How scholarships and national recruiting have changed the CIS

One of the growing trends in CIS athletics in recent years has been a shift towards national recruiting. Local and regional recruits used to make up the majority of most university teams, and while they still have an important role to play, we're seeing more and more athletes head across the country for school. One such case is B.C. product Dylan Ainsworth, who I wrote about recently for the South Delta Leader.

Ainsworth and his teammate Sam Livingston led the South Delta Sun Devils to the 2008 AA high school championship, and both were sought-after recruits locally. They both elected to head to Ontario after receiving athletic scholarships, though, and will suit up for the Western Mustangs next fall. There have always been some prominent athletes who have gone out of province for school, but they used to be few and far between. These days, these stories are becoming more and more common.

There are probably a multitude of reasons behind this shift. We frequently talk about a shortage of CIS media coverage, and there are significant issues there, but at the same time, many schools are likely receiving more national coverage then they have before, thanks to national broadcasts of various CIS regular-season games and championships (both via conventional television and webcast initiatives like the Streaming Sports Network) and the increase in university sport-focused blogs and forums.

Additionally, many schools are looking to market themselves nationally to students, not just regionally, and they're doing more advertising, alumni events, career fairs and other forms of outreach across the country. It's easier to get information on different schools in other parts of Canada these days thanks to the Internet and the focus on websites, and that holds true for athletics as well; many CIS athletic departments have dramatically improved their websites in recent years, adding webcasts, blogs, video content and other information, so a prospective recruit from B.C. can probably get as much information about an Ontario school's athletics program as he or she could about a local university.

All of these factors have an effect on recruiting, but I think perhaps the most important ones are the increased athletic scholarships on offer. The improvements in facilities, and the rising number of full-time coaches have also played significant roles. These factors have created dramatic change in athletics across the country, but an interesting case in point is Ontario.

During my time at Queen's from 2005-2009, Ontario University Athletics underwent drastic change. After a divisive debate, Ontario schools voted 16-3 in 2006 to bring in athletic financial awards for first-year students. Previously, Ontario athletic scholarships could only be offered to upper-year students and were very minimal even then, limiting their effectiveness as a recruiting tool. That meant Ontario schools were at a disadvantage nationally, particularly against Canada West, which had offered athletic scholarships much earlier. The western edge showed up in many sports, particularly men's volleyball and women's basketball.

The new rules changed that to a degree (although Ontario schools still can't offer as much as western schools), but they also brought their own consequences.
Athletic scholarships are one of the largest costs for an athletic program, particularly if you're offering a substantial amount of them across a good number of sports. Moreover, there's extra impetus to offer them in large numbers; if other schools in your conference are providing lots of scholarships in a sport where you're only handing out a few, they'll grab the choice recruits and they'll probably wind up beating you on the field, making your recruiting task even tougher. Money is one factor in recruiting, but success is another, and if you don't put in money at the start, success can be very difficult to come by.

The problem this created is that many Ontario schools had teams spread hither and yon across a wide variety of sports. That worked just fine when each team only needed a little funding, but proved much more challenging with the introduction of scholarships. Furthermore, athletic scholarships present a particularly difficult task, as the funding is needed immediately, but the results (program success, increased paid attendance at games, increased national profile) take much longer to appear. This gives schools a difficult choice. If they bite the bullet and invest heavily, hoping to see returns down the road, they may reap substantial long-term benefits. However, if every other school invests heavily in scholarships as well, their competitive advantage is lost, and the dividends of a successful athletic program may not come in at all, leaving them deeply in the hole.

In a climate of university budget cuts and funding crunches, increased athletic funding was difficult to swallow for most schools, especially when the returns were anything but guaranteed. Most of their athletic departments realized that the status quo couldn't be maintained, though; without increased funding, their sports would fall behind and their revenues would diminish.

This led to difficult decisions on cutting and prioritizing sports, and created a climate of athletic reviews, many of which cited the introduction of athletic scholarships as the motivating factor behind the desire for change. In 2007, nine of the 17 OUA schools were undergoing some form of review. Not all of the reviews wound up in sports being completely axed, but most of them changed internal funding levels and funnelled more money towards the big programs; many, such as the one at Queen's, also asked for more funding from students.

There were still strict limits on the scholarships that could be offered, though, and recruiting has always been about more than just the money. New facilities were needed as well at many schools, and the reviews also turned up just how stretched the largely part-time coaching staffs were. In addition to scholarships, schools began to hire more full-time coaches and build new facilities, all of which carried their own costs.

These factors all help attract prospects nationally, and they also encourage coaches and programs to recruit on a nationwide basis. Full-time coaches who don't have to spend their time juggling with other jobs have more time to investigate recruits on a national basis, and often larger travel budgets as well. Extra recruiting staff also help, as does the ability that scholarships and advanced facilities confer to be more selective with your recruits.

Another key factor is the amount of information out there. In the 1990s, an Ontario coach might have heard of a B.C. prospect like Ainsworth, but probably wouldn't have had much information on him outside of a network of acquaintances. These days, you can watch Ainsworth's highlights on YouTube, read articles about him in local papers and see what others think of him on blogs and forums. There's a much larger conversation about recruits, and that promotes thinking nationally.

You can make an argument that national recruiting efforts aren't necessarily good for CIS as a whole. Certainly, all CIS schools aren't created equal, and they definitely can't all afford to run top-quality programs that attract the best athletes in every sport. There is a danger of a competitive imbalance arising between the poor and the rich; national recruiting isn't the only thing involved in that, but it is a large component. However, that isn't an inevitable outcome; it's very possible for smaller and less prosperous schools to focus on running less programs, but running them all very professionally (Langley's Trinity Western University is a great example of this). This seems to be the way many universities are going, and a large part of the reason for that is the availability of athletic scholarships and the need for national recruiting efforts.

Even that solution has its own downside, though; it diminishes opportunities for athletes to play CIS sports (less schools per sport = less athletes participating), and it could see the demise or severe attrition of some of the lesser-publicized sports, which is sad in its own way. However,its upside is in increasing the quality of athletes and programs, which could increase media attention, broadcast rights and sponsorship revenues. National recruiting also provides more opportunities for and benefits to the top athletes, and could also encourage more of them to stay in Canada instead of jumping to the NCAA; more competitive, professional, high-quality programs in each CIS sport would make CIS more comparable to NCAA competition.

You can decide for yourself if the national recruiting scene and the benefits that come with it are worth the significant tradeoffs; personally, I think they are. Regardless of which side of the aisle you fall on, though, CIS sports are changing, and scholarships and national recruitment efforts have played a significant role in that transformation.

[Cross-posted to The CIS Blog]

Campus Corner: A momentous day

One of the things we often forget about democracy, especially at the level of student politics, is the impact some decisions can have. That was evident at tonight's AMS Annual General Meeting, where around 800 students packed Ban Righ Cafeteria and almost unanimously approved the athletics department's request for a $120 fee increase [myself, Queen's Journal] over four years. It's easy to see why we often have voter apathy, though; much of the rest of the meeting was consumed with the petty squabbles and meaningless arguments more frequently found in politics, and it's a credit to those who managed to stick it out until the Athletics motion. Still, this one decision was incredibly important and will be remembered as such. Yes, there was a long process of research, polling and discussion leading up to today, but in the end, the future direction of the department all came down to this vote. Without the increase, Queen's sports would have been reduced to a shell of their former selves; with it, the stage is set for a further push towards excellence. That's why March 16, 2009 may be a day long remembered by those who follow Queen's sports.

Tonight's meeting was not an isolated event, though. I spoke with Director of Athletics and Recreation Leslie Dal Cin about the result shortly after the motion, and we talked about how this was part of the logical evolution of the department that started shortly after her appointment [Brennan Leong, Queen's Journal]. In fact, some of the issues even predate her involvement. The introduction of entrance athletic financial awards, for example, has led to massive shakeups [myself, Queen's Journal] in how Ontario universities approach their athletic programs and was one of the key factors in the long-running and long-delayed Athletics Review [myself, Queen's Journal]. One of the key recommendations in that review was raising the student athletics fee to a point where it was one of the top five in Ontario [myself, Queen's Journal].

Actually, this increase is more ambitious than that; with the $120 tacked on to the current fee of $131.75, Queen's becomes the OUA school with the highest athletic fee, narrowly edging out the University of Toronto (according to the comparative information provided by the athletics department). 11 of the 18 OUA schools have said they'll be looking for a fee increase in the next two years, though, so Queen's may not retain that distinction for long.

I was happy to see this fee pass with so much support; I figured it would be a much tougher challenge given students' natural opposition to parting with more money and the magnitude of the increase, plus the widespread apathy towards varsity athletics that seems to exist on campus. It was a tremendously smart decision on the part of Athletics to first find out how many people were generally in favour of a fee increase via referendum (72 per cent) and then use that and the information on the services students value to create a specific number for the increase that could be passed at Assembly and then the AGM. Referendums on campus are characterized by apathy; most people have one or two issues they care about, and fill out the rest of the ballots either at random or without a lot of thought. Some don't care about any issue, but vote to earn their free coffee. A $120 increase is much tougher to pass in that climate, especially as there's no opportunity to explain why it's needed or what it's for.

By contrast, the Annual General Meeting route is still quite democratic. Any student can attend and vote (although not all have the time), but the effort that's required to do so means that the people who turn out are those passionate about the issue (in this case, at least half the crowd appeared to be varsity athletes). There are several legitimate concerns about this increase, and many have been addressed during the various discussions to this point, but the key factor here is that this increase was hardly rammed down students' throats. It's up for debate if as many people would have supported it in a campus-wide referendum; what this did prove is that those who support the increase were much more organized, passionate and effective about it. The opportunity for dissent was there, but it was barely taken; most of the criticisms I've heard on the issue were only raised by one Tyler King on his radio show, and he didn't bother to speak about the motion at any of the meetings along the way. I'm sure there are others who share his concerns, but apart from one economics student who complained about the magnitude of the fee tonight (mostly because he wanted money for his own pet project, a climate-change audit of the university) and the 5-10 people who voted against the increase, there wasn't much dissent voiced. To me, that shows that Queen's students are at least as apathetic about long meetings and votes as they are about going to varsity games.

It's interesting to look back at how Athletics has evolved over my time at Queen's. There have been plenty of changes, some I have heartily supported and some I have disagreed with. The overarching narrative has been one of a department moving towards a professionally-run excellence-driven approach. Sure, there have been missteps along the way, but those happen in every organization. Overall, though, it looks to me like they're heading in the right direction with full-time coaches, athletics scholarships and some great new facilities that should open this fall. This new funding is an important step towards that kind of excellence-driven model. Moreover, undergraduate students have now shown that they're strongly behind athletics, which is something the department can hopefully leverage to get further support from the graduate students, the University and the alumni. This decision isn't the end of the road, as there are still many changes to come and the cuts to athletics from the University mean that the impact of this student support is lessened. However, it is an important milepost along the way.

Campus Corner: Update on Queen's proposed athletics fee increase

Next Monday's going to be a very significant moment in the future of Queen's athletics. That's the date of the AMS (Alma Mater Society, the undergraduate student government) general meeting, which takes place in Ban Righ Hall at 8 p.m. All current students have a vote at the meeting. The key motion to be addressed is a $120 increase to the current athletics fee of $131.75, spread out over several years (you can see the details on the Queen's site here, along with some very interesting budgeting data). Steep university budget cuts mean that the athletics department is facing some challenging times financially and may have to drastically alter their programs if they don't get this increase. Anyway, an interesting foreshadowing of what may go down at the AGM occured March 1 at a special AMS Assembly meeting to consider endorsing the fee increase and sending it to the general meeting for further ratification. I got the bare-bones details on the meeting in last week's Journal but figured I'd provide a little more information and context on it here thanks to the lesser space constraints. My article follows; I'll weigh in with my own thoughts on the matter as the AGM gets closer.


Athletics fee increase sent to AGM
By Andrew Bucholtz
Sports Editor
At a special meeting on March 1, AMS Assembly voted to put a motion to increase the annual Athletics and Recreation fee on the agenda for the AMS annual general meeting on March 16. The motion proposes an increase of $120 spread out over several years. The final schedule of proposed fee increases differs from the original plan put forward by Athletics at the February 11 AMS Assembly, which proposed a $50 increase in 2009-10, an additional $40 increase in 2011-12 and a further $30 in 2012-13 with the fee to be indexed to inflation thereafter. The new schedule proposes a $35 increase in 2009-10, with a $40 increase to follow in 2011-12, and a $45 increase in 2012-13 before indexing the fee to inflation in 2013-2014.
Director of Athletics and Recreation Leslie Dal Cin said the change was due to feedback from the department’s meetings with the PHESA and ComSoc assemblies, which proposed that shifting the larger increases to later years would be fairer to the students graduating next year who would only have one year of access to the Queen’s Centre facilities. Dal Cin said the revised schedule would force the department to run a deficit for one more year than the original plan would have, but the University has agreed to let the department run that deficit. Over 50 student-athletes and coaches attended the meeting to show their support for the fee.
Dal Cin said she was thankful for the support Assembly showed for Queen’s athletics and recreation programs.
“We’re grateful for both the support and the comments about the process,” she said. “The fact that so many people think supporting athletics and recreation is important is tremendous and is tremendous for our confidence.”
Dal Cin said the department plans further campaigns to increase awareness of the proposed increase and what the funds would be used for before the AGM.
“We still have more education to do,” she said. “We really felt people needed to be informed and engaged.”
Dal Cin said the change was due to feedback from student leaders.
“That was a suggestion that came out of both the ComSoc meeting and the meeting with PHESA,” she said. “It really spoke to an understanding of when the services would come on line and a certain degree of fairness that people who are graduating next year wouldn’t have had the benefit of what the Queen’s Centre can bring and all the programs and services for their previous three years.”
Dal Cin said the department made the change because they wanted to address student concerns about the fee increase.
“It was a great suggestion and we were happily able to accommodate it,” she said. “I think that helped in terms of shaping our process and people understanding that we were looking for input and prepared to accept it once we received it.”
CESA president Todd Ormiston said the increase is necessary thanks to the budget pressures faced by the athletics department.
“I think unfortunately this fee is needed,” he said. “This fee needs to happen for athletics to survive and I think we all recognize that.”
Ormiston said he doesn’t want the University to cut their funding to athletics further, though, as that would force students to bear even more of the load.
“It’s time for us to stop paying backdoor tuition fees,” he said.
Dal Cin said she’s hopeful the University will continue to support the department.
“We will do our best to make sure that the University does its part for Athletics and Recreation,” she said.
EngSoc president Jordan Black said the increase is needed to allow students to take full advantage of the new Queen’s Centre facilities for both athletics and recreation programs.
“It’s really important that we continue to provide the resources or improve the resources to both of these programs,” he said. “With all these new facilities coming in the form of the Queen’s Centre, it would be a shame to not operate them at their full capacity.”
Black said the strong student support shown for the fee increase in both the winter referendum and further polling conducted by Athletics and Recreation made it important for Assembly to send the motion to the AGM.
“Students are making a point of saying that they support this,” he said.
Medical students’ representative John Doan brought forward an amendment to approve only the first year’s fee increase and send the other increases to a referendum. Doan said his constituents don’t support a fee increase, as many of them don’t often use athletics facilities.
“In general, they are somewhat opposed to the motion, and as their representative, so am I,” he said.
Done said his constituents were also concerned that the fee was going to the AGM instead of a campus-wide referendum. He brought forward an amendment to send the first increase, of $35 for the 2009-2010 school year, to the AGM and bring the other proposed increases to referendum.
Dal Cin said the funding uncertainty that would arise from Done’s amendment would put the athletics department in a deficit position.
“If we were to adopt that motion, we would never be able to get out of that deficit,” she said.
Chair of the AMS Board of Directors Kaitlyn Young spoke against the amendment. She said she wasn’t concerned about sending the fee to the AGM instead of a referendum thanks to its support among students.
“We have student support for this and that’s what we’d be looking for in a referendum,” she said.
Young said the increase is essential to ensure stability in the athletics budget.
“Ever since I’ve been here at Queen’s, there’s been uncertainty around the athletics program,” she said. “I think the way the motion is worded without the amendment is perfect to give athletics some stability.”
Done’s amendment was voted down and the motion to send the fee to the AGM was passed with only one vote against.

Campus Corner: Review finally released

At long last, Principal Karen Hitchcock released her recommendations on the Queen's Review of Athletics and Recreation. The initial review was due March 30, 2007; however, it wasn't released until June 27 after Hitchcock spent several months looking over its content. Ultimately, she decided to take until Dec. 31 to accept further input from the Queen's community (many who had already made their views clear to the authors of the review before its release, Drs. Bob Crawford and Janice Deakin). That process wound up stretching out even longer, with Hitchcock stating shortly inside the New Year that it would be issued by the end of January, and then her office issuing a "no comment" after that deadline came and went.

It's nice to see at least one part of this review saga finally come to an end. However, it's a bit disappointing to see that this is essentially again putting off the key decision (whether to cut teams or not, and if so, which ones) for over another year (April 2009). Mike and I will have the complete story on this in tomorrow's Journal, and I'll probably have more about it here thereafter: struggling to get a hold of key people at the moment, though, and the tight deadline pressure means I can't write too much more about this at the moment.