Hewitt, Extension, wait, what?

[Walter]

As an alumnus who wants a winning basketball program, I say stick it to the students.

 

[GMUgemini]

As an alumnus who wants a winning basketball program, I say stick it to the students.

How much more money do you think the basketball team needs? And this is a question for everyone who says we aren't funding it properly. What do you guys think is the proper funding level for our men's basketball program?

For comparison's sake:

vcu: $5 million
Dayton: $3.9 million
UMass: $3.2 million
GW: $3.1 million
GMU: $3 million

I have a feeling vcu's is $5 million only because they are using student fees to pay back the bonds on the Siegel Center upgrades and the practice facility.

 

[KAOriginal]

If you think what vcu is doing is sustainable in the long term, you're kidding yourself.

They have significantly increased their donor base, but despite the endless hype/media fawning over Shaka and Havoc and even their obnoxious pep band, they still couldn't fully fund their practice facility with private money.

What does that tell you? It tells me that not enough of their fans are either willing or able to put their money where their loud mouths are.

At some point, when students and their parents finally start paying attention to what universities are actually doing with their millions in student fees, there's going to be hell to pay.

Because it's fairly scandalous, politicians are starting to warm to the issue. Lots of talk around the state capital about "encouraging" universities to stop funding their athletic departments on the backs of their students.

Without student fees, vcu couldn't afford to pay Shaka $1.5 million, build a shiny new practice facility or have the highest basketball budget in the A-10.

Shaka is one hell of a coach, obviously, but the rest of it is just so much smoke and mirrors.

I could care less about a dedicated practice facility. That's just penis envy on a different scale. If private donors can make it happen, great if not oh well.

As for fees...I have to laugh at anyone getting up in arms over them. Higher education has been a scam for the past 30 years and only gets worse. While there is some grumblings, there will be no meaningful change anytime soon. The administrators will be more than happy to say "hey we've reduced the student activity fee by $150" and count that as a win in reducing college costs while never getting tuition reduced by any significant amount. I laugh here in Maine they eliminated French as a degree and a Masters Program in applied Science to save costs. The two programs graduated 20 students last year, but will save the University $6 million by being eliminated...but yet the academics act like someone strangled a newborn.

In any case...practice facility or not, student fee hikes or not, they have done a good job in making a great basketball program.

I don't think we need to spend much more....I just think we need to spend what we have MORE WISELY. We could have had NO coach and got about the same results last year....

 

[GMUgemini]

I don't think we need to spend much more....I just think we need to spend what we have MORE WISELY. We could have had NO coach and got about the same results last year....

The coach is the crux of the issue isn't it?

 

[Raider_SPE]

How much more money do you think the basketball team needs? And this is a question for everyone who says we aren't funding it properly. What do you guys think is the proper funding level for our men's basketball program?

For comparison's sake:

vcu: $5 million
Dayton: $3.9 million
UMass: $3.2 million
GW: $3.1 million
GMU: $3 million

I have a feeling vcu's is $5 million only because they are using student fees to pay back the bonds on the Siegel Center upgrades and the practice facility.

For those interested in the details.

http://www.apa.virginia.gov/reports/GMUNCAA2013.pdf

http://www.apa.virginia.gov/reports/VCUNCAA13.pdf

 

[GSII]

It does need more money. Why should we pay to keep a high priced professor who migjt bring the university a few nickels but mostly is spending the millions reaped from a revenue sport and not pay the coach who built the team, who won the games, which brought the attention to school, who then gained valuable tv contracts and sponsorships. Yes our program needed and needs more money. If we had it a few years ago we wouldnt be in the mess we are in now.

 

[GSII]

vcu gets 17 million in student fees. We raise 14 million. Anyone care to breakdown where this money actually goes?

 

[GSII]

The proper funding level should be 4.5 million or more IF we are going to the dance every year. Currently, we shouldn't pay a new coach as much as the shaka gets until we starting living in the top 4 again. And when we do, we should be prepared to sustain the success. unlike last time.

 

[Raider_SPE]

vcu gets 17 million in student fees. We raise 14 million. Anyone care to breakdown where this money actually goes?

Looks like a per-sport breakdown is not required, but some schools do so, JMU for instance.

35% of their fees are Non-Specific, so I would assume that goes to maintenance and operating costs of all university athletic facilities, practice/intramural fields etc.

Whether Mason is in that same ball park who knows.

 

[GSII]

The big difference is we have what, 20 sports funded by those fees and vcu has only 12? That and the 3 million raised in addition provides them with a lot of cash to feed their 'cash cow'.

 

[KAOriginal]

It does need more money. Why should we pay to keep a high priced professor who migjt bring the university a few nickels but mostly is spending the millions reaped from a revenue sport and not pay the coach who built the team, who won the games, which brought the attention to school, who then gained valuable tv contracts and sponsorships. Yes our program needed and needs more money. If we had it a few years ago we wouldnt be in the mess we are in now.

You can blame ALL of this on Merten.

Between L and the A--10 situation, he had no interest in prioritizing our premiere sport. While I dont advocate going crazy financially, the reality is the basketball success meant alot to the school, and to just dismiss it when the rubber met the road was the wrong move. We lost so much momentum.

 

[GSII]

I do blame Merten. He had no clue or didnt care to capitalize.

When he says the Final Four run was "the gift that keeps on giving", it tells me he had his hand out to receive, not give back.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/mar/06/the-final-four-effect/?page=all

 

[GSII]

Academics weren't enriched by increased selectivity? Smarter students means better results. More applications means you can select more out of state kids and charge double tuition, which is really what gives presidents boners. Either Merten suffers from ED, or he just ignored the real gift OCM handed him.

 

[GMUgemini]

Academics weren't enriched by increased selectivity? Smarter students means better results. More applications means you can select more out of state kids and charge double tuition, which is really what gives presidents boners. Either Merten suffers from ED, or he just ignored the real gift OCM handed him.

International students are actually where it's at, and they don't care about athletics.

As for Mason's facilities maintenance, they claim to have $0 in maintenance costs.

 

[Patriotfan49]

vcu gets 17 million in student fees. We raise 14 million. Anyone care to breakdown where this money actually goes?

Hewitts silk ties and curved collar shirts and Tom O Connors greens fees and Taylormades.

 

[Vurbel]

How much more money do you think the basketball team needs? And this is a question for everyone who says we aren't funding it properly. What do you guys think is the proper funding level for our men's basketball program?

Not one penny less than the highest basketball budget in the A10. Championships and NCAA appearances is not something we should strive for. It is something we should expect.

 

[Vurbel]

The big difference is we have what, 20 sports funded by those fees and vcu has only 12? That and the 3 million raised in addition provides them with a lot of cash to feed their 'cash cow'.

I know this isn't PC, but part of me says if we need to cut 8 sports to be competitive in men's basketball then so be it.

 

[wijg]

How much more money do you think the basketball team needs?

At least enough to afford to be able to fire a coach that has shown after three years of a five year contract that he sucks without people saying we don't have that kind of money.

You know, if that situation were to ever occur...

 

[wijg]

Wijg, you do realize you went to a research one university and that forcing tenured professors to be in the classroom more would fundamentally change the classification of the university you are attending or attended

Yes, and I was young and stupid once. I would have been much better off at a university where the professors wanted to teach instead of one where they are forced to teach so they can do their research or the ones that get tenure and then retire in place, teaching one class a semester and nothing else. Then my education would have cost me about 1/10th. The research reputation of your university means very little if anything to your career. If anything, it might help get your foot in the door on your first job. After that, nothing.

 

[psyclone]

Yes, and I was young and stupid once. I would have been much better off at a university where the professors wanted to teach instead of one where they are forced to teach so they can do their research or the ones that get tenure and then retire in place, teaching one class a semester and nothing else. Then my education would have cost me about 1/10th. The research reputation of your university means very little if anything to your career. If anything, it might help get your foot in the door on your first job. After that, nothing.

Productive researchers get grants from federal agencies (NSF, NIH, etc) and other outside sources. Grants pay for a portion of the researcher's time that buys him/her out of some of their course obligations. Those grants also produce overhead that allows the university to hire term/adjunct faculty to cover the courses that the researcher buys out of. These non-tenure line faculty are not highly paid and have no research responsibility; thus the students in these courses are getting faculty who are mainly interested in just teaching.

Universities have an obligation to "produce" new knowledge through research, not just pass on past knowledge. That's how advancement in science and other fields happens and increases our understanding of the world and ourselves.

I'm sorry if you have experienced poor classroom performance by faculty who you think are only teaching because they are forced to. My observation over many years at Mason is that many of our best researchers are also outstanding teachers and that phenomenon is only increasing as the research reputation of GMU is also on an upswing that makes easier to recruit new faculty with high potential as both teachers and researchers.