National Collegiate Athletic Association
NCAA News Archive - 2007
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Canadian institutions given opportunity for membership
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By Gary T. Brown
The NCAA News
The NCAA News
ORLANDO, Florida — The NCAA Executive Committee at its January 8 meeting authorized a program that allows a limited number of Canadian four-year colleges or universities to begin the process for becoming NCAA member institutions.
The Executive Committee OK’d the concept from an Association-wide perspective, but each division has the autonomy to determine whether to advance the enabling legislation necessary to authorize Canadian membership within that division.
The recommendation to proceed came from the Executive Committee’s Working Group on Membership Eligibility for International Institutions, chaired by Executive Committee member and Belmont University President Robert Fisher. Fisher called the initial procedures “baby steps,” but ones that nonetheless facilitate movement under a practical approach.
The program offers interested schools to enter an exploratory period with the opportunity to attain provisional NCAA membership status and advance through the membership process in a specified division.
The program’s objectives are to assess the benefits and challenges of international membership for the Association generally, and student-athletes specifically; and to determine how seamlessly international colleges and universities can integrate into the NCAA system. Schools that enter the process will be required to report to the division membership committees any issues or challenges relating to international membership.
Those committees will assess the program over the next 10 years, after which a multidivisional working group will review recommendations from each division and determine whether the program should be expanded to include additional Canadian institutions. To date, the NCAA has not received formal interest from schools in other countries.
The issue emerged in 1998 when a Canadian institution sought entrance into NCAA Division II. However, a proposal to facilitate the process at the 1999 Convention was ruled out of order because it applied to a single division rather than Association-wide. Recently, a second Canadian school has expressed interest, which led the Executive Committee to establish the working group in April 2006.
Faculty collaboration
The Executive Committee also reviewed suggestions from faculty members who endorsed recommendations from the NCAA Presidential Task Force on the Future of Division I Intercollegiate Athletics. The Task Force report released in October emphasized not only fiscal responsibility in athletics, but also the need for the campus community to work collectively on integrating athletics into the educational experience. Task Force members identified faculty as a key constituent in that regard.
Lorrie Clemo, president of the Faculty Athletics Representatives Association and the FAR at the State University of New York at Oswego, and Dennis Leighton, FARA president-elect and FAR at the University of New England, presented a document identifying FARA as “the only Association-wide organized faculty group that understands and supports the belief that intercollegiate athletics is a benefit to the academic process and that it should be preserved and valued.”
Clemo suggested a number of ways to help implement Task Force recommendations regarding integration, including legislation that requires orientation to NCAA policies and expectations for newly appointed FARs, and best practices for appointing members to the position. For example, FARA recommends FARs be tenured or continuing multiyear faculty appointments with regular teaching assignments, and whoever fills the position should understand the time involved and the principles of preserving academic integrity. Clemo also encouraged presidents to consult with faculty governance in making the appointment (see Clemo’s guest editorial, page 4).
Leighton added that FARs also should be required to attend meetings to help them remain current on NCAA issues, including the NCAA Convention, NCAA Regional Rules Seminars and the annual FARA meeting and symposium in the fall.
The idea is for FARs to assume a greater role in not only becoming more experienced and involved in academic-integrity issues, but also serving as the bridge to the broader faculty on campus, so that the FAR might serve as the point person for promoting the value of athletics and the need to ensure the enterprise is integrated into the academic mission.
Balancing life and work
The Executive Committee also heard from the Life and Work Balance Task Force appointed last year after several NCAA groups raised concerns about how the competitive work environment in intercollegiate athletics affects retention of valued employees.
Task force Chair Carol Cartwright, president emeritus at Kent State University, presented the group’s report, which concluded among other things that more emphasis should be given to employees and their families, and that the NCAA should explore legislative options to support that premise.
“The people who work in intercollegiate athletics are key to the success of the enterprise,” Cartwright said. “Administrators must set the tone at the top. It’s critically important that people understand institutions want to support them. We attract them and want to retain them, and we want them to have a career with their families intact.”
Among legislative suggestions are changes in recruiting calendars, establishing travel days as a countable athletics activity, and even declaring one day per week as a nonathletics activity day for everyone in athletics. Those items would have to be vetted through the governance structure.
The report also urges the NCAA national office to take the lead in modeling best behaviors that incorporate balance. Conference offices also are important to the effort of sharing best practices.
“People are more comfortable talking about these issues in a peer group,” Cartwright said of conference collaboration.
The Executive Committee agreed to continue working with the task force to facilitate further discussion of best practices and shepherding the legislative proposals into the governance structure for review.
The Executive Committee OK’d the concept from an Association-wide perspective, but each division has the autonomy to determine whether to advance the enabling legislation necessary to authorize Canadian membership within that division.
The recommendation to proceed came from the Executive Committee’s Working Group on Membership Eligibility for International Institutions, chaired by Executive Committee member and Belmont University President Robert Fisher. Fisher called the initial procedures “baby steps,” but ones that nonetheless facilitate movement under a practical approach.
The program offers interested schools to enter an exploratory period with the opportunity to attain provisional NCAA membership status and advance through the membership process in a specified division.
The program’s objectives are to assess the benefits and challenges of international membership for the Association generally, and student-athletes specifically; and to determine how seamlessly international colleges and universities can integrate into the NCAA system. Schools that enter the process will be required to report to the division membership committees any issues or challenges relating to international membership.
Those committees will assess the program over the next 10 years, after which a multidivisional working group will review recommendations from each division and determine whether the program should be expanded to include additional Canadian institutions. To date, the NCAA has not received formal interest from schools in other countries.
The issue emerged in 1998 when a Canadian institution sought entrance into NCAA Division II. However, a proposal to facilitate the process at the 1999 Convention was ruled out of order because it applied to a single division rather than Association-wide. Recently, a second Canadian school has expressed interest, which led the Executive Committee to establish the working group in April 2006.
Faculty collaboration
The Executive Committee also reviewed suggestions from faculty members who endorsed recommendations from the NCAA Presidential Task Force on the Future of Division I Intercollegiate Athletics. The Task Force report released in October emphasized not only fiscal responsibility in athletics, but also the need for the campus community to work collectively on integrating athletics into the educational experience. Task Force members identified faculty as a key constituent in that regard.
Lorrie Clemo, president of the Faculty Athletics Representatives Association and the FAR at the State University of New York at Oswego, and Dennis Leighton, FARA president-elect and FAR at the University of New England, presented a document identifying FARA as “the only Association-wide organized faculty group that understands and supports the belief that intercollegiate athletics is a benefit to the academic process and that it should be preserved and valued.”
Clemo suggested a number of ways to help implement Task Force recommendations regarding integration, including legislation that requires orientation to NCAA policies and expectations for newly appointed FARs, and best practices for appointing members to the position. For example, FARA recommends FARs be tenured or continuing multiyear faculty appointments with regular teaching assignments, and whoever fills the position should understand the time involved and the principles of preserving academic integrity. Clemo also encouraged presidents to consult with faculty governance in making the appointment (see Clemo’s guest editorial, page 4).
Leighton added that FARs also should be required to attend meetings to help them remain current on NCAA issues, including the NCAA Convention, NCAA Regional Rules Seminars and the annual FARA meeting and symposium in the fall.
The idea is for FARs to assume a greater role in not only becoming more experienced and involved in academic-integrity issues, but also serving as the bridge to the broader faculty on campus, so that the FAR might serve as the point person for promoting the value of athletics and the need to ensure the enterprise is integrated into the academic mission.
Balancing life and work
The Executive Committee also heard from the Life and Work Balance Task Force appointed last year after several NCAA groups raised concerns about how the competitive work environment in intercollegiate athletics affects retention of valued employees.
Task force Chair Carol Cartwright, president emeritus at Kent State University, presented the group’s report, which concluded among other things that more emphasis should be given to employees and their families, and that the NCAA should explore legislative options to support that premise.
“The people who work in intercollegiate athletics are key to the success of the enterprise,” Cartwright said. “Administrators must set the tone at the top. It’s critically important that people understand institutions want to support them. We attract them and want to retain them, and we want them to have a career with their families intact.”
Among legislative suggestions are changes in recruiting calendars, establishing travel days as a countable athletics activity, and even declaring one day per week as a nonathletics activity day for everyone in athletics. Those items would have to be vetted through the governance structure.
The report also urges the NCAA national office to take the lead in modeling best behaviors that incorporate balance. Conference offices also are important to the effort of sharing best practices.
“People are more comfortable talking about these issues in a peer group,” Cartwright said of conference collaboration.
The Executive Committee agreed to continue working with the task force to facilitate further discussion of best practices and shepherding the legislative proposals into the governance structure for review.
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