The Division I governance structure will have the opportunity to debate the merits of a series of recommendations from the Basketball Academic Enhancement Group, including a proposal that all incoming men’s basketball players be assessed academically and assigned appropriate support.

The Board of Directors accepted the group’s report Thursday and is expected to sponsor specific legislative proposals related to the recommendations for consideration in the 2009-10 legislative cycle, as the BAEG intended when it completed its work. The specific proposals will be developed in the next few months and introduced by the Board in October.

Among the recommendations is a summer-school plan for incoming freshmen that makes member institutions responsible for assessing the academic preparedness of those student-athletes and properly easing them into the college academic experience. Individual institutions would be tasked with setting the criteria in the assessment.

Prospects identified by the schools as needing an academic head start must enroll in six credit hours in the summer session and pass three to be eligible for competition in the fall. Those student-athletes, as well as others who opt for classes in the summer for any reason, may participate in up to eight hours per week in athletically related activities.

Those hours with coaches – expected to be a separate piece of legislation – are expected to strengthen a student-athlete’s connection to a specific institution and reduce the instances of transfers and early professionalization, both identified as problems in men’s basketball. Data support the notion that student-athletes who participate in the “summer bridge” programs are more likely to achieve academic success.

The Board also acknowledged the BAEG’s concerns about the frequency of student-athletes transferring into NCAA institutions from two-year schools and supported the group’s goal of collecting data on the academic success of those student-athletes before making any final recommendations in that area.

The discussion of the BAEG report was part of a larger discussion of men’s basketball issues, including the establishment of the Basketball Focus Group, a three-person team dedicated to investigating the basketball recruiting environment. The team is part of a multi-pronged approach to the sport that includes enforcement and the establishment of a  Division I Men’s Basketball Ethics Coalition.

The focus group has spent more than a year learning about the recruiting environment and is expected to come to the Board in October with recommended action that could help reduce the nonscholastic influences in the sport. At the same time, the ethics coalition is working to promote ethical conduct through leadership, education and mentoring.

Also part of the basketball discussion was a proposal from the National Association of Basketball Coaches that aims to improve the communication between men’s basketball coaches and presidents, as well as faculty, at the campus, conference and national level. NABC Executive Director Jim Haney said the idea for the communication plan sprang from the positive interaction between presidents and coaches on the BAEG, and the desire to make that relationship more long-term.

As part of that discussion, the Board decided to ask the NABC executive director to  report twice a year to the Board on the progress of the sport and any new issues and challenges faced by the coaches.

In other business, the Board:

• Approved a recommendation from the Committee on Academic Performance that slightly changes the appeals process for the most serious of penalties associated with the Academic Performance Program. Going forward, the Board subcommittee that hears appeals of penalties will have the ability to remand an appeal back to the CAP with guidance on how to reconsider a decision. That option was not open to the subcommittee in the past.
• Took no action on Proposal No. 2008-46, adding a 14th week to the beginning of the baseball season, and Proposal No. 2008-59, adding sand volleyball to the list of emerging sports for women. Last month, the Legislative Council sustained its action approving both measures. Both proposals will now go to a vote of the Division I membership at the 2010 NCAA Convention in Atlanta. To overturn the measures, a five-eighths majority of those present and voting must vote to override the action of the Legislative Council.