After recent implementation of significant changes in championships ranging from bracket expansion to improvement of the student-athlete experience, the Division III Championships Committee devoted its September 17-19 meeting in Indianapolis to discussing emerging issues.

A few such issues were raised during a committee session with chairs of Division III sport committees — including the possibility of increasing multiyear agreements with championship hosts and the growing difficulty of accommodating institutions with written policies against competition on days of religious observance.

Under current Division III championships policy, agreements to host championships are limited to two years, but some of the chairs participating in the session reported that host institutions or organizations may be more willing to fund improvements of facilities or make other investments supporting the student-athlete experience if longer agreements are offered.

Committee members expressed interest in obtaining feedback from the Division III Student-Athlete Advisory Committee on ways that championships held annually at the same site may contribute to or detract from the student-athlete experience.

During another discussion, several sport committee chairs reported that a policy requiring accommodation during championships competition of institutions on the basis of religious observance increasingly is conflicting with Division III’s efforts to conduct most championships competition on Saturdays and Sundays to limit missed class time. They noted that such conflicts likely will become a greater problem as more events are planned at predetermined sites and some are scheduled for television broadcasts or Webcasts.

The championships committee did not act on either multiyear championships agreements or institutional accommodation, but indicated it will continue to study those issues.

It also showed interest in another issue: current legislation governing single-sport conferences, including eligibility for automatic qualification. Currently, automatic qualification is available to multisport conferences and to single-sport conferences that have maintained the same core membership since February 1998.

The committee asked the Division III Management Council to raise the issue in a future Virtual Focus Group discussion, which would solicit feedback from various Division III constituencies about whether automatic qualifi cation might be granted to single-sport conferences in specific situations (for example, for emerging or geographically isolated sports).

Other highlights

In other business, the Division III Championships Committee: