Monday is decision day. That’s the day the Division III Presidents and their representatives will vote at the NCAA Convention to either pass or reject Proposal 65 — the proposal that would eliminate the ability of Division III schools to offer athletic grant-in-aid packages (scholarships) in sports in which they “play-up.”<\/p>\n
After a Sunday business meeting to discuss all the proposals on the reform package, the proposal is due to hit the floor for a roll-call vote at 9 a.m. on Monday morning and should be completed by noon. If not, the afternoon session will see a continuance of the vote with a decision by 3 p.m.<\/p>\n
Ever since this bombshell was dropped on the eight affected schools — just one small part of a sweeping Division III reform package aimed to get D-III back in line with its founding principles — the coordination of effort and cooperation among their athletic departments and administrators has been masterful. And as the vote approaches, the effort has been ramped up, intense and hectic.<\/p>\n
“It was a good effort, probably because we’re all team players to begin with,” said Margie Strait, athletic director at St. Lawrence. “To look at this issue as proactively as possible — and mostly when information is shared, accurately, openly and with direct concern for each.”<\/p>\n
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Each of the eight affected schools — Clarkson, Colorado College, Hartwick, Johns Hopkins, Oneonta, Rensselaer, Rutgers-Newark and St. Lawrence — play up in one men’s and\/or women’s sport, and four of them are in college hockey, making it a particularly urgent matter there.<\/p>\n
Proposition 65 aims to prohibit D-III institutions from awarding scholarships in D-I sports. The eight schools then entered amendment 65-1, which would grandfather in those schools, something that already occurred in Division I legislation 20 years ago.<\/p>\n
“Quite deliberately we went at it … to get people to at least hear us, and to hear why it’s important and to show why good legislation already occurred in ’81-82,” said Strait.<\/p>\n
Johns Hopkins has been a leader in this fight. Its men’s lacrosse program is renowned the way Duke basketball is.<\/p>\n
“The eight schools working together, working the way we have and communicating has been pretty impressive to have all of these schools from all parts of the country from Upstate New York to Maryland and different sports that are affected has been great,” said Tom Calder, athletic director at Johns Hopkins. “It’s really been well orchestrated by the presidents and the ADs, and because of that, we’ve gotten to the vast majority of the Division III membership to explain our stories — how if 65 is passed, how it would negatively affect our programs. And I feel good that we communicated with them.”<\/p>\n
Because of the nature of this year’s reform legislation, 98 of the D-III presidents are expected to show up personally.<\/p>\n
“We’ve had the help of our presidents calling other presidents,” said Calder, “and we’re starting to feel more confident that when people vote that they know how it affects Clarkson hockey or Oneonta soccer.<\/p>\n
“My biggest fear was that if we went to the convention and people did not hear our side of the story — and we did a good job of [addressing] that.”<\/p>\n
Coordination<\/h4>\n
These proposals have made it through every step of the NCAA legislative process, except this final one. Prop 65 was the only one met with any hesitation, but was ultimately passed by the Management Council and Board of Directors. The vote at the convention consists of the presidents — or their representatives — from all 416 member D-III schools.<\/p>\n