Rice U. Considers Major Changes in Athletics as Report Identifies Host of Problems

Rice University is losing $10-million a year on its sports teams, and athletes are segregated academically and socially from other students, according to an outside report submitted to the university's Board of Trustees this month. The report also says that any institution trying to mix big-time sports and elite academics faces the same problems, and that Rice athletes do much better in the classroom than those at most other Division I institutions.

The 121-page report, compiled by McKinsey & Company, a consulting firm, chronicles Rice's glory days in the 1930s, '40s, and '50s, before rich television contracts and conference membership dictated how well football and basketball teams could perform. The university has always struggled with the tensions between its academic and athletic goals, though, and has maintained a physical-education major predominantly for athletes since the 1920s.

"The bottom line is demographics," the report says. Precious few students can both play at the Division I level and score above 1250 on the SAT. A handful of universities -- Duke, Notre Dame, and Stanford -- "have a geographic or legacy advantage or possess powerful traditions ... [but] there are not many athletes left for the Vanderbilts, Baylors, Tulanes, and Rices."

Rice athletes admitted in 2003 had an average SAT score of 1130. The overall student average was 1426. Other "minority groups" were closer to the overall average, the report says. Students admitted to the architecture school averaged 1399, while those admitted as music majors averaged 1341.

Athletes, particularly football players, majored overwhelmingly in kinesiology or managerial studies, and in all areas of study, athletes' grade-point averages lagged behind those of other students.

The report also notes that a majority of athletes live off campus because of the difficulty of managing their practice and travel schedules. Many of them said in exit interviews that they regretted not having participated more in campus life, the report says.

The athletics department is in a particularly difficult fiscal situation now, making a transition within the National Collegiate Athletic Association from the Western Athletic Conference to Conference USA. Travel costs are expected to rise, and the new league cannot provide Rice with the wealthy subsidies that the Southeastern Conference gives Vanderbilt or the Big Ten Conference gives Northwestern University. Nor can Rice expect an invitation to join either league.

To deal with all of those problems, the report suggests that Rice has four options:

• Remain in Division I-A but aggressively work to improve top-tier sports locally and nationally.

• Move to Division I-AA, dropping scholarships for the football team and lowering costs somewhat.

• Drop football altogether.

• Move to Division III, dropping athletics scholarships and adopting a less-competitive model of athletics.

Each option has costs and benefits, the report says. Tulane University went through the same process last spring and chose the first (The Chronicle, June 13, 2003). That university is now raising funds aggressively, and its president, Scott S. Cowen, has become a leader of colleges seeking financial concessions from the conferences that control football revenue.

Rice's board is soliciting comments on the report and plans to make a decision on the future of Owl sports by the end of this month, university officials said. The board has a meeting scheduled for this weekend but is not scheduled to make any decisions by then.