[NU Sports] Ryan Field fans ... (fwd)

[Mike Nolan]

> I agree that OSU clearly has many more alumni than we do, but I think 
> you've got your numbers a little out of whack here.
> 
> We have fewer than 2000 students per class.  So over 20 years, we would 
> graduate a little over 35,000, not 200,000.  And OSU does have 50,000 
> students, but that's undergrad and grad school.  They only have about 
> 35,000 undergrads, and a six-year graduation rate around 65%.  So that 
> yields 35000(.65)/6=3800 graduates per year or about 75,000 over 20 
> years, not a million.

I think your numbers are on the low side.  NU admits about 1800 freshmen
a year, 90% of whom graduate.  That means about 1600 new alumni per year.

Let's assume they average living 50 years from when they graduate,
that would mean there are around 80,000 living alumni, just counting
those who only did their undergraduate work at Northwestern.  I think
the number I've seen published for living alumni including graduate and 
professional schools is in the 120,000 range.  

By comparison, Ohio State graduates around 9600 students a year (bachelors,
masters and PhD), so using the same 50 year period as for NU there are 
probably around 480,000 living OSU alums.  

However, I would guess that more than half of the OSU alums continue to 
live within 6-8 hours of Columbus while Northwestern alums, since they
have a wider geographic diversity in the first place, are much more 
dispersed.

As I live in a college football town myself, I am very familiar with 
the extent to which the football team can dominate the local social scene,
even among non-alums.  (In Nebraska's case, it dominates the whole state 
since UNL is the only 1-A team in the state.)

Most of the major football schools are not located in major metropolitian
areas (ie 2 million or more).  The biggest exceptions are probably USC 
and UCLA, and neither school is exactly a big draw in the LA area.  
The Coliseum has an official capacity of 92,000 but they averaged 85,229 
last year.  Yes, USC drew a school and conference record 511,000 fans 
last year, but only 345,000 in 1999.  The Rose Bowl also seats over 90,000 
but UCLA's average season attendance is usually around 55,000-60,000 and 
they have had only only season where their average attendance has been 
above 70,00 once, in 1998.
--
Mike Nolan