As the Knight Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics prepares to release a report on the issues of money, athletics, and higher education in the 21st century this summer, USA Today continues their own examination into college athletics financing with a cover story in today’s edition. The newspaper repeatedly looks to the expertise of the Knight Commission to help tell the story of covering the gaps in athletic operating budgets with student fees and university funds.

“There are pressures that one would predict would keep [spending] going up if nothing is changed, and I think it’s clear that for at least two more years, expenditures for the academic sector are going to go down,” says [Knight Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics] co-chairman Gerald Turner, president of Southern Methodist University. “I think that is not a position most universities want to be in ‘ or that they’ll find sustainable, either operationally or politically.”

In an accompanying article, USA Today contends:

‘The nation’s highest-profile college athletic programs drew a greater percentage of their revenue from student fees and their schools’ general funds in 2009 than they had in any of the previous four years.’

Covering the growing gap in athletic department budgets with University funds is an issue that co-chair Turner believes needs public support to achieve reform:

“It’s important that these issues about athletic expenditures be brought out to where there is some public support for more rational approaches to this.”

Look for the forthcoming report and policy recommendations about reforming the financing of college athletics from the Knight Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics in May or June of this year.

Learn more about the Knight Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics and their mission to ‘spur reforms that emphasize academic values in an arena where commercialization of college sports often overshadows the underlying goals of higher education’ at http://www.knightcommission.org/