One of the most compelling arguments made in favor of retaining Division
I-A status is that football games serve as a mechanism for building a sense of
camaraderie and school pride. We do not dispute this argument.
Indeed, many members of the SJSU Academic Senate have been affiliated
with institutions with prominent football programs, and they have fond
memories of and strong bonds with their institutions that were partially
engendered by the football program.
Unfortunately, this argument falls flat at SJSU.
Football games only contribute to school spirit if students actually
attend the games. That does not happen at SJSU.
The attendance figures tell the story.
For decades now, students (and faculty and alumni) have avoided SJSU
football games in droves. For example, in 2001, attendance at San Jose State
football games ranked 112 out of 115 teams in Division I-A, with an average
attendance of 10,207 at each of its four football games (Hamm 2002b). A
massive effort to boost attendance in 2002 failed, and average attendance that
season was only 10,360, which ranked placed SJSU as 115th out of 117 teams in
Division I-A that year.
These figures are not aberrations. SJSU has ranked
near the very bottom in Division I-A attendance for more than a decade
now. For
official NCAA attendance figures and rankings, click here.
________________
Hamm, Andrew F. (2002b) �SJSU
Outlines Plans to Stay in Division 1-A.� Silicon Valley/San Jose Business Journal
September 20. http://sanjose.bizjournals.com/sanjose/stories/2002/09/23/story4.html