the rationale for disallowing scholarships in football but allowing them in other sports. What exactly is the difference?

[StonewallSpider]

Due to Title IX for every Football Scholarship a school must offer a Woman's sport scholarship. This means to offer scholarships for football Lehigh would have to create 2 more women's teams (because football requires twice as many scholarships as most sports).

[Franks Tanks]

Well if they dont want to offer scholarships then its their choice, however, if they dont want to comply with everyone else then they should be forced to drop down to Division II or form their own "non scholarship" sub FCS with the Ivy and Pioneer leagues and whoever else and seperate from the rest of the FCS teams and only play games with each other.

If the Patriot League faced with such a choice it would cause its donwfall. Schools like Fordham, Colgate, and most likley Lafayette and Lehigh would ramp up to whatever level needed to maintain "full FCS status". Holy Cross and Bucknell may be on the fence and Georgetown would go down.

The IVY wouldnt care if they seperated from FCS, they dont associate with the playoff system anyway and play onlya few schools outside of the PL anyway.

[th0m]

Due to Title IX for every Football Scholarship a school must offer a Woman's sport scholarship. This means to offer scholarships for football Lehigh would have to create 2 more women's teams (because football requires twice as many scholarships as most sports).

I think the extent of issuing scholarships is actually more rigorous than that. If I understand Title IX correct, the amount of scholarships awarded to male and female student-athletes should resemble the demography of the university as a whole, as far as male to female ratio is concerned. Seeing as (according to collegeboard.com) Lehigh has 39% women, the addition of 63 scholarships in football would require 40 scholarships for female sports. For a school like JMU, where there are 62% women, 63 FB scholarships equate 102 female scholarships alone. Somebody correct me if I've got it wrong here. Similarly, it makes sense that a school like Winthrop (68% women) doesn't offer football, as the addition of football would require 133 scholarships be made available for female sports.

Added: I just looked up Title IX specifics (on the wiki-site for comfort, so take it for what it's worth) and Title IX only addresses public schools and private schools that receive federal funding. I don't know if Lehigh/Lafayette receive such funding. There are a couple of states that have enacted laws regardless of federal funding, but Pennsylvania is not among those states (per the wiki-page). Nor South Carolina for that matter, possibly allowing Winthrop a FB team in the future after all!

[DetroitFlyer]

Let me repeat my previous comment. TODAY, the Patriot League is a scholarship football conference in the eyes of the NCAA. What they do is considered to be equivalent to an athletic scholarship, so you may hear the term "scholarship equivalents" relative to the number of athletic scholarships provided by Patriot League schools. Most folks believe that the top Patriot League schools currently offer somewhere in the neighborhood of 50 -55 "scholarship equivalents". Well below the 63 maximum and below the FBS counter level of 57.

In the Ivy League and the PFL, the teams offer ZERO athletic scholarships,(or scholarship equivalents if you will).

Here is a key test to better understand the PL versus the PFL and IL. If a player quits a PL team, they can and most likely will lose whatever aid they are receiving. If a player quits a PFL team or an Ivy League team, they keep whatever aid they are receiving from the school. This difference is one of the main reasons why the PL aid is viewed as an athletic scholarship by the NCAA, while the aid in the PFL and Ivy League is not viewed as an atheltic scholarship.

Frankly, the PL has set themselves for the worst of all worlds. They basically offer athletic scholarships with all kinds of restrictions that severely limit the kids they can recruit.

[Franks Tanks]

Due to Title IX for every Football Scholarship a school must offer a Woman's sport scholarship. This means to offer scholarships for football Lehigh would have to create 2 more women's teams (because football requires twice as many scholarships as most sports).


The aid PL schools give to football players must already be equalized by aid in womens sports. So with football spending included all PL schools are already Title IX compliant. Also as DF says the NCAA doesnt consider the PL "non-scholarship"

[DFW HOYA]

If the Patriot League faced with such a choice it would cause its donwfall. Schools like Fordham, Colgate, and most likley Lafayette and Lehigh would ramp up to whatever level needed to maintain "full FCS status". Holy Cross and Bucknell may be on the fence and Georgetown would go down.


Again, what evidence is there of this?

[Franks Tanks]

Again, what evidence is there of this?

No evidence just the general feeling I get from fans of each school as to what may happen. Didnt mean to offend anyone, and if you feel differently I would certainly accept your answer as you have the pulse of the Georgetown program.

[bison137]

The aid PL schools give to football players must already be equalized by aid in womens sports. So with football spending included all PL schools are already Title IX compliant. Also as DF says the NCAA doesnt consider the PL "non-scholarship"



PL schools are compliant now. However, if they switched to football scholarships I'm not sure they would still be fully compliant, as I understand it. The reason is that the aid that must be equalized is only aid that is athletically-related, so some of the money being received by football players likely does not count for Title IX purposes. If a football player receives $35,000 a year in grants, and an equivalent non-football student (male or female) would have received $20,000 in loans and $15,000 in grants, I think that only the $20,000 would count towards a Title IX requirement.

[bison137]

Here is a key test to better understand the PL versus the PFL and IL. If a player quits a PL team, they can and most likely will lose whatever aid they are receiving.


That is not exactly correct. If a player quits a PL team, they will then be treated exactly like an ordinary student. In most cases, that means that they will still receive about the same amount of aid since all of the aid was need-based in the first place. However, a significant amount of the aid they are receiving as grants may be converted to loans - putting them in the same place as if they had come into the school as an ordinary student.

[Franks Tanks]

PL schools are compliant now. However, if they switched to football scholarships I'm not sure they would still be fully compliant, as I understand it. The reason is that the aid that must be equalized is only aid that is athletically-related, so some of the money being received by football players likely does not count for Title IX purposes. If a football player receives $35,000 a year in grants, and an equivalent non-football student (male or female) would have received $20,000 in loans and $15,000 in grants, I think that only the $20,000 would count towards a Title IX requirement.

What you are saying makes sense, as I know part of the package offered by a PL school may include non-athletic related aid. However, when they say we give 50 equilivants for example I believe they are referenceing the amount of straight athletic aid being dolled out. Actually I have no idea however, I as guessing and using logic but that doesnt apply to title IX.

When Barack Obama said he would like to see a FBS playoff system that was small potatoes. The most perplexing thing in college football is really the PL aid structure--wow. We can never seem to get a straight answer.

[Franks Tanks]

That is not exactly correct. If a player quits a PL team, they will then be treated exactly like an ordinary student. In most cases, that means that they will still receive about the same amount of aid since all of the aid was need-based in the first place. However, a significant amount of the aid they are receiving as grants may be converted to loans - putting them in the same place as if they had come into the school as an ordinary student.

Many of my friends quit a sport while in school, and what you say is true in my experience.

[Lehigh Football Nation]

Here is a key test to better understand the PL versus the PFL and IL. If a player quits a PL team, they can and most likely will lose whatever aid they are receiving. If a player quits a PFL team or an Ivy League team, they keep whatever aid they are receiving from the school. This difference is one of the main reasons why the PL aid is viewed as an athletic scholarship by the NCAA, while the aid in the PFL and Ivy League is not viewed as an atheltic scholarship.

This is accurate - up to a point.

What happens in the PL is that every athlete goes through the financial aid office. The ratios of grant, loan, and work study are computed - just like Ivy/PFL schools.

What happens in some players' cases is that "loan portion" can be converted to a grant. This is in effect the same as a scholarship.

In some PFL schools to my knowledge (Davidson) and all Ivy League schools, all students go through the financial aid office, but if they make less than a certain threshold, that loan potion is changed to a grant. This is effectively the same as a football scholarship for football players. It is aid that is available to the whole student body, but the effect is the same: free education.

Since it is available to the whole student body, the Ivy/Davidson aid AFAIK is not subject to Title IX. However, the loan-to-grant conversion for football players in the PL - up until this year, that is.

Recently, Lehigh and Lafayette have offered a similar (but lower) threshold for aid for all students (something like $90,000?). If a football player quits but his family is making less than that, he could still attend Lehigh with all the loan portion converted to grant.

Is that grant portion still considered a scholarship for Title IX going forward? That's a very good question. If I were interpreting things, I would say that starting this year that it would NOT be if the parent/parents of the football players are making less than the threshold - since it's aid that is available to all students.

[Lehigh Football Nation]

You could make a case that all the Patriot League is doing with its current aid policy is hampering the number of academically qualified student-athletes applying to their schools.

And it's not only due to the number of scholarships offered. At other FCS and FBS schools, kids can be recruited as walk-ons or "preferred walk-ons" that can earn a scholarship on the field by working their way up the depth chart. Since the PL aid formula is based on need and has no test for football ability, it's harder to recruit walk-ons - and narrows the pool of athletes considerably more.

This is in addition to the (as I call it) the "donut hole" of aid: that PL schools tend to attract either full-need (in which case the aid is like a scholarship) or no-need (in which case the football player pays in full). There is a strata of kids in there that generally look elsewhere for education - never mind individual factors like having a lot of brothers and sisters going to college at or around the same time, etc.

Basically, though, it's about fairness. Why discriminate against football? It's being offered in all other sports in the PL.

[DFW HOYA]

Recently, Lehigh and Lafayette have offered a similar (but lower) threshold for aid for all students (something like $90,000?). If a football player quits but his family is making less than that, he could still attend Lehigh with all the loan portion converted to grant.


Ummm, yet another issue to add to Georgetown's list--the school maintains need blind admission and does not offer "threshold pricing".

In addition, it does not provide merit aid, so that can't be used as a buffer through a Marquis or Dean's scholarship.

[Lehigh Football Nation]

Ummm, yet another issue to add to Georgetown's list--the school maintains need blind admission and does not offer "threshold pricing".

In addition, it does not provide merit aid, so that can't be used as a buffer through a Marquis or Dean's scholarship.

My question to you is: could it? I get the impression that G'Town has been increasing spending on football at least in 2006 - not to LU/LC/CU levels, but increases nonetheless. Could G'Town start offering Marquis' and Dean's grants - er, scholarships - and fit it into G'Town's athletics budget?

[RichH2]

Practical question?

Economy?? LU's endowment down some 200M,while school says it will not curtail current aid programs ,it will stop any expansion os spending for the near future.

How would switch impact on the $$$? Will athletic aid cost more?

[DFW HOYA]

Could G'Town start offering Marquis' and Dean's grants - er, scholarships - and fit it into G'Town's athletics budget?

Yes and no. Financial aid grant money could be folded into a scholarship award, but the school doesn't offer merit aid of any kind (if you define it outside athletics).

[401ks]

Chuck,

You wrote in your article:


"So, parents must choose between paying tens of thousands of dollars for the honor of playing at a Patriot League school and paying only room and board to play elsewhere under a scholarship."

To be clear...

Athletic scholarships pay for Room & Board as well as tuition, books, and various required fees.

On a side note...

When my son was being recruited by some Patriot schools, one PL coach famously said, "Don't expect to get much aid money from us. Your parents make too much money."

Gee, I actually felt "rich" for a few minutes. :p The feeling quickly passed. ;)

[MplsBison]

Let's be clear here.... The Patriot League is a scholarship conference according to the NCAA. Only the PFL and the Ivy League are non-scholarship in the eyes of the NCAA.


Correct, only the PFL and the IL have DIII teams playing in FCS.

[MplsBison]

Yes and no. Financial aid grant money could be folded into a scholarship award, but the school doesn't offer merit aid of any kind (if you define it outside athletics).

Otherwise known as the DIII model.

[Lehigh Football Nation]

Practical question?

Economy?? LU's endowment down some 200M,while school says it will not curtail current aid programs ,it will stop any expansion os spending for the near future.

How would switch impact on the $$$? Will athletic aid cost more?

A very good question, and one I'll be interested in pursuing in the offseason.

I have been following this, but I haven't heard anyone back away from their promises yet. IMO, it seems likely now that the cat is "out of the bag" it will be awfully hard to put it back in. What will H-Y-P do, cry poverty? Even if they've lost 30% on their endowment recently they're still probably over $100 billion (that's with a b), and that's pretty conservative. They also have to distribute 5% of of that with new laws coming on the books (I think). So they may be able to distribute 30% less, but it's still a huge number.

The small privates below them - including the rest of the Ivies, Lehigh, Lafayette, Colgate, etc. - will probably need to keep what they have in place just to keep up.

[I-AA Fan]

I am so tired of the "superior than thou, and feel sorry for me" rants of people that do not even know what goes on in their own institutions. How many times is those going to be covered, these institutions do offer scholarships. They just make them grants, or loans payable in 999 years with an exception for death, and no "per stirpes" clause written in. His article even says:

"Schools like Lehigh and Lafayette can only offer need-based aid to football players. While both Lehigh and Lafayette can convert all of the need-based aid to grants in some circumstances (which is in effect the same as a scholarship), not everyone suiting up this weekend has this opportunity."

Yes, the 1 or 2 of those whose fathers prepaid at the time of their birth. If a public institution allowed some of the things that go on at the PL/Ivy schools, the teams would be put on suspension. Particularly in relationships between benefactors and players. Take a look at all of the need-based prep programs; they are the best in the nation ...as were the Ivy Leagues for how many decades? They have always been academic and need-based. The difference is the rest of the institutions lobbied and organized to compete ...thus the NCAA.

Furthermore, the alumnus of these schools (PL) are generally more highly paid & can afford more in return to their Alma-mater ...as most are all but required to do. Now most schools in the country are like the one I attended. Heck, I remember going to watch summer camp & then read in the paper that the same day (must have been before I got there, or after I left) the police came in an arrested a player for murder ...right on the field. That guy will not be giving anything back to his state university Alma mater. Although he will be giving the state 15-to-life.

The point is, you get what you pay for, and no football players (other than a few frosh partials) at football schools, are paying for school. Their linemen are as big and dumb as the rest. Furthermore, the only reason schools like Georgetown and Butler are non-scholarship is because they are basketball schools & they do not want to divert funds into what is essentially not a revenue-generating sport.

[coover]

FCS Schools can give as many as 63 athletic scholarships for football. The Patriot League, on the other hand, does not offer athletic scholarships, but virtually all top performers get other types of financial aid, which, when added up, are about the same as an athletic scholarship.

The Patriot League schools call themselves non-scholarship for FCS so they don't have to offer additional scholarships for womens sports. They are lying to the public and they are lying to themselves.

[Franks Tanks]

I am so tired of the "superior than thou, and feel sorry for me" rants of people that do not even know what goes on in their own institutions. How many times is those going to be covered, these institutions do offer scholarships. They just make them grants, or loans payable in 999 years with an exception for death, and no "per stirpes" clause written in. His article even says:

"Schools like Lehigh and Lafayette can only offer need-based aid to football players. While both Lehigh and Lafayette can convert all of the need-based aid to grants in some circumstances (which is in effect the same as a scholarship), not everyone suiting up this weekend has this opportunity."

Yes, the 1 or 2 of those whose fathers prepaid at the time of their birth. If a public institution allowed some of the things that go on at the PL/Ivy schools, the teams would be put on suspension. Particularly in relationships between benefactors and players. Take a look at all of the need-based prep programs; they are the best in the nation ...as were the Ivy Leagues for how many decades? They have always been academic and need-based. The difference is the rest of the institutions lobbied and organized to compete ...thus the NCAA.

Furthermore, the alumnus of these schools (PL) are generally more highly paid & can afford more in return to their Alma-mater ...as most are all but required to do. Now most schools in the country are like the one I attended. Heck, I remember going to watch summer camp & then read in the paper that the same day (must have been before I got there, or after I left) the police came in an arrested a player for murder ...right on the field. That guy will not be giving anything back to his state university Alma mater. Although he will be giving the state 15-to-life.

The point is, you get what you pay for, and no football players (other than a few frosh partials) at football schools, are paying for school. Their linemen are as big and dumb as the rest. Furthermore, the only reason schools like Georgetown and Butler are non-scholarship is because they are basketball schools & they do not want to divert funds into what is essentially not a revenue-generating sport.

All Patriot League athletes are representative of their class. Some athletes may be "dumb" but they had strong scores and grades.

[HoyaMetanoia]

All Patriot League athletes are representative of their class. Some athletes may be "dumb" but they had strong scores and grades.

While the AI is supposed to promote a reasonably representative sample of the student body as a whole, it is my experience that that is rarely the case. 90% of the athletes at these schools would not have had a snowball's chance in hell of getting into school on their own ( at the Ivies and tougher PL schools). Even the top band kids may have had, say, similar GPAs to some of the regular admits, but in normal admissions, most of those kids wouldn't have even gotten a second look.

[LeopardFan04]

FCS Schools can give as many as 63 athletic scholarships for football. The Patriot League, on the other hand, does not offer athletic scholarships, but virtually all top performers get other types of financial aid, which, when added up, are about the same as an athletic scholarship.

The Patriot League schools call themselves non-scholarship for FCS so they don't have to offer additional scholarships for womens sports. They are lying to the public and they are lying to themselves.


The funding must match anyway, whether the funding for football is scholarships or not.

[Franks Tanks]

While the AI is supposed to promote a reasonably representative sample of the student body as a whole, it is my experience that that is rarely the case. 90% of the athletes at these schools would not have had a snowball's chance in hell of getting into school on their own ( at the Ivies and tougher PL schools). Even the top band kids may have had, say, similar GPAs to some of the regular admits, but in normal admissions, most of those kids wouldn't have even gotten a second look.

I would have gotten in to most of the PL schools on my own merit just as many of my team mates. Georgetown is the only PL school that is significantly harder to get into. Lafayette, Holy Cross, and Bucknell have incredibly similar admission standards. Colgate is a bit higher but not extremely. Lehigh is not a liberal arts school but their admission criteria is very in line as well.

Maybe not every player has a 1,400 of their SAT's but the number of FCS caliber players with scores like that is amazingly small.

[Go...gate]

Let me repeat my previous comment. TODAY, the Patriot League is a scholarship football conference in the eyes of the NCAA. What they do is considered to be equivalent to an athletic scholarship, so you may hear the term "scholarship equivalents" relative to the number of athletic scholarships provided by Patriot League schools. Most folks believe that the top Patriot League schools currently offer somewhere in the neighborhood of 50 -55 "scholarship equivalents". Well below the 63 maximum and below the FBS counter level of 57.

In the Ivy League and the PFL, the teams offer ZERO athletic scholarships,(or scholarship equivalents if you will).

Here is a key test to better understand the PL versus the PFL and IL. If a player quits a PL team, they can and most likely will lose whatever aid they are receiving. If a player quits a PFL team or an Ivy League team, they keep whatever aid they are receiving from the school. This difference is one of the main reasons why the PL aid is viewed as an athletic scholarship by the NCAA, while the aid in the PFL and Ivy League is not viewed as an atheltic scholarship.

Frankly, the PL has set themselves for the worst of all worlds. They basically offer athletic scholarships with all kinds of restrictions that severely limit the kids they can recruit.

That is the one thing I dislike about the system, because the reason you go to school is to get an education. If you decide you want to concentrate on your studies so you can make your way in the world, why should you lose a grant-in-aid or scholarship?

[ngineer]

I am so tired of the "superior than thou, and feel sorry for me" rants of people that do not even know what goes on in their own institutions. How many times is those going to be covered, these institutions do offer scholarships. They just make them grants, or loans payable in 999 years with an exception for death, and no "per stirpes" clause written in. His article even says:

"Schools like Lehigh and Lafayette can only offer need-based aid to football players. While both Lehigh and Lafayette can convert all of the need-based aid to grants in some circumstances (which is in effect the same as a scholarship), not everyone suiting up this weekend has this opportunity."

Yes, the 1 or 2 of those whose fathers prepaid at the time of their birth. If a public institution allowed some of the things that go on at the PL/Ivy schools, the teams would be put on suspension. Particularly in relationships between benefactors and players. Take a look at all of the need-based prep programs; they are the best in the nation ...as were the Ivy Leagues for how many decades? They have always been academic and need-based. The difference is the rest of the institutions lobbied and organized to compete ...thus the NCAA.

Furthermore, the alumnus of these schools (PL) are generally more highly paid & can afford more in return to their Alma-mater ...as most are all but required to do. Now most schools in the country are like the one I attended. Heck, I remember going to watch summer camp & then read in the paper that the same day (must have been before I got there, or after I left) the police came in an arrested a player for murder ...right on the field. That guy will not be giving anything back to his state university Alma mater. Although he will be giving the state 15-to-life.

The point is, you get what you pay for, and no football players (other than a few frosh partials) at football schools, are paying for school. Their linemen are as big and dumb as the rest. Furthermore, the only reason schools like Georgetown and Butler are non-scholarship is because they are basketball schools & they do not want to divert funds into what is essentially not a revenue-generating sport.

Not sure where that comes from. There is no 'requirement' for alums to contribute to their alma mater. Indeed, Lehigh's percentage of alums giving financially to the school is about 60%--which, while greater than most schools, still means a lot of alums do NOT give back later.

[bison137]

Not sure where that comes from. There is no 'requirement' for alums to contribute to their alma mater. Indeed, Lehigh's percentage of alums giving financially to the school is about 60%--which, while greater than most schools, still means a lot of alums do NOT give back later.



That would be a fantastic rate of contributing - if it were really the number. However, the giving rate that Lehigh reports to USNews is actually 32.6% - still pretty good.

All of the giving rates are exaagerated by at least some amount since at the least they do not include alums that they have no addresses for. In some cases, the numbers are also gamed significantly by a school taking names out of its data base if the school doesn't think they can get any money out of a given alum. Then all of those names are not included in the denominator.

[DFW HOYA]

In addition, it does not provide merit aid, so that can't be used as a buffer through a Marquis or Dean's scholarship.


Otherwise known as the DIII model.

Once again, it would pay to do your homework. Georgetown offers about 100 athletic scholarships across its 29 sports--while certainly not enough, it is not a Division III aspirant. Its athletic budget is larger than any other I-AA school (including your own), and not solely because of basketball.

The decision not to offer merit aid is an academic decision, not an athletic one. With most of its 16,000 applicants able to qualify on merit, Georgetown's financial aid is based on need so as not to turn away deserving applicants who can't afford the opportunity to study there. The cost of a year at Georgetown is roughly four times that of a state-funded I-AA school; hence, NDSU can fund as many as four scholarships for the cost of one at Georgetown.

So before you dismiss this out of hand as "Division I schools should not restrict admissions" or some such nonsense, bear in mind that scholarship aid is out there, but only for about one in eight athletes, with room to grow.

[MplsBison]

Oh ok, so you do offer aid to athletes that is counted by the NCAA, unlike the PFL and IL.

That's all I want to hear.