According to an NCAA news summary, 25 Division III schools’ financial aid awards were found not acceptable and were forwarded to the NCAA’s enforcement staff. In these schools, the aid to student-athletes exceeded the aid awarded to the general student body by at least 4%, when comparing students with similar need.

The original list of schools out of the norm was 60, about 14% of Division III. Some details of the various levels of review were included in the NCAA’s piece.

That wasn’t the committee dealings the NCAA chose to emphasize, but it was what leaped off the page at me. The other big news is a proposal to put in year-round drug testing in Division III. One of the justifications was that a 2005 NCAA study put Division III drug usage at or above levels of usage in Division I. That may be true. It might also be the case that Division III student-athletes were simply more truthful in filling out the survey, since there are fewer consequences at the non-scholarship level. The testing proposal is for a two-year pilot program.

There was a list of things that the Management Council urged the Presidents Council and Executive Committee Working Group to consider:

·Further limitation on the provisional class size (one or two per year).
Not a problem. Division III is going to be too large to manage at some point.

·Tightening the standards applied to exploratory and provisional members to begin the process in lieu of the lottery system.
What a concept. Almost like I posted last August.

·Long-term divisional structure in the NCAA.
Does this sound like the late ’90s movement to subdivide Division III? Ugh.

·Optimal size of Division III based on resource allocation.
Optimal size of Division III is pretty darn close to where we are now.

·More aggressive screening of active members consistent with the Division III philosophy, membership and legislative requirements.
Sounds like more enforcement.

·Raising membership dues, if necessary, to address additional Division III resources, services and long-term membership options.
Seems reasonable.

·Changing demographics in the United States in relation to higher education.
Anyone working in higher education please chime in on this one.

Lincoln is leaving Division III.

If all goes according to plan, the Lions will be in the Division II Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association (and playing football, by the way), in 2010-11. Although the NCAA may consider Lincoln as a Division III member during part of the reclassification process, we will not consider Lincoln a Division III member from the moment they have a scholarship athlete.

Men’s basketball coach Garfield Yuille hinted at this in an interview on Hoopsville (full audio clip) at the end of January, so it isn’t much of a surprise. But the volume of material on Lincoln’s Web site begs the question:

What happens if the CIAA doesn’t take Lincoln?

This is how university president Ivory V. Nelson termed it in his letter to the university community of Tuesday afternoon, April 11:

If invited to join, we will begin the intercollegiate athletic transition process via the NCAA. We will not petition for Division II status until we have a definitive decision from the CIAA.

Let’s hope that works out. We know Lincoln has made overtures to the CIAA before, only to be told it needed to add football as well. But Lincoln fits very well in that league.

So Lincoln: Enjoy your 36 football scholarships and your 10 basketball scholarships. I would say thanks for the memories, but shoot, Lincoln was only on the radar for about a year and a half of the nine years we’ve been running the site. The rest of the time, getting info was like pulling teeth. Memories are hard to come by.

The move would leave Division III with just two historically black colleges: Fisk and Rust.

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