As the athletic program embarks on its second year of the scholar-athlete experiment, athletic director Michael Giorlando can look to other programs on campus that give talent-based scholarships for guidance. One of those is the music program.
Just as a basketball coach recruits players to fill positions, Edward Kvet, dean and professor of the music department, puts together his roster of music scholarship recipients based on the needs of the program.
“It’s like putting together a team,” Kvet said. “Each year we try to fill a target number of sopranos or trombonists, for example.”
Although Kvet said that there are some similarities between the two programs but there are also differences.
“The fundamental difference between music and sports talent-based awards is that our scholarships go toward an academic program,” Kvet said. “Our students receive a degree in what they are getting their scholarship for. Some people may say that if we give music scholarships then we should give athletic scholarships, but I would say that that is not a fair comparison.”
Music scholarships are only given to music performance majors. About 30 are given out each year, according to Kvet. In the proposal by the ad hoc committee for athletic scholarships given to the Rev. Kevin Wildes, S.J., university president, the committee drew up a tier system that would fund 35 total scholarships after a four-year period, distributed among the athletic program’s seven teams. The teams include men and women’s basketball, women’s volleyball, men’s baseball, women’s soccer and men and women’s cross country.
Kvet said a significant portion of the funding for the music scholarships comes from endowments within the college of music while the remainder of the money comes from what he called the “same academic pot,” where the Office of Admissions pulls other scholarship money.
SGA president and communications senior Martina Mills said that students have suggested to her that athletics should do more fund raising to create its own endowments to draw scholarship money like the music program.
Music alumni and other patrons of the program contribute about a
$1 million annually, according to Kvet. The music department makes fund raising a priority because administrators “know the importance of what talent-based scholarships bring in,” Kvet said.
Mills said that a newly formed athletic alumni board would probably generate revenue for the athletic program as well as for the university. Sports information director Brett Simpson said that the board does not generate much money yet but does support the athletic department with its involvement in the annual golf tournament and its presence at games.
Simpson said Giorlando plans to look at the ‘Pack Backers Club during the summer to see how he can generate more money. He also said that some alumni have expressed interest in reforming the “L Club,” an organization that invites every athlete who has lettered at Loyola to join for a fee.
Another difference between athletic scholarships and the music scholarships is the cost of housing and feeding the student athletes. Kvet said that the music department’s awards deal only with tuition while the athletic scholarships in the program’s pilot year covered tuition, residence at Cabra Hall and a meal plan.
According to the ad hoc committee proposal, the university administration requested that Institutional Advancement raise $15,000 for meals for the six initial athletic scholarships during the 2004-05 academic year.
Simpson said that Loyola has to offer its scholarship athletes competitive financial awards in order to keep the athletes from signing with other schools.
“Our athletic scholarships do not cover everything,” Simpson said. “The students are responsible for books and fees. I think when you look to the future of athletic scholarships, one needs to consider what other schools are offering.”
“We did extensive research as to what other schools do indeed offer when it comes to athletic scholarships. We feel that tuition, room and board was necessary to compete with other schools offering athletic scholarships to attract the best talent athletically and academically,” Simpson wrote in an e-mail.
While Mills said there is not as much student support for the athletic scholarship as the 2002 SGA poll suggested, there has also been little controversy since the uproar in the Faculty Senate last year when the Rev. William Byron, S.J., interim president, decided to institute athletic scholarships.
Kvet said that he has accepted that the scholar athlete program shows a commitment toward a scholarship role of athletics on this campus that can compete with other teams.
“It appears that the president has made his decision,” Kvet said. “If he has, then we move on.”
Wildes said he sees athletics as a way to enhance the university as a whole. He stressed in a Town Hall meeting April 19 that the mission statement of the athletic program matches the mission statement of the university.
According to the mission statement, the athletic program seeks to enhance the student athletes’ whole person along with the Jesuit values of the university.
Gigi Alford can be reached at [email protected].
