Previous years will be remembered as the heyday of college sports, when, for instance, there was a month of football bowl games -- several of which required such headline sponsors (and eventual federal bailout recipients) as GMAC, Capital One (COF), and EagleBank. As is the case with professional sports now, it seems out of touch for executives to spend money on loan from taxpayers on sponsoring a bowl game. (See New York's ill-advised Citi (C) Field for a particularly egregious example.)

Now, colleges are increasingly turning to students for bailouts -- a rather ironic decision since athletes at many schools are funded more generously than regular students and receive a munificent academic double standard. More than half of Division I universities rely on student athletic fees, which can range from $30 a year to more than $1,000, according to the New York Times. Fee increases are often put to a vote.

At some colleges where athletics are less popular, those votes have recently gone against sports. Since March, students at 3 California universities -- Sacramento State, Long Beach State, and Cal State-Fullerton -- voted against fee increases. The same thing happened at the University of New Orleans, where fees would have doubled to a little less than $400 per student a year. The president of student government there said students were reluctant to give money to athletics when academic programs faced cuts.

College sports had been hallowed ground -- a sort of “front porch” for the university for a whole, and one that presidents were more than happy to spend lavishly on. Even the whole idea of the scholar-athlete elevated them above the larger student body.

But the front porch isn’t so inviting any more -- and it may ultimately only have room for a very lucky few.