Cornhusker wrote: but also from research grants that will over shadow the athletic windfall by being a member of the best conference in the country.
speaking generally and not just to the NU case, i've taught at U of Colorado or the U of Denver (d-1 hockey powerhouse) for 10 years and i have not seen one example in my daily professional life in which sports conference affiliation had any impact whatsoever on the funding or direction of academic research or partnership. i think this is something people want to believe more than actually has much practical reality. there may be "partnerships" that get some public play but that's more on the PR lines of those commercials for every school at halftime....mostly fluff "our school is so great and unique". i've seen this all over the CU boards for the last month and i really don't think there's much to it in reality....that how CU profs will now "partner up" with researchers from Stanford or UCLA in new ways instead of the flunkees at K-State (I guess)....because the Pac is so flippin awesome. guess what, in the almighty US News, Iowa State is ranked higher than half of the Pac 10.
academics by and large, the godless commie islamofascist loving nanny-stater that we all are either 1. are utterly ambivalent about BTPCF (80%)* or 2. are actively against BTPCF (about 15%) and about 5% who are "into" it. when "academics" are talked about in the sphere of BTPCF about 99% of the time that means Uni admins and the PR arm of Unis and steady diet of "facemen" or creatures whose job is to supply the eternal wars of "college rankings"....and very little to do with actual classroom instruction or research.
*i'd guess at least 1 in 5 of the people i know personally as colleagues at CU couldn't even tell you what conference CU was in....in the first place.
now, "corporate partnerships" which are private funds to research...those people love the skyboxes....but, i still wouldn't say that has anything to do with conference affiliation.
