Earlham College suspends football program after 53 straight losses
RICHMOND, Ind. — Earlham College has suspended its football program after a fifth consecutive winless season and a Division III record 53 straight losses.
The Quakers finished the season with a 70-6 loss to Rose-Hulman last Saturday. On Tuesday, interim President Avis Stewart announced the college will suspend the program for the 2019 season. A committee of alumni, faculty, athletes and current and former Division III coaches and athletic directors will review the viability of the school having a football team.
The plan is for the program to return in 2020 under three conditions , including appropriate funding and recruitment of players as well as hiring a "highly qualified" coach.
https://www.southbendtribune.com/sports/college/earlham-college-suspends-football-program-after-straight-losses/article_a0180472-5b89-599e-b518-678bd26bc94b.html
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The "Undefeated Since 1950" T-shirts were also a big revenue producer between the time they announced the return to football and playing the first game.
The program at Southwestern was 0-10 in the first year, but by the fourth year they went 7-3 and won the SCAC championship. The last two seasons they have played in a larger conference and had 6-4 records which isn't bad considering that 3 of the 10 universities in the American Southwest conference appeared in the national rankings within the past two years.
One of the catalysts for adding the football program was because of gender imbalance. The student body shifted to 62% women so that created social issues as women had to leave the campus to meet men. For a university with about 80% of the students living on campus, that meant that the parents didn't feel that their daughters were as safe driving to Austin for their social life rather than staying on campus. As a private liberal arts university, having an environment where guns are prohibited and the student body is mostly female also makes the campus an easier target for violence.
The gender imbalance was also beginning to affect the school's ratings in national rankings because of the wage gap between men and women after graduation. As a result, the growth of the endowment fund stagnated.
The football program did help school spirit and stimulate philanthropy among the alumni so overall I believe that it had a positive effect. It also has provided additional publicity for the university which helps to recruit new students. There was some concern that the addition of the football program would have on its academic reputation, but it doesn't appear that concern materialized. The business community in Georgetown, Texas has also been very supportive of the football program--the first football game drew nearly 6,000 fans which is amazing for a university with only 1,500 students. The team also is playing in the largest stadium (seats 11,000) of any Division III program since they have an agreement with Georgetown ISD to use their facilities so the financial impact spreads throughout the community.
While I understand your point that looking at the financial information on the Website provides, there are other financial considerations that don't show in a departmental budget and non-tangible effects that Earlham will need to consider. Meanwhile, my alma mater is the only place where if someone yells, "Pillage Pirates, Pillage" it won't draw too many strange looks. 
