85-1,132. Findings and declarations.

The Legislature further finds and declares that:

(1) The University of Nebraska-Lincoln participates in a national intercollegiate football program which produces millions of dollars through ticket sales, lucrative national television and other electronic broadcast contracts, and participation in postseason bowl games;

(2) The football program promotes the university and generates valuable intangible benefits such as enhancement of image;

(3) The exertion of players and the revenue they generate produce employment and salaries for many others, subsidize other sports programs at the university, and underwrite travel expenses of numerous university officials, staff, and others who attend postseason bowl games in which the team participates;

(4) The university employs a large athletic department to administer its intercollegiate athletic program and a sizable football coaching staff charged primarily with the responsibility of producing a team capable of competing successfully against the best teams in their conference and in the nation and of generating as much revenue as possible;

(5) Maintaining a winning football team has become an integral aspect of the overall business or occupation of the university as an institution;

(6) The football program of the university could not exist without the athletes who play that arduous and dangerous game;

(7) Such athletes do not appear at the university by accident or happenstance but are actively recruited by university personnel at considerable expense;

(8) Such athletes are not recruited nor are scholarships awarded on the basis of need or academic achievement but for athletic prowess, the recipients having been recruited to be football players and not scholars;

(9) Many players spend more time on football-related activities than academics; and

(10) Because a sound academic program for football players may be difficult to develop due to the demands of the sport, football players are entitled to some tangible return for the strenuous work they perform and the revenue they generate for the benefit of the university.

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