According to the NCAA Student Athlete Handbook, college athletes are not allowed to receive any form of compensation for their participation in sports.
Compensation would include anything from actual money to free meals at a restaurant.
This rule is a good one because it prevents someone from outside the college from paying for the athlete’s education or removing the athlete from the college. However, there is a lot of pressure placed on college athletes and there should be some sort of award system setup to pay them back for all the hard work they put in.
A lot of athletes who play at the collegiate level receive scholarships and those players would be ruled out due to the fact that they received money from the sports program to pay for school.
This system would only apply to those athletes who are graduating and have participated in sports for all four years of athletic eligibility and to those athletes who maintained an overall grade point average of 3.5 or higher.
To be eligible to participate in sports, an athlete must maintain a GPA of 2.0 according to the Student-Athlete handbook.
If implemented, this award program could cause a substantial rise in a team’s cumulative GPA which could increase the amount of scholarship money available to the program.
The player should also be a walk-on and receive less than two thousand dollars in scholarships every year.
The award ceremony would take place during the week of graduation. There would be three finalists picked from all the possible candidates and each would receive a plaque.
The finalists would be chosen by their peers in the form of an electronic ballot. After the three finalists had been decided, the students would once again vote on the finalists to decide who would get the cash award.
The cash award would be a check for $1,000 presented to the athlete by his or her head coach.
Athletes deserve an award like this because of the dedication they have shown to their school. These men and women are expected to perform at a high standard every day whether they are at practice or competing in a game or event.
The players are not only responsible for being at practice and playing in games, but they have a responsibility to show up to class and maintain decent grades. Some coaches even pick a group of players to entertain recruits.
According to the ESU Student Athlete Handbook, a player will be paid $30 for each day he entertains a recruit. Also, all athletic programs at ESU require their student athletes to participate in community service.
Even when the season is over, most sports programs require their athletes to condition during the off season, which includes anything from running to weightlifting.
Even the athletes who are not starters are expected to do just as much as those who are and rewarding those who put the team before themselves is worthy cause for this type of award.
Matthew Pierce/The Bulletin
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