The University of Houston is not alone in funneling academic money and student fees to its athletics programs. Texas universities are relying heavily on student fees and other subsidies to help fund athletics programs.

At some Houston-area colleges -- including Lamar University in Beaumont, Sam Houston State University in Huntsville and Prairie View A&M -- more than 70 percent of athletics revenue comes from outside of the athletics programs, according to an investigation by the Chronicle of Higher Education and the Huffington Post that crunched the numbers at schools across the nation.

The investigation found that while some elite and well-established athletics programs, like the University of Texas at Austin, pay for themselves, many schools are relying on outside sources, including student fees.

"In the past five years, public universities pumped more than $10.3 billion in mandatory student fees and other subsidies into their sports programs," the report found. Student fees, accounting for nearly half of all subsidies, increased by 10 percent at those schools over the last five years.

At the University of Houston, where more than half of athletics revenue is subsidized, student fees increased at an even quicker pace -- in 2014, students paid UH $126 million in fees, 32 percent more than they paid in 2008, according to data provided to the Chronicle. Students there voted to pay $45 more per semester to help pay for a new football stadium under an agreement that was at the center of strife surrounding the stadium earlier this year.