The Division I Board of Directors continued to work on academic reform during its October 30 meeting in Indianapolis, focusing specifically on rates that track academic progress and the incentives/disincentives structure that will be implemented based on how well institutions measure up to those rates.

The entire package remains on track for review and discussion from the Division I membership at the NCAA Convention and a final vote from the Management Council and Board in April.

During their October meeting, Board members were enthusiastic about two rates -- one that will provide a term-by-term snapshot of academic progress for individual sports teams and another that will measure institutions' graduation success more accurately than the current federally mandated methodology does. The first rate, the Academic Progress Rate (APR), will use data already being collected to develop a metric that will identify programs' short-term and long-term academic achievement. The second rate, the Graduation Success Rate (GSR), is a longitudinal metric that is a better measure of graduation than the federal rate because it gives schools credit for incoming transfers who graduate and for outgoing transfers who leave in good academic standing, neither of which the federal methodology takes into account.

Data collection for the APR began this year. Two years of data will be gathered before the Board decides points in the metric at which programs would be rewarded or penalized, and four years of data will be collected before any historically based incentives or disincentives are applied.

A primary challenge facing Board members as they discussed the APR concerned whether graduation should be factored into the metric. At its August meeting, the Board asked the working group developing the incentives/disincentives package to consider a metric that would award bonus points for graduation in addition to equal points for eligibility and retention. At that time, some Board members were concerned that since graduation was the ultimate goal, it should count significantly in the APR. The working group pointed out that student-athletes who graduate under the model based only on eligibility and retention earn more points than non-graduates, but the Board in August didn't believe that the distinction was strong enough. Some Board members in fact felt that the proposed model could be construed simply as an "eligibility rate" that did not hold institutions accountable for graduating student-athletes who had exhausted their athletics eligibility.

But the Board during its October meeting focused on the two rates -- the APR and the GSR -- as a package and became comfortable with the fact that graduation is adequately treated in the latter, in addition to it counting for more points in the former. Though some Board members still were concerned that schools wouldn't have adequate incentive to graduate student-athletes who had completed their eligibility, others argued that the incentives/disincentives package would be based on both rates and thus hold institutions accountable for ensuring that their student-athletes earn degrees.

Another challenge for the Board was how to manage the various filters within the APR in order to determine penalties for academic underachievement. Once the APR data are compiled, individual teams would be subject to three comparison stages, one against all teams in all sports, one against all teams in that sport only, and a third against the academic success of that institution's student body, before rewards or penalties would be applied.

Board members are comfortable with using data from the APR for the first two filters, but some believe there isn't an effective way to measure the third filter, especially since the only existing measure for the student body -- the federal graduation-rates methodology -- is flawed. That hurdle could be cleared if the GSR were to be applied to the student body, but Board members are concerned that asking institutions to compile that data would be too burdensome. Thus, the Board asked the working group to review the third filter further and determine other options.

Contemporaneous penalties

A third challenge for the Board was determining procedures for the so-called "contemporaneous penalties" that could be applied to programs that underachieve academically. The Board supported the working group's recommendation that teams should "qualify" for contemporaneous penalties based on their APR, and that based on the APR, teams would be subject to the penalty as determined after two years of data collection.

An example of a contemporaneous penalty that has been proposed is prohibiting institutions from re-awarding an athletics scholarship given to a student-athlete who then leaves the institution and would not have been academically eligible had he or she returned. The Board supported that penalty and also supported the working group's recommendation that the penalty be applied at the institution's next available opportunity. In other words, if an institution had committed all its scholarships and then discovers it is subject to a contemporaneous penalty, it could wait until the following year to apply the penalty in order not to disadvantage an already-signed scholarship student-athlete.

The working group also had recommended that contemporaneous penalties not be applied to student-athletes who had exhausted their eligibility, but the Board asked the working group to revisit that concept. Some Board members believe that many student-athletes fail to focus on academics once their eligibility is concluded and their attention turns to other pursuits. Thus, applying the contemporaneous penalty to those student-athletes should have the desired effect of changing the culture.

In a related matter, the Board also asked the working group to consider an additional benchmark, based on progress toward degree, that would exempt institutions with exemplary performance in the APR from being subject to the contemporaneous penalty applied to student-athletes who have exhausted their eligibility.

Finally, the Board supported the creation of a standing nine-member committee called the Committee on Academic Performance that would serve as the oversight body for the incentives/disincentives program. The group, which would include a CEO as chair, would address appeals from contemporaneous and historically based penalties.

The Board also supported establishment of a second appellate body that would be limited to hearing matters involving postseason penalties, membership restrictions and claims of abuse of discretion by the Committee on Academic Performance. Board members suggested that this group be a subcommittee of the Board in order to ensure presidential oversight and involvement.

Other highlights

Division I Board of Directors
October 30/Indianapolis

Adopted several legislative proposals that had been approved as noncontroversial legislation by the Division I Management Council, including Proposal Nos. 02-88, 03-53, 03-110, 03-116, 03-123, 03-124, 03-127 (as amended by 03-127-1), 03-128 (as amended by 03-128-1) and 03-129. (The proposals are summarized in the October 27 issue of The NCAA News.)

Reviewed other significant legislative proposals that will receive initial consideration in January, in accordance with the new Division I single annual legislative cycle. Among proposals of interest to the Board are No. 03-49, which would permit institutions to pay student-athletes' medical expenses, including those unrelated to athletics, provided the expenses are necessary for the student-athlete to return to competition; and No. 02-83-A, which would permit financial aid up to the actual cost of attendance.

Discussed the status of California Senate Bill 193 that proposes a student-athlete bill of rights. The Board noted that the Pacific-10 Conference hosted an October 28 meeting of NCAA institutional and conference representatives, along with California State Assembly Committee on Higher Education Chair Carol Liu and California State Sen. Kevin Murray, who introduced the bill.

Reviewed the Convention schedule and noted that a presidential session set for Sunday, January 11, would address the following topics: (1) the Association's strategic-planning process; (2) crisis management programs for individual campuses; and (3) the integration of intercollegiate athletics and academics.

Reviewed discussions between Bowl Championship Series (BCS) conferences and non-BCS leagues and noted that a second in-person meeting between the two groups had been scheduled for November 16.

Board Task Force completes work on reform agenda

The Board of Directors Task Force, a group appointed by the Board to steer academic reform proposals through the governance structure, completed its work and was dissolved by the Board at the group's October 30 meeting in Indianapolis.

The Task Force was established in 2001 and was charged with:

Reviewing broad Division I goals and developing a conceptual and visionary framework to guide the Board's strategic-planning efforts;

Overseeing the development of a baseline study of economics; and

Reviewing issues related to academic and fiscal integrity and prioritizing those requiring immediate attention.

With the academic reform package well into the governance structure, the preliminary baseline economic study completed and the strategic-planning process in an advanced stage, Board members felt that the task force had successfully executed its charge and could be dissolved.

The Board acknowledged Fran Lawrence of Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, New Brunswick, and University of Michigan President Mary Sue Coleman for their work in chairing the task force during its existence.

The Board also noted that procedurally, the task force served as an important tool in tackling broad-based issues and should be used again as similar situations warrant.