The Strategic Vision and Planning Committee will have the authority to consider prospective waivers of sport sponsorship requirements for Division I members, the Division I Council decided Wednesday.
The Council approved a temporary waiver process for the remainder of sports seasons this school year. This gives the Strategic Vision and Planning Committee the authority to consider waivers, before seasons are completed, to minimum contest, participant and scheduling requirements for reasons related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
"We're encouraged by the amount of teams who have been able to meet the sport sponsorship requirement this year, but we recognize a need for a temporary waiver process for those few teams who had unforeseen, pandemic-related circumstances impact their sport sponsorship requirements," said Shane Lyons, chair of the Division I Council and athletics director at West Virginia.
Modernization track
The Division I Council introduced into the modernization legislative track four proposals related to recruiting.
The proposals would:
- Amend the trigger for student-athlete status to align with the approach authorized by waivers the past two academic years in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
- An individual would remain a prospective student-athlete until the individual signs a National Letter of Intent or the school's written offer of admission and/or financial aid or the school receives the individual's financial deposit in response to its offer of admission and completes all high school graduation requirements or all transfer academic eligibility requirements.
- An individual would revert to prospective student-athlete status if the individual does not attend classes at the beginning of the first full-time regular academic term after the individual completes all high school graduation requirements or all transfer academic eligibility requirements.
- Specify a school shall not provide more than two consecutive nights of lodging to a prospective student-athlete in conjunction with an official visit.
- Eliminate the limitation on the number of official visits a prospective student-athlete may take.
- Specify that in sports other than basketball, contact may not be made with a prospective student-athlete during the time of day when classes are in session at their school.
The earliest the Council would vote on these proposals would be at its April meeting.
