It may not be the first problem that comes to mind as institutions decide to move from one Association division to another, but the question of how to tally football yardage, basketball scoring and other individual and team performances at reclassifying institutions recently has weighed on the minds of the NCAA statistics staff.

Because of changes in reclassification requirements, that staff recently revisited and revised long-standing policies for reporting game statistics.

Basically, once an institution completes both an "exploratory" year and year one, then commits to reclassification, its teams' statistics will be included with the weekly statistical reports of its new division. However, rather than ranking those teams along with current active division members, those schools' statistics will be listed separately.

"Our long-standing rule was, statistically speaking, whatever division a reclassifying school is in is where we put their stats until they're a full-fledged member of the next division," said Jim Wright, NCAA director of statistics.

But divisional changes in the length of transitional-membership periods for reclassifying members -- to five years for institutions moving to Division I and three years for institutions moving to Divisions II and III -- prompted a change.

"We started talking, as a staff, early this summer about how to do this, because in a five-year transition, you could have a student-athlete who plays his or her entire career in this kind of netherworld," Wright said. "We weren't really sure what direction we wanted to go."

Because that decision significantly would affect Division II, where five institutions have begun the five-year process to join Division I, the staff asked attendees at a meeting of Division II conference sports information directors for recommendations.

"The answer was unanimous; they strongly believed that a school moving from Division II to, in this case, Division I-AA should not be included in Division II statistics," Wright said.

The staff then asked the institutions for input, and those institutions agreed they should not be included in Division II rankings.

"So next we thought about, in this case, how would we affect the Division I-AA schools," Wright said. "Is it fair to go completely the other way and put these schools immediately into the Division I-AA stats?

"We can't really, we don't think, rank them in Division I-AA yet, but we don't want those stats to be lost. So we decided the best policy is to list the reclassifying teams (separately) in the national rankings of the division they are moving to."

Therefore, with a quick assist from the NCAA information technology staff, the Association's statistics Web site now displays reclassifying institutions' statistics in the division they are joining -- but they appear at the bottom of the rankings.

"There's no perfect resolution to this," Wright admitted. "But we believe that it answers most of the concerns that most people have."

The handling of reclassifying members is distinctive from the handling of provisional members that are joining the NCAA for the first time. Those institutions are not included in weekly statistical rankings until they achieve active division membership.

Because divisions also have lengthened the provisional-membership period for new members -- to seven years in all three divisions -- the statistics staff weighed the impact of the waiting period on student-athletes against the impact on current active members.

"That's one that we struggled with, because we're talking about kids who could go through their entire careers and not be ranked anywhere." Wright said. "But, again, is it fair to list them in our rankings when they're not full-fledged NCAA institutions yet?

"The thing that's really a sticking point in both instances is the long transition period. We want to be sensitive to the student-athletes; it's not their fault that they are in this situation, but we also were uncomfortable with the possibility that an NCAA record could be established by someone playing for an institution that is not yet a full member of the Association."

Effect on RPI

Reclassifying and new members also present a challenge in another statistical area -- the calculation of a Rating Percentage Index (RPI).

Because institutions are required to comply with contest scheduling requirements during the second year of provisional and reclassifying membership, those institutions now are being included in the RPI beginning in that year.

If an institution is able to comply with contest scheduling requirements during the first year of its provisional membership, that school can apply by September 15 to be included in the RPI during that year.

Including provisional members in the RPI should help encourage active members to schedule contests with those institutions, Wright said.

Because reclassifying institutions will not be ranked in statistics reports until they achieve full divisional membership, they also are not eligible to achieve division statistical game, season or career records.

However, those institutions are eligible to qualify for "collegiate" or all-divisions records, since they currently are NCAA members. Individuals or teams that qualify for such records will be identified in records books as representing reclassifying institutions.