The Minority Opportunities and Interests Committee (MOIC) confirmed plans to develop the Leadership Institute for Ethnic Minority Females during its September 27-28 meeting in Indianapolis.

The institute is scheduled to make its debut in June 2005 and will run for three years. The newly created institute will be similar in format to the 12-month-long, highly successful Leadership Institute for Ethnic Minority Males currently in place. After the conclusion of its current class, the men's institute will be offered again beginning in 2008, in a rotation with the women's institute.

Based on the popularity of the male institute and the number of female athletics administrators currently within the NCAA structure, the committee hopes to attract a maximum of 25 participants representing schools and conferences from Divisions I, II and III. Applications will be available in the near future.

"The main thing the committee is trying to achieve with the institute is to develop the top-notch candidates that the NCAA and the membership needs to direct programs in conference offices and on campus," said Robert C. Vowels Jr., commissioner of the Southwestern Athletic Conference and chair of the committee.

The MOIC also took action on another of its major programming initiatives -- the NCAA Coaches Academy, which is designed to assist ethnic minority football coaches with career advancement. As part of its 2004-05 and 2005-06 joint budget request with the NCAA Committee on Women's Athletics, the MOIC had asked for $250,000 to fund the academy's Advanced, Expert and Executive Coaching Programs, but was granted $70,000 less than the requested amount. While program administrators are currently seeking the additional funds from the National Football League, which contributed funds to the programs in 2003-04, the committee voted to delay the launch of the Executive Coaching Program if those funds are not secured.

The Executive Coaching Program of the NCAA Coaches Academy, which will pair veteran high-profile college administrators with selected minority coaches over a 12-month period, is currently scheduled to debut in January 2005. The Advanced Coaching Program and the Expert Coaching Program were launched earlier this year.

In addition, the committee discussed a request from the Division I Committee on Athletics Certification to provide feedback on methods to ensure that institutions' gender-equity and minority issues plans are more specific. The plan is required by each institution to fulfill Operating Principles 4.1 and 4.2 (NCAA Bylaws 22.2.4.1 and 22.2.4.2) of the certification process.

The MOIC believes institutions should be evaluated on the way they balance the academic and athletics pursuits of ethnic minority and female student-athletes, integration of ethnic minority and female student-athletes into the campus environment and the commitment to inclusiveness when developing ethnic minority and female student-athletes. The committee also identified graduation rates, scholarship opportunities and the presence of other ethnic minorities and women in the athletics department, administration and faculty as other possible areas on which institutions may be evaluated.

Vowels said that although some of the committee's initial feedback to the request by the Committee on Athletics Certification will be relayed in the near future, the MOIC will continue to develop a more formal response.

The MOIC also received a status report on the American Indian mascot issue. Self-study materials for institutions currently using American Indian mascots, nicknames and logos will be developed by NCAA staff for NCAA Executive Committee review at its October meeting and distributed by December. Identified institutions will have until May 2005 to complete the self-study. The Executive Committee will revisit the issue in August of next year.