We know a lot of schools have easy majors that athletes congregate in. But I hadn't heard of one being funded specifically by the athletic department and kept alive by the AD after faculty voted to eliminate it.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/at-auburn-at...1440635278

In 2013, Auburn University’s curriculum review committee took up the case of a small, unpopular undergraduate major called public administration. After concluding that the major added very little to the school’s academic mission, the committee voted to eliminate it.

But according to internal documents and emails reviewed by The Wall Street Journal, the committee’s decision was ultimately overruled by top administrators after it met significant opposition from another powerful force on campus: Auburn’s athletic department.

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In addition to meeting with the school’s provost to urge him to spare public administration, the documents show, top athletic officials also offered to use athletic department funds, if necessary, to help pay its professors and support staff. Gary Waters, Auburn’s senior associate athletic director for academic services, wrote in an email in January 2013 that athletics had made “similar investments in academic programs during the last few years,” although in those cases, he added, “it has not been publicized.”

In the fall semester of 2013, more than half of the roughly 100 students majoring in public administration were athletes, records show, including nearly all of the top stars on the Auburn football team, which would win the Southeastern Conference title and play in the national-championship game. “If the public administration program is eliminated, the [graduation success rate] numbers for our student-athletes will likely decline,” a December 2012 internal athletic department memo said.

An Auburn spokesman said that while various groups may provide input on curriculum decisions, the “athletic department has not improperly influenced academic decision-making.” The school said athletics has donated money and other resources to help several academic programs over the years, “but public administration is not one of them.”

For as long as universities have fielded big-time sports programs, many star athletes have gravitated to a handful of friendly majors that make it easier for them to meet the NCAA’s academic eligibility requirements. At some schools, these majors have come under intense scrutiny. An internal investigation at North Carolina last year found that many football and basketball players were enrolled in “no attendance” classes in the African and Afro-American Studies department, where the only requirement was the submission of a single research paper. The NCAA has told North Carolina it is investigating the matter.

Auburn faculty members, in interviews, said the athletic department’s interest in public administration represents a troubling new development. Michael Stern, the chairman of Auburn’s economics department and a former member of the faculty senate, said athletics is so powerful at Auburn that it operates like a “second university.” Whenever athletic interests intersect with an academic matter, he said, “it’s a different kind of process.”

According to the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges, the agency that accredits Auburn, universities must place “primary responsibility for the content, quality and effectiveness of the curriculum with its faculty” and that decisions about majors must be made by people who are qualified in the field. The commission hasn’t reviewed the Auburn situation. In general, a spokeswoman said, if the commission received evidence that a school’s athletic department had influenced a curriculum decision, “there would be cause for concern.”
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