Compliance Corner

Just in time for the holiday weekend, the staff has checked in with these:

Eligibility for Institutional Athletically Related Financial Aid -- Student-Athlete Returns to Original Institution (I)

Date Published: July 1, 2009 

The academic and membership affairs staff determined that a transfer student from a four-year institution who is returning to his or her original institution must have been eligible to compete in the next regular academic term had the student remained at the previous institution in order to receive athletically related financial aid during the first academic year of his or her return to the original institution. [References: Bylaws 14.5.5.4 (eligibility for institutional athletically related financial aid) and 15.01.5 (eligibility of student-athletes for institutional financial aid)]

Basketball Off-Campus Recruiting -- July Evaluation Periods (I)

Date Published: July 1, 2009 

The academic and membership affairs staff determined that, in basketball, during the July evaluation periods, an institution may use either the general rule regarding the limit on the number of coaches who may recruit off campus at any one time (i.e., a replaced coach may not engage in additional recruiting activities until after he or she has returned to the institution's campus) or the exception to the general rule (i.e., a replaced coach is not required to return to the institution's campus before engaging in additional recruiting activities, provided no more than three coaches engage in off-campus recruiting activities each day). [References: NCAA Bylaws 11.7.4.3 (off-campus recruiting -- at any one time) and 11.7.4.3.1 (exception -- basketball -- July evaluation periods)]

It will be interesting to see how this all plays out. Better than Caddyshack II, in all likelihood.

The NCAA Eligibility Center is launching a new portal for prospects who plan to enroll in fall 2010 and beyond. New URL: www.eligibilitycenter.org.  

Access to the existing Web site will continue to be available for prospects enrolling prior to fall 2010. It will also continue to provide member institutions academic and amateurism information for fall 2009 and winter/spring 2010 enrollees.

A new portal is also coming soon for institutions; details are available via each institution’s Eligibility Center account.

The Eligibility Center will host question and answer sessions about all this via teleconference on June 25 and June 29:

New Membership Portal Q&A

4 to 5 p.m. Eastern time, Thursday, June 25
Dial-in Number: 877/874-1568; Passcode: 2486026

4 to 5 p.m. Eastern time, Monday, June 29
Dial-in Number: 877/795-3635; Passcode: 7088645

SLR has spoken:

NCAA Division I Bylaw 13.12.2.3.3 (other noninstitutional privately owned camps/clinics -- sports other than basketball.).  June 15, 2009.  The NCAA Division I Legislative Council Subcommittee for Legislative Relief approved with conditions, a blanket waiver to permit NCAA Division I institutional athletics department personnel to serve in any capacity (e.g., counselor, guest lecturer, consultant) in a noninstitutional, privately owned camp or clinic that is not operated on the institution’s campus, within the state in which the institution is located or within a 50-mile radius of the institution’s campus.  The subcommittee granted the blanket waiver request with the following conditions:  (1) This is a one-time waiver request for the 2009 summer and future requests will be denied; (2) The waiver is for institutional athletics department personnel who committed (e.g., verbal agreement, written contract, etc.) prior to May 28, 2009, to serve in any capacity (e.g., counselor, guest lecturer, consultant) in a noninstitutional, privately owned camp or clinic that is not operated on the institution’s campus, within the state in which the institution is located or, if outside the state, within a 50-mile radius of campus; (3) The camps have advertised the coach’s or institutional athletics department personnel’s participation (e.g., coach’s name or name of coach’s institution is referenced in camp brochures or on camp’s online Web site, etc.); and (4) The camps must occur during one of the institution’s designated two 15-day periods for participating in camps and clinics.  The subcommittee granted the request based on totality of the circumstances and coach well-being.  Specifically, the subcommittee noted: (1) The demonstrated widespread misapplication of the legislation. Specifically, several Division I institutions have misapplied the football camp location restrictions as applicable only to their own institutional camps or clinics and have not extended application of this restriction to the employment of institutional athletics department personnel at noninstitutional, privately owned camps or clinics.  Institutions have permitted coaches and athletics department personnel to commit to participate in noninstitutional, privately owned camps occurring outside the state of the institution and beyond a 50-miles radius of the institution’s campus; (2) The waiver only applies to those coaches or institutional athletics department personnel who committed (e.g., verbal agreement, written contract, etc.) to participate prior to the May 28, 2009, interpretation provided by NCAA staff to member conferences; (3) The institutional athletics department personnel or the camp will incur expenses related to previously booked travel and lodging if the waiver was denied; (4) The waiver only applies to those camps that have advertised the coach’s or institutional athletics department personnel’s participation; and (5) The camps are being conducted in accordance with all other restrictions applicable to institutional camps or clinics.  To view this blanket waiver in its entirety, please access SLR Case No. 11937 on LSDBi.

Nine new Editorial Revisions (ER-2009-20 through ER-2009-26, ER 2009-28, E-2009-29) were approved in late May. Our Manual Updates page has the rationale for each of them.

We hear the compliance world is chirping about Twitter. (Speaking of which, follow us).

We've touched on this issue before, and our views have evolved a bit since then. We understand that an EdCol is forthcoming from the NCAA Real Soon Now, but here's what it's probably going to look like, at least when it comes to Twitter's three main functions, coaches, and prospects:

• Tweets. Run-of-the-mill tweets that a coach sends out are usually going to be okay. They can't contain things that NCAA rules would preclude, such as announcing a verbal signing, or talking about a particular prospect. If coaches stay away from obviously recruiting-specific issues, they'll probably be in a safety zone. Remember, Twitter is most easily thought of as a micro-blogging tool (up to 140 characters per tweet). Since it's already okay for coaches to have their own website (which could include a blog), garden-variety tweets that could appear on a blog are generally going to be okay. I wish we could be more specific than this guideline, but it's pretty difficult to create a hard and fast rule for tweets, given all the variables.

• Direct messages. The NCAA equates these to email messages since they are private between the Twitter sender and the recipient/follower. Keep in mind that it would not be permissible for a coach to send a direct message to a high school freshman since the starting point for email to prospects is at least a year later.

• @Replies. Even though these messages begin with another Twitter user's account name, these are public messages that any Twitter user can read. So if a coach were to post an @Reply to a prospect, that's going to run afoul of the ban on electronically transmitted correspondence (in other words, it's not a fax or email) and be an issue with the recruiting publicity rules, too.

We've got a reminder about the upcoming softball dead period that surrounds the Division I championship.

The NCAA Championship is approaching and so is a dead period. We've got a reminder.

On the heels of yesterday's EdCol about meals and lodging in transit, comes today's offering, providing more depth to the recent official interp concerning telephone calls to prospects concerning camp logistics.

The new recruiting certification test is up and running. Details are on the NCAA website.

The gremlins were at work earlier today and the correct list of dates appears below. You can get these at the NLI website (be sure to click the link for future signing dates), but we'll save you the trip.