There has been a lot of talk lately about skyrocketing expenditures in big-time college athletics. The "arms race" has become an agenda item for almost any athletics oversight group. It also became an agenda item this year for faculties in the Pacific-10 Conference, and they took steps toward doing something about it.

Faculty concern at the University of Oregon about out-of-control spending in intercollegiate athletics picked up when the university announced an $80 million expansion project for the football stadium last year.

But, you're thinking, the $80 million is donated -- it doesn't come from academic budgets or the general fund -- so what's the problem?

Consider it from the faculty's point of view. An athletics program that prospers while academic programs starve is a warning sign: a red flag, a flashing light, a clanging gong. We're an institution of higher learning, after all, not an arm of the entertainment industry. Our mission statement makes no mention of sports or entertaining the community.

Besides, read the fine print: The university has to borrow nearly $20 million to start construction. That's a mighty big mortgage to put your name on. Not to mention that the athletics department, for all its robust growth, still needs $2 million annually from the general fund. To the faculty, that looks like a big red flag.

Ah, but you ask, doesn't athletics bring the university lots of money? And doesn't it make sense to court donors with skyboxes? The debate on those questions is complicated, but by and large the faculty are skeptical of both claims. First, all the money athletics makes goes to athletics. Second, nearly all athletics departments, for all their amazing power to draw donors and fans, run in the red. Third, no one has shown that donations to academic programs rise with the football budget.

Until recently, universities didn't worry about such things, but a decade of declining state allocations sent us seeking money elsewhere -- from private donors, corporate tie-ins and big-time sports. It's a dangerous new game, and the nature of the university is at stake. Just look what ceaseless fund-raising has done to politics. It's hard to hold on to your ideals when you've got both your hands out.

College sports is now big business, a growth industry. It feeds on ever-greater sums of money. Everyone involved, including the athletics department, admits that spending is out of control. Competition for players and coaches is so fierce and the stakes are so high that our athletics budget almost tripled in the last 10 years, from $12 million to $32 million.

From the fan's point of view, of course, bigger is better. There's no such thing as too much. But the owner has to ask, "Where will it end?" How big is too big? And what happens when the winning streak ends, attendance drops off and donors fade? Who pays the mortgage then?

Did you know that here and across the country, student attendance at the games has been dropping steadily? That's good for business, actually, because we can charge the public a lot more for the same seats -- and money's the name of the game now. So much for school spirit.

From the faculty's point of view, it's beginning to look like our ever-deepening investment in sports may be sapping our ideals, our energy and our money, and encroaching on the educational mission.

Faculty feeling was already high when the athletics department announced it had rescheduled next year's "Civil War" football game between Oregon and Oregon State University to the Saturday before final exams -- for television purposes. Normally the "dead week" before exams is sacrosanct, set aside for study. The provost has elaborate rules protecting it. The Civil War game is, of course, the biggest party weekend of the year. The faculty saw that as a flashing light.

"The growth of intercollegiate athletics has made the scheduling of athletics events more complex, and conflicts with the academic calendar are almost inevitable. Such conflicts may be unavoidable, but we should not lose sight of the principle that the academic needs of our athletes and other students are always our top priority. We urge a heightened sensitivity to the academic calendar by the athletics departments of our two universities."

This modest experiment in faculty solidarity prompted us to wonder if faculties around the Pac-10 share our larger concern about spending in athletics. A quick check revealed that all the faculties are of one mind. So, the 10 senate presidents agreed on a joint resolution, an unmistakable message of concern to the 10 university presidents, urging them to confront the problem. It's been brought before seven faculty senates so far and has passed unanimously in every case.

In summary, the resolution says the following:

* We urge Pac-10 presidents and chancellors to begin serious discussions aimed at moderating the exponential growth of athletics programs and budgets. We urge them to put this topic on their agenda and to set as a first priority for the Pac-10 the development of an appropriate strategy and its implementation.

* We endorse the recommendations made in Indiana University, Bloomington, President Myles Brand's guest editorial, "Presidents have cause, means to reduce arms" (February 12, 2001, NCAA News), and urge the Pac-10 presidents to address them as the basis for their discussions.

In his editorial, Brand recommends that presidents:

1. Make certain that academic support systems for athletes are totally integrated into university-wide efforts. That would lessen the chance for the high-profile academic scandals we have seen at some Division I institutions, and it would reduce the isolation of student-athletes from the rest of the student body.

2. Resist over-commercialization. Working together, especially through conferences, presidents can limit the times and days when basketball games are played, the number of breaks in games for commercials, the type and prevalence of advertising in the stadiums and arenas and the logos worn by players and coaches. Limiting the revenue flow to athletics programs leads to the next step.

3. Stop, or at least slow, athletics expenditures. Resist subsidizing athletics programs from the academic side of the institution. Demand the same cost accountability from athletics programs that is expected from other university programs.

Embracing Brand's thoughts in recommendation No. 3, our senate ended its year by striking an agreement with the administration and the athletics department to reduce and finally eliminate our $2 million subsidy. We reached a compromise that gives the athletics department four years to attain financial self-sufficiency and that redirects $1.3 million to faculty salaries. Soon, Oregon will join that small handful of schools that do not subsidize athletics from their general funds. That should be a source of great pride for our athletics department and a tremendous relief to the faculty. So much for that particular clanging gong.

I hear from lots of alumni who feel that the senate is negative on athletics; but I also hear from many who agree that athletics is good but that growth is a mixed blessing. Just recently, I received a letter from a donor who wrote, "No Oregon graduate likes to howl and quack for Duck athletics teams more than I do. But I agree completely with the contention that intercollegiate athletics costs need to be brought under control. Entertaining though they may be, intercollegiate athletics must never be allowed to interfere with the university's main mission of teaching, research and providing intellectual leadership to the community at large."

That's just what the faculty's been trying to say.

James Earl is a professor of English and president of the University Senate at the University of Oregon.