At five years old, we all planned on becoming the next Michael Jordan or Mia Hamm.

As we aged, a majority of us realized that becoming a “superstar,” wasn't so easy as making the A-team.

So, some of us "settled" with the next best thing; competing at the professional level.

However, very few of us go straight from their high school athletic years and into the professional realm.

College becomes a pit stop.

College is where the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), comes into play. This organization mandates all collegiate athletic teams and their players, providing all the rules and regulations they must abide by. Yet it mostly sets restrictions, and not the good kind. The NCAA allows student-athletes to be used in advertisements and endorsements for brands and other products, however, they do not allow the athletes used in the advertisements to profit any of the earnings made off of the final product. Even when these students are provided with scholarship money, they still have barely any left to spend on feeding themselves at the end of the day.

This is quickly beginning to become a nationwide problem. Collegiate student-athletes nationwide are suffering from lack of proper nutrition due to not having the needed money to supply themselves with food.

Lawsuits are beginning to pop up at various universities and word is growing much stronger against the restrictions that the NCAA has placed on scholarship usage, and what is considered breaking the “no pay rule.” This rule restricts coaches, alumni, and universities, from paying and feeding players more than what their scholarship endows. To many this might not seem like a large dilemma, however, with the prices of tuition and books constantly rising, little is left over from their scholarship money to support affording a proper meal plan.

A report in 2011, entitled “The Price of Poverty in Big Time College Sport” confirmed that 85 percent of collegiate athletes that are on scholarship live below the poverty line.

Former UCLA basketball star, Ed O’Bannon, recently took part in a massive trial against the NCAA in the fight for the rights of student athletes everywhere; the right of publicity. One of many restrictions placed by the NCAA is the restriction that states how student-athletes are not allowed to profit any of the earnings from commercials, photo shoots, sportswear ads, advertisements, and video games that they are used in. O’Bannon had fought for five years and finally got his day in court on June 9, 2014. O’Bannon had found himself in a video game, one that put him in it without his permission. Despite this, he still was not allowed to receive any money from the organization who produced the video game due to the pay laws written by the NCAA.

On July 10, O’Bannon succeeded and the judge ruled against the NCAA, now enabling players that are used in endorsements to receive some extra pay. William Isaacson, the co-leading attorney for O’Bannon stated, “This is a big win for college athletes because now schools would be permitted to provide fair and reasonable sharing of revenues.”

Being a student athlete, ones metabolism is resting at a much higher rate than other non-highly active people. This means that their daily caloric intake needs to be significantly higher than the average in order to function at the needed level. The NCAA only allows universities to provide their student athletes with one scholarship-provided meal a day, and they are on their own with supplying themselves with the other two. Broken down, this leaves the majority with only three dollars a day to spend on meals. If a coach or a university official were to buy a hungry student athlete a meal, this would be considered fraud and the player would be sanctioned.

Recently, the NCAA passed a law that allows universities to feed athletes unlimited meals, however, most universities choose not to do so for financial reasons.

Take for instance this statement from Forbes Magazine, covering the NCAA regulations on meal coverage, “As it currently stands, NCAA Division I programs are allowed to provide scholarship athletes with one training table meal per day. A cost for the training table meal is deducted from the amount of money those athletes receive to purchase food plans or other food with. Walk-on and non-scholarship athletes may participate in training table meals, but must pay to eat them.”

Overall, student-athletes are expected to perform at peak levels, even when their bodies are not able to do so, and there is nothing that they legally can do about it.

Many people argue that being a collegiate athlete is a privilege, not a right.

They argue that some scholarships pay upwards to $125,000, which is more than enough to cover room/board, meals, and tuition over several years; but this is not the case when it comes to the majority.

Other arguments state that athletes are not worth very much, therefore the fact that some are living below the poverty line is somewhat acceptable.

In an article written by Rodney Fort and Jason Winfree titled "The Argument Against NCAA Pay-For-Play Sucks," they state, “The argument goes that college sports fans are very loyal and will spend money regardless of who is on the field—that is, they root for uniforms…”

Despite all the counterarguments against my claim, and many others, these student athletes worked for many years to be where they are.

Being a collegiate athlete it is a privilege.

Yet, it is a privilege that was worked incredibly hard for.

These athletes deserve to be rewarded for their efforts.

They deserve to be provided with basic living necessities.

They deserve to be able to live out their dreams, without the stress of not eating dinner for the second night in a row.

In this day and age, the cost of being a student athlete is no longer costing the university-- but it is costing the players themselves.