Rodney Fort, a University of Michigan professor professor of game management, is the guest columnist today.
I have some free reign to rant about access to the NCAA’s Membership Financial Reporting System ( MFRS )’s financial reporting system’s ( MFRS ) collection of data on college sports finances. In my opinion, the MFRS data provide the most comprehensive analysis of school sports finances, which could be applied to a number of crucial school sports issues.
However, the nearly unsurmountable obstacles to obtaining the information in the first place prevent those of us who are interested in studying these problems from doing so. It does n’t need to be this way, really.
The athletic directors submit the MFRS types each year. The NCAA uses the data to assess economic compliance, as well as to assess competition using” trade union” data. Lastly, the Office of Postsecondary Education uses the MFRS data to create Title IX compliance reports, which are reviewed annually.

The variety is created to be the same for all schools because it was collected under the “agreed-on techniques” of the NCAA. There are some inconsistencies in the interpretation of each reporting class due to the sport director’s discretion. However, in my opinion, these are quite simple to spot. Institutional data is included in the MFRS statement forms, including membership, budget, and debt, tuition, as well as team enrollment and gender data. Additionally, the varieties list the average salaries earned by men’s and women’s educators, broken out by men’s and women’s teams, and the number of instructors.
Sports, men’s basketball, women’s basketball, different sports, and non-sport specific headings are the revenue and expenditure groups. There are 126 costs items and 114 income items. Although space restrictions prevent a list, take my word for it because the categories are entirely exhaustive of all revenue and expenditures.
A information mine emerges as a result.
The main issue is, however, that few experts who are interested in studying university sports finance questions can access this information. Some sport agencies post MFRS types online to their credit. All the rest of the sport agencies may simply transfer the forms required by the Freedom of Information Act, or FOIA, to discredit them. Every school releases its annual budget, so it’s obvious that college administrators will stick these particular budget data behind the FOIA wall.
The human cost of FOIA software is expensive unless one has a team at their disposal or it is their part-time job. An illustration is provided below. An MS Excel document with the MFRS information from 2004 to 2017 is located at my online Sports Business Data Pages. Only under half of the MFRS types that are available for this time period for FBS athletic departments are covered by the information. The irony is that this inadequate report was produced by me and a brave band of five or so academic research students over the course of a year, using every MFRS report we could find.
On this front, I’ve made an effort to be more effective. It was discussed in a private conversation that USA Today uses its workers to FOIA a little larger set of MFRS types. The University of Indiana collaborates to create its Revenues and Expenses internet site. The MFRS types ‘ enormous amount of data is only a very minimal version, though. I looked into creating a searchable database with download, editable Excel data, but to no avail. The people at USA Today’s response had to do with custom value and marketing, which is likely to be a factor in why the USA Today screen abandoned its paywall soon after our interactions.

There is no denying that the MFRS data can be more helpful than its current” Gee guru, look at how much money is generated” status. The evaluation of spending on men’s and women’s hockey for Tigers in 2016 is shown in the Excel document at my website.
The board contains both interesting and compelling evidence of sex spending disparity for one of the Title IX compliance categories. Funding must be put toward ensuring that men’s and women’s athletes have a similar experience.
In front of athletic managers and other members of the college sports field, I have made my petition. I’ve made an effort to make those who have overcome the Epic hurdle more knowledgeable in a more diverse and valuable distribution of their hard-earned data. The outcomes can be as useful for those who are now using the data as they can get for those who put it to broader use with well-defined assistance. The improved understanding of the economic and business decisions school officials and their athletic managers make are waiting for someone to reach over and pick them up.
Rodney Fort is the University of Michigan’s emeritus professor of sports control. Professor Fort is an authority on both the economy and the sport’s industry. He frequently appears in sports cases to make comments and provide expert witness.