Division I Intercollegiate Athletics Success and the Financial Impact on Universities

Abstract

Private monetary contributions and the role of athletics are topics of discussion at nearly all institutions, and thus any relationship between the two has become increasingly valuable to determine donor motivations. This quantitative research study analyzed universities’ overall private contributions to determine whether there was a significant difference in the percentage of overall financial support to the institutions following a year of athletics success. For this study, athletics success included participation in either the Division I (DI) men’s basketball National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Final Four or DI Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) Bowl Championship Series (BCS) Bowl Game. The study focused on a period of 10 years (2002-2011) using a sample of 129 observations (Council for Aid to Education’s [CAE] Voluntary Support of Education [VSE] Survey)—satisfying the criteria above, then comparing them with the baseline (all institutions) during the same period of time to determine whether the change in the percentage of overall contribution was statistically significant over a 2-year period. The results show a significant statistical difference of more than double in the percent increase of overall private contributions for institutions with athletics success compared with all higher education institutions. Furthermore, a small statistical difference was found for the athletics success in private institutions compared with public institutions that experienced similar athletics success. No difference was found by region, for history of athletics success, or between basketball or football athletics success for those institutions experiencing athletics success. The study concluded that there are significant implications for overall private financial support for institutions that experience athletics success, especially those with a private affiliation.