By Matthew Schofield, a member of The Star's editorial board

This is how the deal is supposed to work:

Talented young athletes agree to attend our colleges and universities and play sports. By playing their sports, they elevate the university.

Universities find prestige in athletic success. Graduates (and beyond) donate money. Potential students see the school on television, and at least get their interest piqued.

And, in exchange for elevating the stature of this school, the exceptional athletes receive a college/university education.

A higher level education is a wonderful thing. It's the foundation of our future as a nation. We all know that even exceptional athletes often fail to make it in professional sports, so it's a useful thing to have, to fall back on.

This deal sounds like a win-win, doesn't it?

But, as we all know, it's not working. Perhaps, in a time of billion dollar television deals, it's intensely naive to think it ever could work.

Instead, we have a system in which school athletic departments really represent only themselves. The benefit to our schools, and we're all touched by this, is at best minimal, the damage more than we should stand for.

It doesn't get any more obvious than the case of the Henry brothers, who everyone now says are headed toward the University of Kansas.

Full disclosure, I'm a KU grad. I root for the school to be successful. But, by that, these days, I mean the university. I've come to believe that the above implied deal is no longer working, on any level.

In fact, in a case such as this, I'm not sure the Henrys, KU, or the college system as a whole benefit, at all. And I'm not at all convinced the Henry case is unusual.

Jason Whitlock today in The Star had a wonderful column on the topic. In it, he lays responsibility at the feet of the NCAA and NBA for creating a system that encourages this.

And he's right. The problem isn't that the Henrys are spoiled or flighty. Heck, they're teenagers: they're supposed to be flighty and spoiled.

And there's no real problem with the fact that their parents _ including father and old KU fav Carl Henry _ pushed them to become elite athletes. That makes them no different than any other stage parents through the years (well, a little different, as they, apparently, were successful at it).

But I will take issue with one point he made. As a KU grad, I can't help wondering if this debate doesn't diminish, instead of elevate, my school. True, the brothers are supposed to be quite good at basketball, especially the younger one, Xavier. And my old school prides itself on playing basketball well.

But they don't really want to be in college. They'd be happier heading straight to professional sports. And while, yes, that's the system, "one and done" is reality, basketball players who show up for a year in school to build reputations before heading to the pros, should we really take part in what is, in the end, a farce?

The fact is, it's not a farce in a vacuum. The farce is becoming quite common. Universities more and more often, are diminishing themselves for hopes of sporting glory.

Consider K-State's secret contracts, or the University of Missouri's recruiting violations. There are many, many problems surrounding college sports.

The result is that our universities are known more for their sporting problems than for what they do educationally (the sole point of their existence).

So, in the end, the athletes don't really get what they want. The universities aren't really elevated. The NCAA and television networks do make a lot of money, and the schools get a bunch of that. Does it go toward better medical schools, though, or simply better sports programs?

As for the rest of us? Aren't we all a little diminished when our schools seem so willing to trade honor for a couple minutes on Sports Center?

Maybe it's time we, taxpayers, tuition payers, donors, stopped subsidizing professional sports by serving as a developmental league.

We might have to find something else to occupy our days in March. But in the end sports, the schools, and all of us, would be better off.