Not offended by your determination to dismantle almost every opinion I have. I see your point on almost every point but I still would not change my mind. Of course I back the church's decision, I'm just saying I wish they would charge and extra couple hundred bucks and put it all in sports.

Not sure you are seeing my points even if I see yours. Everyone benefits from BYU having name recognition. Not sure how that is an arguable point, but it sounds like you think it doesn't matter. I have to disagree there. If you go around the country you will find that the reason 90% of knowledgeable America even knows BYU exists is because we have had successful sports teams. A tiny population will point out the great law, accounting, engineering, mba etc. If you go outside of the mountain west this has been my experience, maybe yours is different. Almost every job interview I have had outside of Utah has involved individuals commenting on BYU on my resume and often in connection to sports.

Lots of schools are great institutions but have little name recognition. Few people have heard of Wash U in St Louis but their are top 20 in almost every academic category. You think anyone would know who Gonzaga is if they didn't have a top basketball program? In the short term the condition of BYUs sports is not a big deal but in the cumulative it could certainly have an effect on the worth of your degree.

I paid for my own education, I lived very frugal and did not make big bucks. I even took a year off so that I could afford to pay for my education. I get almost no scholarship $ and never got a pell grant. An extra $500- 1000 total cost for my education would have been totally doable, reasonable and would not have been detrimental to my life. This suggestion seems very low stakes to me.

The university pays for all kinds of things I have no interest in but I was good with it because I knew it made it a better school. Example: my roommate was the student body pres. I only ever went to a student body activity once and maybe two or three times got some free pizza or cookies at one of the student body event tables. I could have cared less for that group because I was busy with my own education and activities and given the choice would probably choose to forgo those costs and discount my tuition. That said I have nothing against them including some cost for those things since I understand that the university is doing all kinds of things that don't matter to me personally but make the school better and my degree more valuable, which I believe this does.

Doubt I'm going to change your opinion on the highly improbable, completely hypothetical charge this post was discussing but I also don't think I'll change mine. In a nutshell my only real purpose here: I think the sports, mostly basketball and football, add value to my degree and thus it would be reasonable to charge students an additional fee to help keep them competitive.