CSUN Football Is Mere Entertainment : Despite arguments to the contrary, the sport is not needed for financial reasons. It should be dumped to free up funds for education and women’s sports.

In early March, the mini-drama revolving around Cal State Northridge’s football programs will come to a close when students at the school vote on whether to accept a $27 increase in their activity fee.

If the increase is approved, football will be saved at CSUN and women’s soccer will be added. If students vote it down--and it’s likely they will--football will end.

In many quarters this is considered bad news. After all, colleges and football have a long and colorful affiliation. And all but the most cynical would probably agree that watching a college football game is not a bad way to pass an autumn afternoon.

However, that’s about the only function football performs at the college level. It’s entertainment at the expense of education. I’ve heard all the nonsense about football’s contribution to our nation’s division on schools and my response is this: It’s horse-hockey perpetuated by either chowder-headed sportswriters or deep-pocketed, loud-mouthed alumni. The truth is that CSUN would survive just fine without football and that purging itself of the sport, while certainly not popular, is probably the right thing to do for the financially strapped school anyway.

Let’s look at five oft-heard, commonly held beliefs about college football:

1. Football revenues help fund university projects, thus helping the ordinary student . Wrong. CSUN’s football team lost $200,000 last year. Even if the football team hadn’t been in the red, the money it made would have funded only other athletic department activities. As writer Rick Telander brilliantly illustrates in his critically acclaimed 1989 book, “The Hundred Yard Lie,” money made by college football teams rarely leaves the athletic department. In fact, the majority of even the big-time athletic departments in Division I of the NCAA are operating in the red anyway.

2. Because of football, more alumni and community members will donate money to the university . Douglas Lederman wrote in the Chronicle of Higher Education in 1988 that this argument “has been repeated with such frequency and certainty that it seems to be accepted as fact by many.” The truth is it’s a myth, and no one at CSUN can offer any evidence otherwise, although some officials worry that the loss of football may cost the athletic department corporate sponsorships that also fund other sports. Then again, running a stripped-down football program at a $200,000 deficit seems like an expensive way to bid for a few extra volleyballs. The team would have to win consistently, and the only way to do that is by spending more money on more scholarships, facilities and coaches. That’s a Catch-22.

3. Football will attract more students to a school. Anyone dumb enough to choose a college based on the merits of its football team probably doesn’t belong in college in the first place. Even before CSUN’s enrollment plummeted to its current level of 22,000, there hadn’t been more than 8,000 people at a game in years.

4. Without football, many students from low-income families wouldn’t get to attend college . Perhaps the worst thing big-time college coaches have done is help foster the belief that playing sports, particularly football and basketball, is the only way low-income students can attend college. It’s not true. CSUN offers only 14 to 20 football scholarships, but that’s beside the point. The best way to get a free ride in college has always been, and will always be, to study.

5. Football is intrinsic to the college experience. Really? I’m a sports fan, but in my last two years of college at Division I Ohio University, I attended one football game and zero basketball games. Do I feel short-changed? No. There was always something better to do, none of which involved studying.

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A university’s mission is to try its best to educate the masses, not to entertain them. If the resources aren’t there for the high cost of having a football program, and CSUN students don’t feel like shelling out more money for something of no real benefit to themselves or to the school, who can blame them? Common sense dictates that any funding available is better used to support a variety of less expensive athletic programs, especially for women, who until recently have been slighted in athletics.

As for the loss of football, maybe an all-encompassing intramural program for men and women will blossom, giving everyone at the school a chance to really participate in the great game football is. And CSUN will be relieved of the burden of trying to field a winning and profitable team, which is no easy task.

Just ask the Rams and Raiders.