The Division I structure also would include four committees that will report directly to the Division I Management Council -- the Committees on Athletics Certification and Infractions, the Infractions Appeals Committee, and a Division I Student-Athlete Advisory Committee. Division I members of the Honors, Postgraduate Scholarship and Walter Byers Scholarship Committees also would report to the Management Council.

Other proposals slated for consideration by Division I address details of the cabinet/committee structure. Those include two membership proposals that would prohibit a subdivision from holding more than 50 percent of a cabinet's or committee's available positions, as well as proposals seeking to guarantee minimum conference representation on those bodies.

Also on the Presidential Agenda Day schedule in Division I is a proposal addressing diversity of representation on the Division I Board of Directors and Division I Management Council and a variety of proposals addressing details of subdivision and conference representation in the governance structure.

The Council is sponsoring the diversity proposal, which establishes minimal goals for gender and ethnic-minority representation on the governing bodies. The proposal calls for the 15-member Board of Directors to include at least one ethnic-minority representative and at least one representative of each gender. The proposal specifies further that "a single member shall not be considered to meet both minimums."

It also calls for the 34-member Management Council to include representation comprising at least 20 percent ethnic minorities and at least 35 percent of each gender. The proposal would establish a process for attaining the diversity goals.

The Ivy Group and Southern Conference are sponsoring an amendment-to-amendment to the diversity proposal that would move language detailing that process from Bylaw 30 to the constitution, thus making future alteration of the process much more difficult.

A series of proposals cosponsored by the Council and member conferences would serve to establish conference responsibility for the selection, rotation and removal of Divisions I-AA and I-AAA representatives on the Board of Directors and Management Council.

The only apparent point of disagreement on those matters involves selection of chairs for the governing bodies and the cabinets. Division I members will consider competing proposals from the Council and from conferences that seek to establish a rotation of chairs involving all subdivisions.

Division II

Division II members will be asked to approve a proposed governance structure that features the creation of a Division II Administrative Committee and a Budget and Finance Committee, and also will vote on a section of Proposal No. 28 that would establish eight division-specific committees.

Division II also will consider proposals that would:

Division III

Division III members will consider proposals to establish an Administrative Committee similar to the one envisioned in Division II and revise the composition of the Division III Management Council, and also will vote on a section of Proposal No. 28 creating eight division-specific committees.

Also scheduled for consideration is a proposal to increase sports-sponsorship requirements for Division III membership.

Other restructuring issues

The Association's restructuring also prompted proposals addressing the Association's provisional-membership requirements and the conduct of championships.

The other proposal will be considered in Division I. It would formalize an agreement among constituencies in that division that no more than one Division I national championship may be conducted in each men's and women's sport. The proposal exempts football.

Presidential issues other than restructuring

Proposals resulting from the work of the NCAA Special Committee on Agents and Amateurism -- including proposed legislation to permit Division I student-athletes to work during the academic year -- are among 22 proposals in the Presidents Commission grouping that address topics other than restructuring.

At least three proposals resulting from the special committee's work will be considered by delegates, including the proposal to permit Division I student-athletes to earn up to the student's cost of attendance from on- or off-campus employment during the academic year.

The special committee believes adoption of Proposal No. 62 will provide student-athletes with an opportunity to improve their own financial situations -- in the process reducing the temptation to accept money and gifts from unethical sports agents or other sources -- and to enjoy the same benefits of undergraduate life as nonathletes.

Similar proposals have failed at past Conventions, in part because of institutions' concerns about ensuring that compensation is received only for work actually performed by student-athletes and at a rate commensurate with experience.

Two similar membership proposals addressing the issue also are on the agenda.

One of the proposals would permit work on or off campus during the academic year and exempt the student-athlete's earnings from counting against the athlete's or institution's grant-in-aid limits. The proposal would require approval of employment by the athletics director and compliance coordinator. Many of this proposal's sponsors also are sponsors of an amendment-to-amendment that would set additional requirements, including completion of the freshman year and compliance with applicable satisfactory-progress requirements.

Another membership proposal simply would exempt Division I student-athletes' earnings from off-campus employment from counting against the student's grant-in-aid limit.

The Special Committee on Agents and Amateurism also is the source of these Presidential Agenda Day proposals:

Other Division I topics

Division I members also will consider proposals addressing financial aid, initial and continuing eligibility, and athletics certification during Presidential Agenda Day.

Financial aid: The agenda includes membership proposals to permit schools to award athletics aid during the summer term prior to a student's initial, full-time collegiate enrollment and to increase the scholarship limit in Division I men's basketball from 13 to 14.

The summer school proposal is designed to provide institutions with the flexibility to help freshmen adapt to classroom demands before beginning competition. The sponsors say schools will not incur additional costs because the proposal will permit aid during no more than five summer terms.

The committee, however, also notes that a number of schools may be unable to offer the 14th scholarship even if permitted to do so, because the committee believes new eligibility standards will cut the number of eligible student-athletes.

Initial eligibility: Division I delegates will consider proposals to include prospects who post core-curriculum grade-point averages from 2.250 to 2.500 (and a corresponding minimum standardized-test score) as partial qualifiers and to award a fourth season of eligibility to partial qualifiers who receive a baccalaureate degree prior to the fifth academic year of enrollment.

Sponsors of the first proposal believe new initial-eligibility standards will prevent some prospects who reasonably can be expected to succeed academically in college from qualifying for eligibility. The NCAA Academic Requirements Committee, however, opposes the proposal on grounds that the time has come to leave initial-eligibility requirements alone for a while.

The proposal to grant a fourth season of eligibility offers what the sponsors call a compromise between achieving higher graduation rates and addressing concerns about the reliability of initial-eligibility criteria, and offers student-athletes the opportunity to overcome the "stigma" of being a partial qualifier. But the Academic Requirements Committee believes granting a fourth season could reduce the incentive to meet NCAA initial-eligibility standards.

Continuing eligibility: Several member institutions are proposing changing the "75/25" satisfactory-progress rule to permit a freshman to earn up to 37.5 percent of required credit hours during the summer (instead of the current maximum of 25 percent). The Academic Requirements Committee opposes the proposal.

Athletics certification: Division I members also will consider a proposal to change the frequency of certification and to incorporate sportsmanship and ethical conduct as specific components of the certification program.

The Council has agreed to cosponsor a membership proposal that would require Division I institutions to be certified once every 10 years, instead of once every five years as mandated by current legislation. Under the proposal, schools would be required to compile a five-year interim status report, and a proposed amendment-to-amendment would specify that the report must be acted upon by the NCAA Committee on Athletics Certification and that its content is not limited to discussion of how the institution is complying with "elements of its initial certification that required correction or modification."

The Council also is sponsoring the proposal requiring institutions seeking certification to demonstrate a commitment to sportsmanship and ethical conduct.

Division II

The Division II business session on Presidential Agenda Day will include consideration of a proposal dealing with student-athletes' eligibility for competition after the 21st birthday.

The NCAA Division II Steering Committee has recommended to the Council that it sponsor a resolution directing a study of the issue, and withdraw a proposal requiring that a Division II athlete who participates in organized competition after turning 21 but before enrolling in college for the first time be charged with a season of competition for any such competition during each 12-month period following that birthday. The Council will consider those recommendations at its pre-Convention meeting.

Division III

Delegates from Division III schools will consider proposals dealing with transfer rules and with preseason-practice and maximum-contest limitations in basketball and football.

The Council and Presidents Commission are sponsors of a proposal aimed at student-athletes who transfer to a Division III institution -- particularly Division I partial qualifiers or nonqualifiers seeking a fourth season of competition. The proposal would require that the student be academically and athletically eligible for competition at his or her previous institution at the time of transfer.

OTHER PROPOSALS

Amateurism/benefits/financial aid/eligibility

Two proposals for the 1997 Convention revisit the question of whether basketball student-athletes should be permitted to enter a professional draft and retain intercollegiate eligibility in the sport.

A group of Division I institutions are proposing that the Association abandon legislation adopted three years ago that permits a basketball student-athlete to enter a professional draft one time without jeopardizing intercollegiate eligibility, provided that the student-athlete declares his or her intention to resume intercollegiate competition within 30 days after the draft.

The sponsors maintain that the rule does not help student-athletes as intended, because a professional team retains rights even for draftees who opt to remain in school. They suggest that existing legislation permitting student-athletes to determine their market value provides sufficient assistance in making a decision to turn professional.

The NCAA Professional Sports Liaison Committee -- which originally recommended the professional draft rule -- is not opposing the institutions' proposal, but it has suggested an alternative.

The NCAA Council is sponsoring a committee proposal that would permit a basketball student-athlete who enters a draft but is not drafted to retain eligibility. The committee anticipates that the National Basketball Association will create an undergraduate advisory committee to provide information to student-athletes on their draft prospects -- and says it will withdraw the proposal if that happens before the 1997 Convention. But the committee is seeking in the meantime to protect athletes who enter a draft without reliable information about their prospects for selection.

Benefits

Division I members will consider a proposal to permit institutions to pay expenses for spouses and children of student-athletes to attend NCAA championship competition.

Because of concerns about providing the benefit equitably across sports, the Council proposes limiting the benefit to payment of expenses during one round of competition at one championship site. Permissible expenses would include transportation, lodging, meals and expenses associated with team entertainment functions.

Financial aid

Two Convention proposals address exemption of financial aid from grant-in-aid limits or cost-of-attendance calculations.

A group of schools proposes that an educational grant awarded from a source outside the institution and not based on the recipient's athletics ability be exempted from grant limitations. The sponsors say that the receipt of such awards is too difficult to monitor, because many are provided by check directly to a student-athlete.

However, the NCAA Committee on Financial Aid and Amateurism is concerned that adoption of the proposal could lead to abuses. It suggests that athletics boosters could establish such grants, then award them primarily to student-athletes.

Initial eligibility

The Council is sponsoring four proposals related to initial eligibility that were recommended by the NCAA Academic Requirements Committee. Two of the proposals address the application of initial-eligibility requirements to students with disabilities.

One of those proposals stems from recent meetings between representatives of the Association and the U.S. Department of Justice regarding the accommodation of students with learning disabilities. The proposal would permit a student diagnosed with a learning disability to use all core courses completed prior to initial full-time enrollment at a collegiate institution -- and confirmed as core courses on a high school's Form 48-H -- in meeting the Association's initial-eligibility requirements.

Another proposal is intended to clarify that the NCAA Academic Requirements Committee has the final authority to determine whether high-school courses for students with disabilities are core courses, rather than a high-school principal who confirms the comparability of such classes with other core courses at a school.

Olympic practice

The NCAA Olympic Sports Liaison Committee is the source of a Council-sponsored proposal designed to give potential Olympians additional opportunities to practice alongside student-athletes in organized practice sessions.

The proposal -- which resulted from an NCAA/U.S. Olympic Committee task force's recommendation for strengthening the relationship between the two organizations -- would permit a graduate student to practice with an institution's team under these conditions: The athlete's participation is recommended by the USOC or a national governing body; the practice takes place only at the institution the athlete currently attends or previously attended as a graduate student; the practice occurs only in an individual sport or the sports of rowing and synchronized swimming; and the athlete does not engage in coaching activities.

Recruiting

Divisions I and II members will continue to wrestle with new communication technology in two proposals at the 1997 Convention.

Last year, Division I members adopted an NCAA Council-sponsored proposal to define e-mail and faxes as general correspondence, rather than telephone contact. Supporters argued successfully that such communication is more cost-effective in providing information to recruits, but less intrusive than the telephone.

Big Ten schools note that the new legislation permits coaches to contact prospects during their junior year in high school -- contact that would be impermissible if e-mail and faxes are regarded as telephone calls.

The sponsors also are concerned about the difficulty of monitoring use of e-mail as it becomes more common in recruiting, and they question the assertion that such communication is not intrusive on prospects' time.

The Ivy Group -- which cosponsored last year's proposal -- is suggesting a compromise. It is sponsoring an amendment-to-amendment that would continue to classify e-mail and faxes as general correspondence, but would prohibit coaches from sending them before July 1 following the prospect's junior year in high school.

Meanwhile, Division II currently regards e-mail and faxes as telephone calls. Several schools, however, are asking the division to adopt the definition that was approved last year by Division I.

Telephone use is the focus of four other proposals in this year's recruiting grouping.

The Council is sponsoring a proposal that would permit Divisions I and II football coaches to call a prospect in May of the prospect's junior year in high school, while eliminating currently permissible calls during the August after the junior year.

The proposal was recommended by the NCAA Recruiting Committee, in response to a recommendation from football coaches. The proposal seeks to give coaches more time to evaluate prospects and to permit an earlier reading of a prospect's level of interest in an institution.

Official visits

Several proposals deal with aspects of legislation governing prospects' official visits to Division I institutions.

The Council is sponsoring a proposal to eliminate legislation that establishes specific academic criteria that must be met by prospects in sports with an early signing period, in order for that prospect to receive an official visit prior to the signing period.

The proposal acknowledges the roadblock that prospects who have not achieved "recruited" status currently face in requesting waivers of the criteria, and also would relieve the NCAA Initial-Eligibility Clearinghouse of the task of certifying the fulfillment of those criteria.

Playing/practice seasons

Proposals to exempt various types of competitions from playing-season limits continue to be a significant feature of the NCAA Convention agenda.

The 1997 Convention's playing-and-practice-seasons grouping includes four proposals seeking exemptions for a variety of competition in several sports.

A proposal sponsored primarily by the Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) seeks to give Division I institutions an exemption similar to one that was approved in Divisions II and III last year for a season-ending tournament in the team sports of baseball, field hockey, lacrosse, soccer and softball that does not require certification by the NCAA Special Events Committee.

A proposal seeking the exemption was withdrawn last year in Division I, which instead adopted 1996 Convention Proposal No. 69. Among other things, that wide-ranging proposal specified exemptions sport-by-sport in Division I.

Proposal No. 69 also made the NCAA Special Events Committee responsible for overseeing the exemption of events based on criteria specified in the legislation, and that committee opposes this year's ECAC proposal. The committee believes the proposal conflicts with the purpose of Proposal No. 69.

The ECAC, however, says the legislation merely makes the exception for a season-ending tournament consistent across divisions for NCAA team sports, thus simplifying the Association's rules.

The proposal also gives all three divisions an opportunity to include ice hockey in the exemption of season-ending tournaments. The proposal approved last year by Divisions II and III inadvertently omitted that sport, and the NCAA Council is joining in sponsorship of that section of this year's proposal for the purpose of correcting the error.

Spring football

On another topic, Division I institutions sponsoring football may -- or may not -- be asked to decide whether to reduce the number of contact sessions in spring football practice from 10 to five.

The Council initially agreed to sponsor a proposal developed by the NCAA Committee on Competitive Safeguards and Medical Aspects of Sports that is designed to reduce what that committee believes is an excessive injury rate in spring practice.

But football coaches objected to the scope of the proposal, and succeeded in convincing the Council that the issue should be studied further. The Council decided to withdraw the proposal in Divisions I-A and I-AA (it still is asking Division II to adopt the reduction).

Any Division I-A or I-AA member, however, can request that the proposal be brought forth for a vote, and the competitive-safeguards committee has indicated that it will seek consideration of the measure in Nashville.

The issue may be discussed further during the Council's Convention meetings. The NCAA Administrative Committee recently approved a request from the chair of the competitive-safeguards committee for an in-person meeting with the Council.

Resolution

Baseball coaches' desire to address what they believe is a competitive disadvantage for teams in the northern half of the United States is behind a proposed resolution that would direct the Association to create an ad hoc committee to study moving NCAA championships in baseball and softball to late June.

The Big Ten Conference is sponsoring the resolution that calls for the ad hoc committee to study and propose legislation that also would move the start of the Division I baseball and softball seasons to late- instead of mid-winter -- taking competitive, academic and financial concerns into consideration.

The American Baseball Coaches Association says that a March 1995 survey of its membership found that 65 percent of coaches favor moving the playing season to later in the year.

Personnel

Proposals in the personnel grouping include one dealing with an issue of considerable concern within the Association -- gambling.

The Council-sponsored proposal would prohibit athletics administrators -- including coaching staff members -- from gambling on professional sports. The NCAA Professional Sports Liaison Committee recommended the proposal, noting that student-athletes already are prohibited from gambling on professional sports and that administrators also should be subject to the rule.

General/deregulation

NCAA members again are seeking to prevent discontinuation of championships in Olympic sports due to insufficient institutional sponsorship.

The proposal is one of a handful of measures -- involving topics varying from championships to special events to drug testing -- that appear in this year's general grouping of legislation.

Many of the institutions sponsoring this year's proposal to exempt championships in Olympic sports from the minimum-sponsorship-percentage requirements of Bylaws 18.2.3 and 18.2.4 sponsored an identical proposal that was defeated at last year's Convention.

The sponsors argue that adoption of the proposal would aid the United States' Olympic effort while preserving championships opportunities for student-athletes.

The NCAA Executive Committee again opposes the measure, saying that it would weaken the criteria for maintenance and establishment of championships that were adopted by that group during the early 1990s.

Restructuring

The Association's continuing movement toward restructuring is behind two proposals in the general grouping -- one involving governance of championships and the other relating to certification of special events.

The NCAA Council and Executive Committee have joined three Division I conferences as sponsors of a proposal that would assign responsibility for establishing Division I championships' field sizes to the new Division I Management Council. The proposal also would put the Management Council in charge of reviewing sports committees' actions involving automatic qualification

Those duties are performed by the Executive Committee in the current governance structure.

The other restructuring-related proposal would establish a reporting line for the NCAA Special Events Committee as it conducts certification of special events in Division I.

Under the proposal, the committee would forward certification recommendations involving previously exempted events through the new Division I Championships/Competition Cabinet to the Division I Management Council and Division I Board of Directors.

Drug testing

The general grouping also includes two Council-sponsored proposals relating to the Association's drug-testing legislation, but one of those proposals is expected to be withdrawn.

The Council has indicated it will withdraw a measure that would authorize drug testing of student-athletes who have tested positive for use of banned substance in testing conducted by another athletics organization.

Each NCAA division, however, will be asked to consider a proposal designed to prevent student-athletes who have tested positive in NCAA testing from transferring to another institution to avoid a loss of eligibility.

Under the measure, the institution from which an ineligible student-athlete transfers would be required to notify the athlete's new institution of his or her ineligibility.

Deregulation

A package of eight proposals to deregulate or simplify legislation relating to playing and practice seasons also is on the Convention agenda.

As with similar deregulation packages recommended in recent years by the NCAA Legislative Review Committee, these proposals are listed in a separate grouping. The proposals, however, will be considered alongside other proposals in the playing-and-practice-seasons grouping.

Seven of the eight proposals address division-specific legislation and will be considered in the appropriate division business sessions. The other proposal -- a measure to delete legislation preventing schools from scheduling a contest in conjunction with a professional sports contest or exhibition -- will be considered by the entire membership in the general business session.

The package features an effort to simplify the definition of playing seasons in Divisions I and II.

That proposal would:

The proposal would continue to provide institutions with the option to divide a playing season into two district segments of competition -- one segment concluding with the NCAA championship in a sport and the other scheduled separately from that segment.