When most people hear the word "reform," they think of tighter standards, but the latest reform the NCAA is taking on actually encourages the Association to loosen up.

During his State of the Association address at the 2003 NCAA Convention, NCAA President Myles Brand mapped out his vision for reform and advocacy in intercollegiate athletics. Part of that reform was a desire to create an NCAA that is more responsive to student-athlete needs. Since then there have been subtle but important distinctions that support Brand's vision. With legislative interpretations, waiver requests and reinstatement appeals, calls in the gray areas are going more to the "yes" side of the ledger when appropriate.

For example, in August, two soccer student-athletes who participated in two contests as members of an outside team had the traditional one-for-one withholding penalty cut in half because of mitigating circumstances. In another case, a swimmer who competed in a meet before the institution completed the one-time transfer exception paperwork was reinstated immediately because the student-athlete "had no culpability" for the violation, and the release could have been requested and received before the student-athlete competed.

Another decision exempted nine incoming men's and women's basketball student-athletes from repaying financial aid given to them despite their not having completed the mandatory six credit hours. The school had just changed its academic system from a credit calculation to an hour format and the aid was provided as a result of an administrative error in determining how the credits transferred to hours in the new system. Had the student-athletes been enrolled in the required number of hours, the aid would have been permissible.

And most recently, several basketball student-athletes from a school undergoing unusual circumstances were granted exceptions to transfer regulations that would have required them to sit out a year before playing at another institution.

Those examples, each in which the case precedent was strong enough to have warranted a more restrictive outcome, represent membership decisions that do not put student-athletes in harm's way when they are caught up in extenuating circumstances.

"In the past, the NCAA has applied precedent so strictly that if any case is remotely close it would generate a 'no' decision," said Kevin Lennon, NCAA vice-president for membership services. "The thinking now is that when staff and committees weigh competitive equity and student-athlete equity, they'll be giving more attention to the latter.

"We're responding to the majority for once. So many of our rules exist because a small minority has tried to gain an advantage. The more-responsive effort is for the 95 percent of the NCAA membership who are tired of clearing hurdles when all they're wanting is what's in the student-athletes' best interests."

What is more responsive?

As a large, national organization responsible for governing the complex intercollegiate athletics enterprise, the NCAA often is seen as overly bureaucratic and too rigid in applying blanket legislation to more than 1,000 unique institutions and 360,000 unique student-athletes.

"It's always a challenge when you have a national organization whose primary function is to make national rules," said Big Ten Conference Commissioner Jim Delany. "You inevitably have conflict between rules that are over-broad by necessity and the needs of individual student-athletes, coaches and administrators. In that sense, it's difficult to carve out situations in which the full impact of the rule shouldn't be felt."

But NCAA President Brand has appealed to all three divisions and the national office staff to do just that by examining areas in which student-athlete needs can be better addressed. In a recent memorandum to the three Management Councils and presidential bodies, Brand said, "Many NCAA bylaws, policies and procedures are designed to ensure competitive or recruiting equity. That is good. But for rules and regulations to be viewed as just and appropriate, they must also be fair and flexible enough to accommodate the unique relationship student-athletes have with higher education."

That has prompted a review of key regulatory functions within the Association, including interpretations, waiver policies and reinstatement guidelines, to see if there are ways to focus more on mitigating circumstances than case precedent for a student-athlete-friendly resolution. In some cases, that review continues an effort already under way.

Carolayne Henry, associate commissioner of the Mountain West Conference and chair of the Division I Student-Athlete Reinstatement Committee, said her group asked the NCAA reinstatement staff to begin looking at cases differently about a year ago.

"So this less bureaucratic/more responsive piece is in line with what we've been thinking all along," Henry said. "We're looking for ways to hold the responsible person accountable but not harm the student-athletes if they didn't have anything to do with the situation."

Rob Aronson, faculty athletics representative at the University of Washington, chairs the Division I Administrative Review Subcommittee (ARS), which handles legislative appeals. He said the new approach is a dramatic shift from a process that in the past was inclined to resist granting waivers because of a substantial line of precedent.

"The feeling was that it would be unfair to previous applicants to grant waivers under circumstances that didn't warrant a waiver in the past," he said. "That leads to a lack of change, you might say. Since the new initiative, however, there's a much greater receptivity to petitions for waivers where the precedent may not totally support it and where the legislation seems relatively clear."

Other examples of the more-responsive era are efforts to reduce the paperwork involved with waiver requests and eligibility appeals, and to increase the involvement of the NCAA staff by giving them greater discretion when legislation and interpretations are not "on point."

Staff also would have increased flexibility in deciding reinstatement cases. For example, under the old philosophy when case precedent was unclear, reinstatement committees typically had instructed the staff to rule conservatively; that is, withhold the student-athlete from competition and require repayment of the benefit. But now, if the staff is confident that the committee will grant relief, then it will go ahead and make the call.

That's not to say the committee function would be reduced. The staff keeps in touch with the committee in cases when it believes a more liberal application is appropriate, just to make sure it doesn't get too far out ahead of the committee. "We're not throwing away the rules," Lennon said of the staff role. "We're providing more guidance to committees."

Henry said her reinstatement group is "pretty comfortable" with staff having more leeway in some of the initial decisions and then using a collaborative approach with the membership committees in order to reach the right decision. "If case precedent is unclear," she said, "I'll usually get a call from the director of reinstatement and we'll go over it together and decide the best course of action. The entire committee also conducts frequent conference calls to go over those cases."

Tony Capon, the faculty athletics representative at the University of Pittsburgh, Johnstown, and chair of the Division II Management Council, said Division II committees also have the staff on their speed dials.

"Our student-athlete reinstatement committee probably isn't willing at this point to just hand over that authority to staff. Those committee members still want to maintain some control. On the other hand, the committee recognizes that there are those cases that are no-brainers even though precedent may not be on point, but the director of reinstatement still has to contact the chair."

Competitive-equity hurdle

As with other deregulation or bureaucracy-reduction efforts the NCAA has taken on in the past, the primary challenge in "loosening" restrictions is the impact on competitive equity. Aronson was on point when he said what concerns the membership most is hearing that different rules are being applied to different schools or groups.

The Big Ten's Delany couldn't agree more.

"Where the rubber hits the road is when, by exercising common sense, school A, player A or coach A may be dealt with differently than school B, player B or coach B," Delany said. "It's as much of a challenge to the NCAA membership as it is to the staff to understand that not all situations are identical. While the level playing field is important, so are rational differences."

Delany said determining what differences are rational will be the key. "Somebody, whether it's staff or an NCAA committee, has to draw those lines if we're going to be successful in making the NCAA a more rational, a more common-sense organization," he said.

If it were up to the Big Ten, Delany said, there would be a presumption of good faith when waiver requests or reinstatement appeals didn't have clear precedent.

"Where you have an opportunity either by applying a rule, interpreting a rule or reinstating an athlete, there ought to be a presumption that the rule would be applied or interpreted, or eligibility would be restored, in a way that favors the student-athlete unless it can be shown that the institution and/or the student-athlete acted in bad faith," Delany said. "There should not be a presumption that anyone acted in bad faith -- there ought to be a requirement of showing they acted in bad faith. Absent that showing, if all factors are balanced, there ought to be a presumption of eligibility, an openness toward playing versus not playing.

"The notion of a level playing field, which has tended to dominate these discussions, needs to be minimized."

Pacific-10 Conference Commissioner Tom Hansen agrees, but he acknowledges that it will be difficult to prod the Division I membership in particular to be trusting enough to accept a culture change.

"It's a great thing to try," he said, "but ours is a terribly complex business driven in many ways by an extraordinary competitiveness, so it's going to be difficult. There are those who would do too much for the student-athlete under the heading of student-athlete welfare and then we'd be off and running with another competition. As much as you'd like to back away from many of the restrictions, once you start backpedaling in too many areas you might just get run over."

Acceptance over time

The NCAA's Lennon said there will be other hurdles to clear before a "more responsive" NCAA is widely accepted. He said people who have a tendency to think very legally and narrowly will have a tough time wondering why precedent doesn't always apply. He said some people also may balk at the idea of greater staff discretion and authority, or worry that the committee role is being diminished.

"People also may not like the way the change in philosophy impacts them, either directly or through their rival," he said. "But over time, the membership will benefit from this. As decisions are made that always have the student-athlete's best interests in mind, more institutions will receive favorable judgments. Thus, over time, more and more institutions will benefit, which reduces the idea of a school's rival receiving a competitive advantage."

Washington's Aronson agreed that the long-term benefit should trump any short-term discomfort.

"The first time a hardship waiver or reinstatement appeal is granted that wouldn't have been in the past may upset people who perhaps had a similar case that recently was denied," Aronson said. "But once people see that's how the rule will apply to everybody, including their school the next time they have a situation like that, then over time people will realize this is isn't any more harmful or uneven, just more student-athlete oriented for everyone."

Delany said that will require an adjustment from those who might criticize the process early on. He said, "Often in bureaucracies, not just the NCAA, but others, there is a reluctance to drive decisions down because you get decisions from people who might be dominated by the letter of the rule rather than the spirit of the rule. The reason those people follow the letter of the rule often is because they know they're going to be pounded on by people who feel they've been competitively disadvantaged.

"Some of the same coaches, athletics directors and conference commissioners who rail against people who may not have complied completely with the rules have to be careful and support a system that is now more understanding."

"Everyone has supported a less bureaucratic NCAA and a more efficient way of resolving issues," Lennon said. "Who wouldn't? But it's the more-responsive NCAA where the membership worries about schools gaining a competitive advantage.

"Still, it's important to note that this culture shift is not directed at any particular committee or section of the membership. It is the regulatory system as a whole that will benefit from this change in philosophy."