The UC Santa Cruz Academic Senate’s Special Committee on Athletics will be holding a town hall to gain feedback from students on the campus’s NCAA athletics program.
The town hall will be from 5:30–7 p.m. on Oct. 19 in the Cervantes and Velasquez Room (above the Bay Tree Bookstore). The committee will provide information to campus leadership about the athletics program, particularly options for future funding.
Most importantly, the committee aims to solicit feedback from the students on how the campus should move forward. The committee invites all students to attend the event. Drinks and food will be provided.
Last spring, 63 percent of UCSC undergraduates voted “yes” when asked whether they would be willing to pay $90 per quarter to support NCAA athletics on campus. Although the opinion poll was nonbinding, this demonstrated significant support for athletics in an campus election with a record 43 percent turnout.
The Special Committee on Athletics, formed in the spring of 2015 in response to the potential elimination of NCAA sports, made an initial report to the Academic Senate and administration just before the student elections and is currently at work on a plan for a sustainable budget for athletics at UCSC, which will likely include a vote this spring about funding.
