Sports

ough

Wego Pratt =

An Uneven Plauing Field
: )

ts 2 f
Pie i

14

ter Uni

FAs in

Mes

Gabriel Cousineau

McMaster currently gives out the

Shelby Blackley
National Sports Editor | CUP

( onsistently, athletic programs

across Canada are searching
for means of making their respective
school competitive, but also trying to
maintain a common ground between
athletics, academics and financial
stability.

Enter athletic financial awards, or AFAs.
These awards are given out throughout
the Canadian Interuniversity Sport
(CAS) to student athletes at the 55
universities across Canada, and are
useful in the recruitment, retention and
financial aid of the student athletes.

“There are a lot of layers to the
scholarships,’ Peter Baxter, director of
athletics at Wilfrid Laurier University in
Waterloo, Ont., said. But where does
the money come from? What limitations
are there? There are certain rules and
components of the student-athlete’s
academic and athletic lives that help
determine which athlete will get funded
and what sport receives the most.

The CIS rules:

As per CIS regulations, there are a

few requirements that must be met in
order for a student athlete to receive
an AFA or athletic scholarship. Firstly,
the student has an “excellence in
performance” that the school wants
to bring in for the upcoming year,
according to Drew Love, director

of athletics at McGill University in
Montréal, OC. As well, student
athletes entering university from high
school must have at least an 80 per
cent average to receive an AFA in their
first year. If this is achieved, depending
on the budget of the particular
school and sport, then a nomination
process will be completed. In order
to be eligible to have the scholarship
continue, the student athlete must
maintain an average of 65 per cent
or higher in their university studies.
For everywhere in Canada except
Ontario, this AFA can dramatically
vary.

A student entering can receive no
financial aid in way of an AFA or
athletic scholarship, all the way up to
getting their full tuition and compulsory

fees paid for. “We follow the CIS

rules with respect to continuation of

a scholarship, which is a C+ average
and with the entering awards that's
80 percent,” said Love. “And then
there is a requirement to retain that
C+ average to have [the scholarship]
continue in the following year.”

For most schools, the athletics
department must also comply with
their respective awards office.
Depending on which requirements
are most restrictive, the AFA could be
altered. “We comply with [University of
Alberta's] award policy as well as CIS
award policy, so generally speaking,
whichever is more restrictive, which

is usually the CIS regulations,” said
Katie Spriggs, associate director of
athletics at the University of Alberta

in Edmonton, Alta. Every university in
Canada is encouraged to comply
with CIS rules and regulations when it
comes to athletic scholarships in order
for the student athlete to receive the
money. However, not every institution
follows the same rules, and not
everywhere in Canada has the same
tuition fees.

Odd one out
While the rest of Canada works on the

same general rules outlined by the CIS,
the province of Ontario works a bit
differently.

Between the Ontario university
presidents and the Ontario University
Athletics (QUA) conference, there
were revisions made to the scholarship
protocol. The two major differences
are that Ontario university student
athletes must keep an average of 70
per cent throughout their tenure at the
respective university, rather than 65
per cent like their country counterparts,
and also that they can only receive

up to $4,000 rather than the entire
tuition and fees. According to Statistics

Canada, for the 2012-13 academic
year, tuition in Ontario was $7,180.

The highest AFA in Ontario then would
leave over $3,000 up to the student to
cover on their own. The tuition average
of Canada as a whole is $5,581]. “Our
AFAs are so much different than the
rest of Canada,” Jeff Giles, director

of athletics at McMaster University

in Hamilton, Ont, explained. “We

are at a significant disadvantage in
Ontario. So, in many cases, we give