Welcome to the third edition of the Presidents' Forum, a periodic feature in The NCAA News that provides presidents and chancellors the opportunity to present their views on important intercollegiate athletics issues. The Presidents' Forum debuted in the June 7, 2004, issue of the News with an examination of the relationship between CEOs and boards of trustees. The second edition in the October 11, 2004, NCAA News examined the division affiliation aspects of NCAA membership. Our topic this time is how universities structure their athletics departments to facilitate presidential oversight and alignment with the institutional mission.

Our particular focus is on large, Division I institutions at which intercollegiate athletics produces revenues above expenses. While there are only a handful of such schools that operate their athletics programs in the black, the very fact that they do so presents them with an array of challenges in mission alignment and fiscal responsibility. While it is one thing to suggest to institutions operating their athletics programs at a deficit that they should subsidize their programs based on the value athletics brings to the institution, it is quite another to suggest that revenue producers such as Ohio State or Nebraska should take the same approach.

Yet, all institutions, regardless of budget, face similar challenges in mission alignment. Athletics' educational mission at a large, public Division I institution is no different than at a small, private Division III college -- the goal is to integrate participation in intercollegiate athletics as part of the higher education experience.

Perhaps the only differences between revenue-producing programs and those that are subsidized are the pressures frequently placed on revenue producers to stray from the collegiate model. Recently, though, presidents have taken steps to guard against their intercollegiate athletics programs becoming more entertainment-based than education-based. Many have done so structurally through ways in which the athletics department reports within the university framework.

Gordon Gee at Vanderbilt University was among the first in Division I to replace the school's traditional athletics department with a new body that, as he said in an NCAA News editorial, "is more connected to the mission of the university and more accountable to the institution's academic leadership."

Other institutions since then have implemented structural modifications, though not as encompassing as Vanderbilt's. Some are represented in this Presidents' Forum package. President Karen Holbrook at Ohio State and Chancellor Harvey Perlman at Nebraska offer their insights on how mission alignment is achieved at their universities. Chancellor Perlman in fact uses an innovative "discussion" approach with the school's faculty athletics representative, professor Josephine Potuto. We've also included the athletics director perspective on this issue from Kevin White at Notre Dame and Tim Curley at Penn State. I believe all of their comments are relevant to this discussion, and that, collectively, this package provides good counsel to all institutions as they work to ensure that intercollegiate athletics lives up to both its mission as well as the broader university mission.

Myles Brand is president of the NCAA.