Put Some of the NCAA Proposed Settlement Money Toward Student-Athlete Career Success

College athletic administrators! Take advantage of this opportunity and give the 92 percent of student-athletes that will not be drafted the knowledge, skills, and best practices they will need to launch their careers!

There is a great deal of confusion about the NCAA’s proposed settlement that will provide a $2.77 BILLION pot of gold to student-athletes who participated in college sports from 2016 through (likely) the end of the 2024 athletic season. There is an equal amount of confusion regarding the second part of the proposed settlement that will share 22 percent of a college’s sports revenue with student-athletes!

To determine the 22 percent of college sport revenue, colleges will include, ticket sales, NCAA and conference distributions, guarantees, options, third-party support, concessions, broadcast rights, royalties/advertising/sponsorship, sport camps and endowment/investment income. It will not include student activity fees, alumni and other contributions, nor government or institutional support.

Based on the above formula, experts predict Division 1 student-athletes will be paid as much as $25,000 a year. What if I participated in Division 1 football in the fall and fencing in the winter/spring!  Will that mean I will get paid $50,000!   

Prior to this announcement, we were already seeing this happen via collectives at Texas Tech that were paying the entire football team members $25,000 a year, as well as a Texas A&M collective that is currently paying their football team members $50,000 a year.

In the world of sports, not everything is equal or necessarily fair! At Division III colleges- again based on the above revenue -- student-athletes share of college athletes revenue could be under $500!

If I were heading off to college, I’d think long and hard about going out for a sport based on that kind of compensation.  Not only do you gain the value of being associated with a group of like minded people who are all committed to one cause, outcome, and mission, but along the way you are learning about important soft skills like teamwork, leadership, and communication. AND, you get paid!

The proposed NCAA settlement offers a great deal of flexibility to colleges on how they want to pay that amount, which sports are to be included, and if men and women’s sports are to receive equal pay!  What was completely ILLEGAL only a few years ago, is LEGAL today. Today student-athletes can be compensated a number of different ways, that do not include scholarships.

For example, student-athletes can:

• Be paid directly by the college as much as $25,000 per year. (Division 1 colleges)
• Generate their own income from their name, image, and likeness.
• Receive products and services like cars, travel, even career and job placement.

Give student-athletes career and professional development training

Colleges have another opportunity available to them as they finalize the formula on how they want to compensate and reward student-athletes.

Why not include career and professional development training, coaching and even job placement.  With only 2 percent of student-athletes being drafted into professional sports, why not either allocate some of that money or encourage student-athletes to invest some of that money in exploring career opportunities, creating a career plan, learning fundamental soft skills, and acquire the interviewing skills, job hunting, and relevant job search skills necessary to launch and lead a successful career?

Research by McKinsey has shown less than 60 percent of students visit the career center and even the National Association of Colleges and Employers surveys show 62 percent of GRADUATING college seniors will either NEVER visit the career center or visit only once or twice.  This is probably why it takes the average grad nearly 8 months to land a job and why recent research by BurningGlass found 52 percent of grads end up in jobs that do NOT require a college degree. 

We’ve not found research conducted specifically for student-athletes, but my guess is these number are much worse for them!  Student-athletes not only have the same college academic and social requirements as traditional students, but they also have to fit in practice, weight training, games, team meetings, and event travel. 

Student-athletes need, no deserve, a dedicated program that will deliver a comprehensive, holistic career and professional development program to them 24/7.  They need a program that will be there for them in their off seasons and during the summers that will enable them to conveniently pick up the skills sets that will get them noticed in a crowded job market.

Encourage your alma-mater's athletic department to include career and professional development programming as part of the training student-athletes receive.

What do you think?