The Division I Academic Cabinet will sponsor legislation in the 2009-10 cycle that would add to the conditions required for applying nontraditional courses toward initial eligibility.

The legislation is considered an incremental step in a more extensive review of nontraditional courses, including Internet, distance-learning, correspondence and other courses not offered in a traditional classroom setting with face-to-face interaction between instructor and student. Prospective student-athletes often use nontraditional courses to earn core-course credits before and after graduation and also to improve sub-par grade-point averages.

The Academic Cabinet’s proposal would require regular and ongoing interaction between a student and instructor throughout the course. The proposal also would provide a system that permits review and validation of a student’s coursework and a defined timeline for completion. Current Division I rules require only that the instructor and student have access to one another and do not specify a way to make sure a student is doing the work himself or herself. They also do not give appropriate times for coursework completion.

The cabinet members heard from an NCAA Eligibility Center representative about some of the “loopholes” prospective student-athletes have discovered that might raise suspicion about the validity of nontraditional coursework, including completing courses in an unreasonably brief period and receiving grades significantly higher in online coursework than in a similar course with a traditional setting.

Adoption of the proposal would provide more specific guidance to prospects, high schools and member institutions regarding the use of such courses to prepare academically for college-level work.  It also would assist Eligibility Center staff in working with the providers of nontraditional course curricula, setting a standard that is required of their materials for their classes to be considered acceptable for meeting NCAA eligibility standards.

The cabinet also recommended that the NCAA staff develop an educational column to clarify the use of “credit by examination” (for example, a process by which a student who has failed a course takes an exam on the material to recover credit for it) and repeated courses to meet core-course requirements. Current interpretations of NCAA legislation prohibit the use of credit by examination to fulfill core-course requirements.

Current legislation permits the use of repeated coursework for initial-eligibility standards, but the cabinet members believe the membership is unclear about what constitutes repeat coursework, particularly when the same course is repeated at a different school. Repeat courses must be substantially comparable – qualitatively and quantitatively – to the original course.

Also, the cabinet updated the policies of the Student Records Review Committee to require explanations for academic irregularities to be corroborated by academic authorities in writing and with other supporting documentation, to require (if applicable) consideration of a prospect’s academic profile including course materials (syllabus, timeline for completion, validation of completion, course content, instruction methodology, instructor/student interaction and student assessments).

The cabinet expects that these changes are just a first step toward a more broad examination of nontraditional courses, for both initial- and continuing-eligibility purposes.