The membership will get a chance to evaluate a range of potential financial aid reforms presented by the Division I Awards, Benefits, Expenses and Financial Aid Cabinet through a white paper now available online.

The ideas include allowing student-athletes to accept federal need-based aid without counting toward team financial aid limits and exempting outside scholarships that meet specified criteria from counting toward team limits.

Cabinet chair Grace Calhoun, associate athletics director at Indiana, said the group hopes to begin formulating legislative concepts in February and June for submission in the 2010-11 legislative cycle. The cabinet embarked on its review of financial aid rules more than a year ago, with an emphasis on aid that counts toward team limits.

“We felt like there were broader changes that were needed, instead of just proposing some minor legislative changes here and there,” Calhoun said. “Our rules can be complex and difficult to understand for financial aid professionals. We want to make some changes that result in a better end product for all involved.”

The cabinet’s discussion document presents each of the options – even options it doesn’t support. Members hope to get feedback from the membership that will indicate what level of support each concept would receive in legislative form.

“The model we’re using is similar to what the Recruiting [and Athletics Personnel Issues] Cabinet did when they looked at coaching limits,” Calhoun said.

The white paper includes 10 concepts:

1.      Exempt all federal need-based aid from counting toward a team’s maximum financial aid limits (team limit) and an individual’s cost-of-attendance limit (individual limit).

2.      Exempt all state need-based financial aid from counting toward team limits.

Cabinet members believed that safeguards are in place through defining award criteria and, in the case of federal aid, predetermined methodologies for determining need, which would minimize the potential for abuse of these two types of aid. Both concepts would benefit student-athlete well-being and could reduce NCAA bureaucracy.

“We started with need-based aid,” Calhoun said, “because if you’re truly approaching this from a student-athlete well-being perspective, it just makes sense that if a student-athlete has a need that’s been identified through the federal methodology, they should be able to accept those need-based dollars that help them go to school.”

3.      Exempt all outside scholarships from counting toward team limits under specific conditions.

The cabinet outlined two separate proposals concerning outside scholarships. One would exempt outside scholarships if the student-athlete’s choice of institution is not restricted, or the institution does not have a direct connection with the donor/scholarship. A similar concept would allow the outside scholarships and either set a maximum value on outside awards or specify that such exemptions are available only for student-athletes receiving a specified equivalency amount. For example, outside scholarships could be exempt for student-athletes receiving no more than 25 percent of a full grant-in-aid.

4.      Allow student-athletes (on his or her own initiative) to replace an athletics financial aid agreement with a more favorable institutional financial aid package before becoming a counter.

Currently, some student-athletes sign an athletics financial aid agreement and are notified later that they are eligible for additional, non-athletically related institutional aid that exceeds the amount of athletics aid. In that case, the institutional aid must count toward the team limit (unless it is exempted, such as an academic honor award). 

Under the current financial aid legislation, once a student-athlete signs an athletics aid agreement, the institution may not reduce or cancel the aid until the period of the award ends. Consequently, though, the only way to allow student-athletes to decline athletics aid in order to accept the nonathletics institutional aid is to include a condition in the athletics aid agreement that allows the institution to cancel the athletics aid agreement if the student-athlete accepts financial aid that exceeds the amount provided by the athletics aid agreement.

The cabinet believes this change would positively affect student-athlete well-being and has the potential to reduce the amount of financial aid that counts toward a team’s maximum limit. Because the timing of the awards (both athletically related and other awards) is crucial and often differs from institution to institution and case by case, Calhoun said the cabinet will continue to explore this issue.

“I hope that feedback we get through this discussion document will help us understand the institutional differences with timing,” she said.

5.      Revise NCAA legislation related to academic merit awards/scholarships to require a 3.0 grade-point average rather than a 3.3 GPA.

The cabinet believes this change would bring this type of award/scholarship in line with the requirements for renewals of academic honor awards.

6.      Exempt state merit-based aid that is administered by an institution, provided the awarding criteria satisfy the academic honor award/institutional academic scholarship legislative requirements.

This change would allow merit-based state aid to be exempted from team limits if the awarding criteria satisfy the legislative requirements for an academic honor award or institutional academic scholarship. This would allow additional sources of aid to be exempt and could reduce the amount of aid that counts toward a team’s limit without creating additional bureaucracy. The cabinet believes the safeguards in place through established awarding criteria would minimize abuse.

The cabinet discussed, but did not support, exempting state merit-based aid that is administered by the institution and does not satisfy any additional awarding criteria.

7.      Allow institutional standards applicable to all students in general to govern institutional academic merit awards/scholarships.

The cabinet was divided on this concept, though it noted it would reinforce the philosophy that student-athletes should be treated similarly to students in general.

8.      For sports other than basketball and football, exempt all institutional need-based aid from counting toward team limits.

The cabinet did not support this proposal because it could affect private institutions differently than public institutions and because of the varying amounts of need-based aid that institutions offer to students.

9.      Permit athletics scholarships to be awarded up to the value of the cost of attendance.

The cabinet did not support this proposal because of the anticipated significant increase in expense and because the cost of attendance varies among institutions. Current NCAA rules do not prevent those who demonstrate financial need from receiving the full cost of attendance through other means.

10.  Allow recruited basketball and football student-athletes to receive institutional financial aid granted without regard in any degree to athletics ability and compete without becoming a counter.

The cabinet did not support this proposal because of the potential for abuse that could result in recruiting inequities.

Calhoun will present the concepts during the Division I Issues Forum at the 2010 NCAA Convention in Atlanta. The cabinet will take the feedback from Convention and other sources and begin crafting legislative concepts in February.