Term-in-ology. College athletics is not immune to industry acronyms or opaque concepts that can throw off the scent. With that in mind, Term-in-ology seeks each week to educate our readers on key NCAA definitions, terms of art, and policies and procedures encapsulating modern-day college athletics. If you are connected in any way to higher education, the business of education, or simply a college sports fan---this weekly morsel can help you decode college sports.
Recruiting
There may not be a broader and more nebulous NCAA term than "recruiting." Many college coaches and athletics administrators will tell you the long-term success of a Division I sports program lies in your recruiting success. If you can’t recruit (and sign and enroll) high quality, coachable athletes, then your longevity as a college coach becomes an increasingly fraught proposition.
NCAA legislation states that “[r]ecruiting is any solicitation of a prospect or a prospect’s family members by an institutional staff member or by a representative of the institution's athletics interests (aka a booster) for the purpose of securing the prospect’s enrollment and ultimate participation in the institution's intercollegiate athletics program.”
On its face, this definition constitutes a fairly broad net. NCAA legislation indicates that actions by staff members or athletics representatives (aka boosters) that cause a prospect to become a recruited athlete at that institution are:
Providing the prospect with an official visit;
Having an arranged, in-person, off-campus encounter with the prospect or their family members; or
Issuing a National Letter of Intent (NLI) or the institution's written offer of athletically related financial aid to the prospective student-athlete. Issuing a written offer of athletically related financial aid to a prospect to attend a summer session prior to full-time enrollment does not cause the prospect to become recruited.
This background is the tip of the iceberg in terms of sketching out the complexities and sport-specific nuances encircling NCAA recruiting rules. Determining whether a prospect is recruited by NCAA definition ends up triggering other tangential NCAA rules including how and when an athletics scholarship to a non-recruited prospect may count toward a team's scholarship limit.
For now, it is important to simply understand what it means to "recruit" and the benchmark activities within Division I athletics recruiting environment that truly signfiy earnest recruitment (e.g., giving a prospect an official visit to campus).
It is also noteworthy to understand what does not constitute recruiting activities governed by NCAA rules.
Two examples of activities that fall outside the scope of NCAA recruiting rules are:
Off-campus recruiting contacts made by a university’s admissions officer and directed at all prospective students including non-athletes; and
Contacts made with a prospect athlete by an established family friend on the premise that such contacts are not made for recruiting purposes and are not initiated by a university’s coaching staff. If, for example, you are a faculty member whose next door neighbor is a family you’ve known for years and one of their children who you’ve known since she was a toddler is now a high school junior and a top women’s soccer recruit, routine communications you might have with the prospect and their family through being a family friend and next-door-neighbor would fall outside the scope of NCAA recruiting rules. Sweet relief…it’s good to be neighborly.
Athletics Veritas is presented for information purposes only and should not be considered advice or counsel on NCAA compliance matters. For guidance on NCAA rules and processes, always consult your university’s athletics compliance office, conference office, and/or the NCAA.
