This year's NCAA Convention will feature a session that seeks to provide the membership with a forum to discuss methods of maintaining Olympic sports on college and university campuses.

At its October 26-28 meeting in Colorado Springs, Colorado, the NCAA Olympic Sports Liaison Committee discussed the importance of the session as a way of engaging the membership in assisting endangered Olympic sports.

The session, called "Protecting Student-Athlete Opportunities: The Future of Olympic Sport Sponsorship at NCAA Institutions," will be held Saturday, January 10, at the NCAA Convention in Nashville.

"I think we really need to engage the membership in a discussion about the crisis many Olympic sports are facing with sponsorship at NCAA institutions," said committee Chair Kyle Kallander, commissioner of the Big South Conference. "Not only are we talking about the usual sports that come up in this conversation, like wrestling and gymnastics and others, but what we're seeing recently is the dropping of a lot of sports that are critical to the USOC and the national governing bodies' success, such as swimming, track, rifle and others."

Kallander said the elimination of those sports on college campuses means fewer opportunities for student-athletes, and the NCAA, along with the United States Olympic Committee and the sports' governing bodies, need to address that.

"With all the talk about athletics and academic reform -- about what's most important in college athletics, about our ideals -- I think this deserves a place in that discussion," Kallander said. "We're all about opportunities for student-athletes, and when we continue to see programs being cut, there are fewer and fewer of those opportunities."

An NCAA analysis of sports lost between 1988-89 and 2001-02 shows that in men's sports, across all three divisions, wrestling has lost 99 teams, tennis has lost 53 teams, rifle has lost 33 teams and gymnastics has lost 32 teams.

In women's sports during the same period, gymnastics is the only sport that has lost a noteworthy number of teams, with 34 teams dropped between 1988-89 and 2001-02.

Kallander said he hopes the panel discussion at the Convention will allow for some "out-of-the-box thinking" on how to solve the problem.

"I think we all want broad-based programs. I think that's the ultimate goal," he said. "Now, how much we can afford is the question. We can't all afford 30 sports, but are there ways that we can at least maintain what we're currently sponsoring or expand some of these sports on campus?"

The committee discourages the practice of dropping men's and women's Olympic sports and will continue to work with the USOC to develop strategies to assist NCAA institutions in seeking avenues to maintain and expand sponsorship of endangered Olympic sports. In that regard, the committee has formed division-specific subcommittees to discuss strategies and the committee supports the USOC's recom-
mendation to develop a joint NCAA/USOC task force to study the issue.

USOC board of directors

The committee also discussed the USOC's decision to reduce the number of members on its board of directors from 123 to 11. While the committee supports this change as a necessary step toward reform of the USOC, it is extremely discouraged that the NCAA does not have a permanent seat on the USOC board.

"We recognize the need for reform," Kallander said. "But the frustration was amplified when we met with these national governing bodies. Every single one came in and said the NCAA is critical to the future of our sport, yet the USOC decides we're not important enough to have a permanent seat. It's very frustrating."

Historically, the overwhelming majority of Olympic athletes have been enrolled at NCAA member institutions or have graduated from those institutions and trained under college coaches. Of the Olympic team members from 1980 to 2000, about 94 percent were attending or had attended an NCAA school.

Since 1991, the committee has proposed, and the NCAA membership has adopted, about 40 pieces of legislation to accommodate the needs of the U.S. Olympic movement. Two of the most prominent initiatives were legislation to allow enrolled and prospective student-athletes to accept Operation Gold money and legislation to exempt Olympic sports from the minimum-sponsorship requirements to maintain an NCAA championship in a sport.

The newly formed, 11-person USOC board will include four independent seats, two people selected by the national governing bodies, two people from the athletes advisory council and three current International Olympic Committee members.

Since the NCAA is the primary developer of Olympic athletes and coaches, the Olympic Sports Liaison Committee believes it is essential for one of the independent seats to be filled by an individual who can represent the NCAA.

Strategic plan

With the evolution of the Olympic Sports Liaison Committee, and in an effort to create a context through which the committee operates, the group developed a purpose statement and four specific goal areas. In addition, the committee developed a strategic plan to carry out the identified goals.

The purpose of the committee is to facilitate communication and understanding among the NCAA, the USOC and the national governing bodies (NGBs). Through this communication, the committee will assist the USOC and the NGBs in facilitating the best possible development of elite athletes within the context of the NCAA's commitment to education and a broad-based development of all student-athletes.

The committee will provide an avenue of communication and access for the USOC and NGBs into the NCAA process and, where appropriate, make recommendations to the NCAA membership. Finally, the committee will strive to provide education to the USOC, NGBs and student-athletes regarding NCAA rules and regulations as they apply to world-class athletes.

The goals of the committee involve education, communication, facilitation and representation.