The number of football scholarships Penn State has to offer might be reduced again.

Iowa's Senate Faculty is voting tonight on the proposal that would call for the number of full scholarships offered to be reduced from 85 to 72. In addition, the number of on-campus visits to be decreased from 61 to 51.

Should this ruling pass in Iowa, it would then have to be approved by the NCAA for it to affect Penn State. If that were to happen, over a five-year span 13 scholarships would be phased out of all 117 Div. I football programs, including Penn State.

In the past three decades, the number of full scholarships offered has dropped from 105 to 85.

Two organizations at Iowa, the College of Liberal Arts and the Sciences Educational Policy Committee presented the proposal, saying the reduced number of scholarships would save the university $150,000.

Faculty Council Vice President Katherine Tachau said the money saved would be used for educational purposes and to fund "non-revenue" sports, as determined by the faculty and administration.

Football would still have enough scholarships to go three-deep at every position on the depth chart, including punter and place kicker, said Peverill Squire, an Iowa political science professor told The Daily Iowan.

If the vote passes, the Faculty Senate would recommend to its representative that this proposal be brought before the NCAA committee.

If rejected by the NCAA, Tachau doesn't know what steps Iowa will take and whether it would be brought before and proposed to the Big Ten Conference.

Even if the proposal passes, Iowa football will not be affected in 2004. There is no timetable set for the scholarship rollback and due to the competitive imbalance it would create, it's doubtful the Hawkeyes would act alone.

"No one can do this unilaterally," Tachau said.

She said that this proposal was partly brought up because state funding has been cut, causing tuition to rise 19 percent. This has forced Iowa to lose faculty and increase classes size.

"For the first day of classes in the fall, I had students sitting on the floor," Tachau said. "I teach medieval history, so it's not that popular of a class."

The majority of athletic programs around the country are losing money, which in the future could become an even larger problem. This raises the question, wouldn't the fewer number of scholarships help these schools that are losing money?

"Athletics are treading a line that is in pretty serious trouble," said John Nichols, associate dean of the College of Communications. "[Programs] are bleeding red ink, not Penn State, but even the typical powers are losing money. Also, a lot of schools find themselves in violation of NCAA regulations and have low graduation rates."

Nichols said many schools believe that winning teams receive a pot of gold at the end and this is an illusion, which causes teams to cut the corners.

"Penn State doesn't have this problem as they have good leadership," Nichols said. "Both the administration and faculty are very active. [Penn State President] Graham Spanier also plays a very active role."