LSU Alumni care more about athletics than academics

LSU president F. King Alexander lamented to legislators Wednesday that the recent cuts to the upper and middle class entitlement program TOPS was substantially affecting LSU from keeping “its brightest and best” students from leaving our state.

Perhaps it’s time for him to get a grip on reality and deal with the heart of the problem, the mindset of LSU alumni.  They simply don’t want to open their wallets and academically support the school that contributed to their success in life.

However, they have no problem supporting LSU athletics, particularly Tiger football.  LSU has the distinct honor of being the only SEC school that raises more money for athletics than for academics.

Even though LSU continually makes upgrades to Tiger Stadium, it is barely able to provide enough dorm rooms for freshmen.  The Tiger Athletic Foundation just recently spent $2.5 million to renovate the weight room.  It also helps fund sports scholarships and supplements coaches' salaries, which, in football, can run into seven figures.  With the help of LSU alumni, Les Miles’ contract was bought out and an entire new slew of football coaches hired.

The other source of fundraising efforts, the LSU Foundation, supports the university's academic and research missions by providing endowed professorships that attract high-profile faculty, building new classrooms and laboratories, and providing scholarships and other student support programs. However, alumni contributions to that foundation pale in comparison to the athletic foundation.

In a typical year, TAF receives about $45 million in donations that serve the university's intercollegiate athletic programs, compared to about $41 million for the LSU Foundation.

“If you look at the buildings of LSU, all of the newest and most spectacular buildings belong to athletics," said Kevin Cope, president of the Faculty Senate. "Meanwhile, there are faculty, students and community members who work in buildings where the plumbing doesn't work, walls are falling down and the facilities are generally in a state of Third World disrepair."

The University of Florida's Gator Boosters athletic foundation resembles TAF, bringing in about $45 million a year. But the University of Florida Foundation, by comparison, brings in roughly $110 million a year for academics – nearly three times what the LSU Foundation raises.

A realistic example of what has actually taken place at LSU involves my next door neighbor, a straight A, Merit Scholarship finalist.  She was offered a $2500 yearly scholarship by LSU; this amount to “keep its brightest and best.”  I bet Leonard Fournette wasn’t offered that measly amount.

However, many argue that an athlete is a show piece that serves as an immediate source of financial benefit for the university.  In fact, LSU athletics makes so much money that in 2012 the Louisiana Board of Supervisors passed a mandate requiring the LSU athletic department to donate a minimum of $7.2 million each year to the academic programs at LSU.  Every year the donation has exceeded that amount with money to spare.

My beef is not with LSU athletics per se, but instead with its president and alumni mindset.

Athletics charges admissions for sporting events and fans eagerly pay the price.  It also benefits from all sorts of branded products and from the Tiger Athletic Foundation which raises money through alumni donations. 

Academic programs don’t have the luxury of diverse sources of funding and rely heavily upon alumni donations to the LSU Foundation.

LSU needs to get over the free ride TOPS mentality for statewide tuition assistance and concentrate instead on getting companies and corporations headed by and filled with LSU alumni to step up and support academics at our state’s premier university.

One would hope that LSU fans would be as concerned about the national academic ranking of LSU as they are about the football team’s ranking.  So far that’s doesn’t appear to be the case.