Myles Brand, president of Indiana University, Bloomington, has been selected as the NCAA's fourth chief executive officer.

Brand will replace Cedric W. Dempsey and will assume his new duties January 1, 2003. He was selected October 10 by the NCAA Executive Committee from among three finalists. His contract is through December 31, 2007.

Brand said his first duty will be to listen to the various constituencies that make up the NCAA.

"I will be a careful listener, and I will work to understand the constituencies and individuals (of the NCAA), especially the student-athletes," he said. "I will not act precipitously but will act firmly when necessary. I see intercollegiate athletics as integral and not ancillary to the overall mission of colleges and universities."

Bob Lawless, Executive Committee chair and president of the University of Tulsa, praised Brand's selection.

"President-Elect Brand in every way continues the high standards of leadership and integrity that have characterized the first three executive directors or presidents of the NCAA," Lawless said.

Lawless, who also chaired the presidential search committee, called Brand one of the nation's premier college presidents and "a leader both on his campus and nationally within higher education."

Brand has been president of Indiana since 1994. He previously served in a similar capacity at the University of Oregon, where he was president from 1989 to 1994. At Indiana, he served as CEO of a Big Ten Conference university with eight campuses, nearly 100,000 students, 17,000 employees and a budget of $3.4 billion.

Brand also has held academic positions at Ohio State University, the University of Arizona, the University of Illinois at Chicago and the University of Pittsburgh.

Born May 17, 1942, Brand earned a bachelor of science degree in philosophy from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in 1964 and a Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Rochester in 1967.

Lawless said that Brand was the unanimous choice of the Executive Committee from among the three finalists. The search committee did not make a recommendation to the Executive Committee among the finalists, Lawless said.

The finalists were selected from a group of 11 the search committee interviewed during September. That group had been narrowed by the search committee from a total of 118 candidates (103 males, 15 females) nominated for the position. Ten of the nominations came from intercollegiate athletics, 29 from higher education, 10 from government and 69 from the corporate world.

Lawless said a minority candidate was among the three finalists.

The challenges

Brand will lead an Association that is financially strong but challenged in other ways.

In December 1999, the NCAA and CBS negotiated an 11-year, $6 billion bundled-rights agreement that provides the Association with a high degree of fiscal security through 2013. In 2002-03, the first year of the contract, the NCAA will receive $370 million through the agreement. By the time the contract expires in 2012-13, the annual figure will rise to $783.1 million.

The guaranteed revenue is impressive and in many ways reassuring, but it does not guarantee serenity in an Association that includes 1,005 active member institutions that vary greatly in size and mission.

In 1997, the NCAA restructured itself in a way that provided each of the three membership divisions with more authority to self-govern and provided greater chief executive officer control for the Association in general.

Last year, the NCAA Executive Committee appointed the Ad Hoc Review Committee to assess the new governance structure and to identify membership and staff perceptions of the NCAA. That group, chaired by former University of Kentucky President Charles Wethington, identified a number of challenges that will face the new president:

Brand said that the Association spoke loudly with his selection.

"It's an important statement being made by the NCAA to choose a sitting university president for this role," he said. "The statement says that athletics is integral to higher education and that the success of intercollegiate athletics -- Division I certainly, but also Divisions II and III -- are integrally woven together."

Division strategic priorities

The following is a list of strategic priorities facing each of the three NCAA membership divisions as new NCAA President Myles Brand takes office:

Division I

Academic progress rate: The Division I Board of Directors is considering development of a new graduation-success rate that will track student-athletes who transfer or leave their current programs in good academic standing. Though the new report would not replace the federally mandated graduation-rate report, which does not track roster attrition, it would be regarded as a more accurate measure of a team's "real time" academic success. Once parameters for such an academic "snapshot" are determined, rewards and penalties may be established based on how well teams meet the criteria.

Football issues: The Football Study Oversight Committee, a group the Board appointed two years ago to conduct a comprehensive review of the health of college football, is recommending continued review of various issues, including financial concerns regarding postseason bowls. Also, college and university presidents have specified the lack of diversity in the football coaching ranks as a major concern.

Division I involvement at the NCAA Convention: The Division I Management Council is developing recommendations regarding the level of involvement for the Division I membership at the annual Convention. Division I attendance at the Convention has waned since restructuring because Division I members no longer vote on legislative matters at that time.

Division II

Student-athlete academic support and health and safety grants: In September 2003, Division II will implement new grant awards in the annual conference grant program that will distribute $750,000 to conferences to enhance academic support services for student-athletes and $250,000 to conferences to address student-athlete health and safety issues.

Student-Athlete Assistance Fund: As the division prepares to implement a $500,000 annual program (beginning September 2004) to assist Division II student-athletes with special financial needs, the Division II Management Council and Presidents Council must develop the guidelines and criteria for the use of these funds by Division II conferences.

Championships: In 2003, the Management Council and Presidents Council will consider a proposal to expand the Division II football bracket by eight teams. In addition, preparations will continue for the spring 2004 Division II Collegiate Championships Sports Festival.

Graduation-success report for Division II member institutions: Graduation rates for Division II student-athletes continues to be a concern since many student-athletes are not included in the calculation method used for the federal government's graduation-rates report. Division II has piloted a graduation-success report that tracks all student-athletes, including transfer student-athletes and student-athletes not receiving athletically related aid for purposes of calculating an institution's graduation rate.

Division III

The future of Division III: The Presidents Council/Management Council Joint Subcommittee on the Future of Division III, established in January, will continue to examine and articulate the academic and athletics values within Division III and explore options for the future that may be both legislative and organizational. The discussion, which will include considerable membership dialogue and feedback, likely will result in legislation for the 2004 Convention. The five areas under examination are: championships, playing and practice seasons, eligibility and recruiting, membership and financial aid.

Financial aid audit: A financial aid audit in Division III is likely to be a reality in the next few years. The focus now is on developing technology to enable such an audit to be both cost-effective and thorough. The Division III Financial Aid Audit Task Force is exploring the use of the NCAA Compliance Assistance software for this purpose.

Potential championships expansion: The Division III membership will consider two different proposals at the 2003 NCAA Convention, both of which address automatic-qualification principles for team sports and propose to expand the number of teams eligible for Division III championships.