Back in January, the University of Arkansas Board of Trustees passed a resolution that the university would begin feeding money to the school's athletics department. This has left many involved parties concerned. That includes Jaxon Hatfield, a freshman at the University of Arkansas who serves as a senator with the Associated Student Government. Hatfield's a sixth-generation Arkansan.
"I've always loved Arkansas. Growing up watching Razorback football and sports, I always wanted to be a Razorback. I had dreams of going out of state for college but that ended up not working. I just got a lot of opportunities to come to the U of A, and I thought it would be a great opportunity for me to get to learn the state and see the people, and just to be an Arkansan and stay in Arkansas."
The in-state undergraduate tuition, fees and expenses at the University of Arkansas for this school year is just under $32,000. Hatfield says this decision by the board of trustees and a potential hike in tuition or other expenses will hurt Arkansans looking to attend their state's flagship university.
"I think we need to put Arkansans first. Arkansans are full of first-gen students. They're full of low-income students, and I think we need to put them on the forefront of the University of Arkansas."
ASG is the governing body for students at the U of A. Hatfield says a majority of their work is writing resolutions.
"We don't have so much authority to where admin has to do what we say, but we write resolutions that encourage departments and the admin to do things that we think would affect the student body."
But when it comes to a population of more than 34,000 students, he says their voice matters. The resolution Hatfield and his colleagues worked on created a referendum. The elections are taking place through Wednesday on campus, with this yes-or-no question being presented to the student body: Do you support potential actions by the Board of Trustees that could result in increasing student tuition, implementing a mandatory student athletics fee, or reallocating existing departmental funds to fund the University of Arkansas Department of Athletics?
"We're really just wanting to see what the student body thinks of it. Personally, I think a lot of people will vote no on it, to not support any raises in tuition, but some might vote yes. So this is just allowing the student body to be adequately represented to the board of trustees and to administration. And while it may not have the gravitas of someone, say, from the state legislature, this is just saying, 'Hey, we go here, we're paying to go here, and this is what we want to see.'"
"I would say to any student that's out there: let those in charge know how you feel. I've read that resolution. I support what they're doing. It's a pretty common-sense step that they're taking and I applaud them for their efforts."
That's Brit McKenzie, a Republican state representative for District 7 and vice chair of the education committee in the Arkansas state legislature. He penned a letter to UA System President Jay Silveria and Chancellor Charles Robinson that lays out many of the same concerns Hatfield discusses. McKenzie says that for years the athletic department has operated pretty independently from the rest of the university.
"Coach Broyles would make a point to say that he wanted to be independent so he could go raise money on his own and he wouldn't draw away from the institution."
He says when he first heard about the resolution, he thought it would be more of a "spirit of change" type of resolution, more aspirational than anything else.
"But when you closely investigated its binding, it instructs the institution to try to find revenues that then can go straight to athletics, as well as absolve athletics of certain requirements as well as a bond repayment. It just kind of sent a red flag. I thought, well, let's engage stakeholders and ask some questions. So that's when I met with members of the board of trustees. I met with leadership at the University of Arkansas System and then with leadership within the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville."
The takeaway from those conversations is that nobody seems surprised by the resolution and its goals. The court case House v. NCAA led to a settlement of more than $2 billion flowing into college sports beginning last fall from schools and the NCAA. This has led to a major influx of money from private donors as well. McKenzie says:
"For a higher education institution, there's always a need for more money, whether it be the research functions of the University of Arkansas, academic pursuits, scholarships for those that are in need or come from communities of need. But in reality, what this is is a sign of: we're trying to compete at an athletic level with some of our peers in the Southeastern Conference. So I understand it. And I'm a born and raised hog fan. I'm originally from Northwest Arkansas. I like to say that being a hog fan came in the mail with samples of Tide laundry soap."
But he says he doesn't think adding a student fee or increasing tuition to provide more funding for a football team is necessarily the right thing to do. In his letter, he drives home the point of fiscal responsibility multiple times.
"I could give you a talking point, or I could tell you the truth. The round number on this is a $300, $400 athletic fee or raise in tuition annually. And that goes on the back of a student or of a family who's paying for that student. Let's just assume for the purpose of this conversation that student has to leverage every dollar for their education. They don't have anything saved up. They aren't working. They were going to focus primarily on their school. $400 times five is $2,000. At 6.5% over a 15-year term, which would be a typical student loan for someone drawing down, even with federal support in the state of Arkansas — if you were to follow that all the way through, the math adds up to more than $3,100 with interest. That's a lot of money for us to be saddling students with in order to have the hope of the possibility of better athletic outcomes."
McKenzie's letter has two requests. The first is to repeal the Jan. 28 resolution that laid out the terms for the university to fund the athletics department. The second proposes an independent cost study.
"That's just a typical exercise that independent agencies or government agencies will do. It's pretty common in private industry to have a clean set of eyes that understand fiscal good practices and say, 'What's happening here?' What I would hope is that we can draw some efficiencies, maybe within the athletic department. Maybe there are some costs that the university could absorb — I'm fine for that discussion. But it came down as dogma from the board. It didn't really take into account any fact-finding. It just said, 'We need to make these institutional changes and we need to transfer this money.' So let's try to slow down for a beat, maybe have a third set of eyes take a look at this and make recommendations. And at the end of that process, they say there are no dollars left — there needs to be some form of institutional support — I'd be willing to have that conversation. There's just not been a whole lot of sunshine put on this process or this discussion been had in the public square."
McKenzie points out the way that the University of Arkansas Athletics department operates is pretty different from other universities in the state. Many of them do tack on a student athletic fee. However, he says those schools operate under a different revenue model, too.
"They don't also have massive TV rights like the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville. From my opinion, as a legislator, someone who regulates and provides oversight to early childhood, K-12 and higher ed, our dollar should be uniquely and strategically focused on what goes on in the education that happens in a classroom. Obviously there are going to be input costs that are required to make that happen, but our dollar should be flowing to students and with students into the classroom."
McKenzie says the primary hope of his letter is that everyone involved slows down just a little bit.
"This has happened between Jan. 28 and the board meeting, I believe, on March 9. This is a really rapid succession of long-term and short-term financial planning. My first hope is that we just all take a beat. I know we want to win next year and I want to win as much as the next guy. But at what cost, and who should that cost fall on? There's a metaphor when it comes to the relationship between a school's athletics and its education — that the sports team can be the front porch of your institution. That's fine. But when the front porch takes three or four times as much to construct as the rest of the house, then we're going to have a problem. The foundation of the house is what holds it together."
Ozarks at Large reached out to the University of Arkansas for comment on this story. They did not respond to our request.
The Board of Trustees met Monday and authorized System President Silveria to provide $3.4 million in additional funding to the athletics department, which is less than the $6 million that was talked about in January's resolution. He wrote a memo to the panel stating that the plan to generate $6 million has proved difficult to accomplish. The funding plan involves a handful of actions. It includes transferring marching band costs from the athletics department to the university, charging the university fair market value for the chancellor's and president's suites at Razorback Stadium, and much more. You can find a detailed rundown from our partners at the Arkansas Advocate.
Silveria and Robinson both agree that adopting a student fee to make up the funding difference is inconsistent with the goals to maintain the department as a financially self-supporting enterprise of the university.
Student Senator Hatfield says ASG plans to share the results of the referendum vote with leadership at the university as soon as possible.
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