As a higher education organization, the NCAA at its core has the educational well-being of student-athletes in mind. Participation in intercollegiate athletics provides a path to the mathematics, history, physics, arts and music that are tangible to earning a degree, and it also promotes the intangibles of teamwork, competitive spirit, character-building and self esteem inherent in college sports.

The NCAA also educates student-athletes about health, safety, sportsmanship and ethical conduct. That includes education about the risks associated with gambling, particularly sports wagering. The Association has sustained a concerted effort over the last decade to educate Division I men's basketball participants in particular about those risks. It is no coincidence that Division I men's basketball scored better than the objective observer might have assumed in the NCAA Study of Sports Wagering and Associated Behaviors.

According to the study, Division I student-athletes were less likely than their Divisions II and III counterparts to engage in gambling or sports-wagering behavior. And among males, basketball ranked lower than golf, lacrosse, wrestling, football, ice hockey and baseball in the proportion of respondents wagering on collegiate sports. That correlates to another finding in the study indicating that Division I student-athletes were the most educated on NCAA rules prohibiting such behavior.

To date, NCAA education and enforcement efforts have been directed toward Division I schools, and to the high-profile sports of football and men's and women's basketball. In those groups, the study showed lower rates of gambling reported than in many other groups. And since the educational tactic has proven to be effective with those constituents, it stands to reason that the NCAA Sports Wagering Task Force is suggesting a similar approach to a broader student-athlete audience.

"The study shows that the grass-roots education effort, particularly in basketball, has been successful," said Bill Saum, NCAA director of agents, gambling and amateurism. "We believe in that grass-roots approach, and we try to educate at every level within the athletics world. The study shows us, though, that we have a campus-wide problem, and the task force has encouraged us to broaden our impact to groups outside of athletics -- national organizations that deal with the health centers on campus, deans of student life, Greek organizations.

"The message is that we all need to walk up to this issue. Student-athletes are subjected to many influences outside of their participation in athletics."

Over the last several months alone, Saum and his staff have coordinated educational efforts that cover a wide range of constituents. They include:

• Presentations with an FBI agent at the Men's and Women's Final Four, the Men's Frozen Four, and the Men's College World Series. Staff also presented to the officials at the latter two events.

• Presentations at the following institutions: the University of Kansas; the University of Central Florida; the University of South Florida; the University of Notre Dame; the University of Southern Illinois at Carbondale; the University of Pittsburgh; Tennessee State University; the University of Nevada, Las Vegas; the Big 12 Conference Directors of Compliance meeting and the Big South Conference Directors of Compliance meeting.

• Presentations at the following conferences: the Florida Council on Compulsive Gambling; the Connecticut Council on Compulsive Gambling; the Association for Financial Counseling and Planning Education; the Western Regional Organized Crime Conference, NCAA Regional Rules Seminars; and the Collegiate Commissioners Association of Compliance Administrators annual meeting.

• Presentations to the Division III Student-Athlete Advisory Committee; the Horizon League Student-Athlete Advisory Committee; the Division III Leadership Conference; the Nike All-America camp; and the NCAA First Team summits (a program designed to educate and mentor premier high-school basketball prospects).

The task force took note of those efforts and recommended that the message be spread to even more events and groups, such as Divisions II and III championships, CHAMPS Life Skills programs, conference SAACs and Youth Education through Sports clinics, just to name a few. Other task force recommendations include developing athletics department personnel at campuses to serve as educators at the local level, and working with the National Federation of State High School Associations to educate high-school booster clubs, parent organizations and prospective student-athletes.

The full array of educational initiatives recommended by the task force will be rolled out in January with the release of that group's final report.

Task force members noted in particular the strength of the alliance approach, since it not only expands the target audience but grows the number of educators delivering key messages. A success story in that area already is evident in the American Football Coaches Association (AFCA), where Executive Director Grant Teaff has organized a coordinated approach that puts the message delivery in the hands of some of the most influential people in student-athletes' lives -- football coaches.

The AFCA played a lead role in the recent "Don't Bet On It" day October 30, during which college football coaches and their staffs were encouraged to wear the blue "Don't Bet On It" wrist bands at games and raise awareness on a local and national scale. All NCAA championships participants this year also will receive a wrist band. The initiative already has been a hit, as requests pour in from student-athletes, students and others for additional wrist bands.

Teaff also said his organization is creating Team AFCA, a program that uses the AFCA annual convention to develop an army of educators in the battle against sports wagering.

"All of the 6,000 coaches who attend the convention, just by virtue of their being there, will be deputized as members of Team AFCA, whose purpose is to bring education and awareness to student-athletes regarding sports wagering," Teaff said. "The good news is that those 6,000 coaches represent high-school, college and professional football. They go back to their respective communities and their coaches and educate and inform their own staffs, players and the other coaches in the other sports. Team AFCA has an expansive reach."

Other coaches groups, including men's and women's basketball and men's lacrosse, have expressed an interest in using similar tactics with their constituencies.

The Rev. Edward A. Malloy, president at the University of Notre Dame and chair of the task force, said education is likely the key component in attacking a cultural problem that otherwise would be difficult to penetrate.

"We want an extended effort to educate as many people as possible -- coaches, athletics directors, officials, student-athletes, and of course the broader society, too," he said. "We want to forge alliances with a broad cross section of people involved in the law enforcement community and the government community so we can be alert to trends and patterns.

"There's a lot of naiveté as to the extent of gambling by student-athletes and the way it has affected outcomes."