NCAA Division I School the University of Vermont has announced a cutback in athletics scholarships in 3 programs, including the women’s swimming & diving program. Between that, the men’s and women’s cross country program, and the men’s and women’s track & field program, the athletics department says that it will save around $180,000 by cutting 3.5 total scholarships.
Vermont’s estimated cost of attendance for the 2018-2019 academic year is $33,804 for Vermont residents and $58,450 for non-Vermont residents.
According to VTDigger, the women’s-only swimming & diving program will from 5.75 scholarships this year to 4.75 next year. Women’s cross country/track and field will drop from 5.9 to 4 scholarships, while men’s cross country/track and field will drop from 3.5 to 2.5. Women’s swimming & diving has a maximum of 14 scholarships, women’s cross country/track & field has a maximum of 18 scholarships, and men’s cross country/track & field has a maximum of 12.6 scholarships in Division I.
Vermont athletics director Jeff Schulman says that ‘the decision was part of a wider effort of cuts to make the department more sustainable,’ according to VTDigger. He also said that operating budgets were cut in all varsity sports, including 3 full-time positions (1 in communications, 1 in facilities, and 1 assistant coaching position).
The school is, however, moving forward with its plan to open a new $95 million athletics center. They explained that money for the facility comes from earmarked donations and restricted bonds, while scholarships come from the athletics budget, which is funded by its own revenue and the university. While the school cut several sports in the early 2000s, Schulman says the latest cuts are part of an effort to maintain the school’s 18 varsity program. The school announced this week that new athletics center will be named the Tarrant Events Center after they received a $15 million gift from Rich and Deb Tarrant – the largest capital gift in school history.
Vermont finished 3rd out of 6 teams at last season’s America East Conference Championship meet, behind New Hampshire and UMBC. Swimulator scores them as 3rd in the conference this year as well based on current season-best times.
The school does not sponsor football, and enrollment overall at the university has been falling for the last 20 years.
It’s worth noting that one of the NCAA’s top mid-major men’s & women’s swimming programs — William & Mary — has NO scholarships for swimming student-athletes. Nor do they have a diving program or a spectator-oriented aquatic center, just a small pool on par with a neighborhood Y. The Tribe men’s swimming program dominates the Colonial Athletic Association (CAA) and routinely beats better-funded D1 programs, and the women’s team competes at a high level as well. For years, W&M has been doing more with less for many years …
Cutting scholarships is a stupid way to lose money. It only happens that the good athletes are going to take money in another place, and bad athletes, that would have attended the same college anyway, will join the team. Result is that you lose the money that, in any case, the students with scholarships are bringing to the school with food plan, fees, partial scholarships. Genius
33,804$ 58,450$ 😯
Like for the cost of healthcare overall or childcare, costs of attendance for public colleges are really insane in USA. Every time I read that kind of numbers I feel bad for American students. It’s free in Germany, Sweden, Norway or Finland. Around 200/250$ in France on average. Unfortunately neolib Macron has recently decided to increase dramatically the cost for foreign students coming from outside of European Union. First step before the same increase for French students in the next years? If he wants another massive protestation in the streets, yes that would be a genius idea. I think he will not dare. Back to USA where making public college tuition free would cost only around… Read more »
But Bobo won’t you think of Raytheon shareholders
Bobo, Mon Cheri, you are a good man! To help you understand USA politics and public opinion, just consider propaganda and public brainwashing is at the same level as it used to be in ex-communist East European countries, except that is here done by smart conmen, not ex-workers as in old commie countries. Much more sophisticated here but the result is the same – dumb people blindly following “American Dream” mantra while being royally screwed and never being able to get close to “the American Dream”.
I count 3.9 scholarships changing?
I hate when schools say they “save” the exact cost of tuition by cutting scholarships. Tuition is not the exact amount it costs to put a single student through. What they’re actually getting is an increase in revenue, as 3 students will now instead be paying fu price. This is a revenue gain, not saving.
What a shame. The swimmers pay for poor management.