NCAA Peer Evaluation Training

The NCAA needed materials that would consistently train faculty, staff, and administrators from Division I schools to visit other campuses and evaluate athletic department management and compliance with NCAA standards. These periodic reviews will determine whether or not an institution's athletic program is certified.

The NCAA has developed a standard certification process in four areas--governance, academic integrity, financial integrity, and commitment to equity. The training materials developed by Georgia Center Community Learning Resources Department Head Helen H. Mills, teach reviewers how to assess schools in each of these areas.

"I think the materials are very effective," said John Leavens, assistant executive director for NCAA Compliance Services. "We have a pool of about 800 peer reviewers, of which about 650 are subject to training whenever they are selected. We've had about 250 to 300 people go through the training so far.

"We've been very pleased with how effective the training has been. We thought once we started the training that substantive changes would be necessary. We're thinking of making a major change in a year, but we expect to use the same materials into the second year, and that speaks well of the package the Georgia Center developed."

The staff of Community Learning Resources had already developed peer review materials for assessing institutions in the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS) in 1992. It was the success of these materials that prompted the NCAA to invite Mills to bid on the contract for its materials. "This project said to us that SACS highly regarded the materials we did for them, because they recommended us," she said.

According to Mills, the project offered a number of benefits for both organizations. "Developing the materials was an opportunity to extend our experience in accreditation reviews and share the experience we already had. And it was a partnership formed with another organization in higher education. Developing these materials was very interesting work, and it was a fabulous project," Mills said.

"The NCAA is interested in making a genuine statement to confirm the credibility of good management in athletic departments across the country. They also want to communicate to the public that they are concerned about good management practices--that they are not just a rules-and-violations group. They are a quality improvement group as well," Mills said.

To write the manual, Mills surveyed athletic directors and brought together a group of potential evaluators to discuss the perception of what peer reviewers should be able to do when they visit a campus. She also worked with an NCAA subcommittee and the NCAA staff.

In addition to the materials, Mills created a train-the-trainer program for a core group of instructors who then go out to train the actual reviewers. The second group of evaluators went through training in fall 1994.

"The review process in accreditation does not have immediate payback. Standards are not raised overnight. It may be a while to know if this evaluation process is really working," Mills said.

For more information, contact Helen H. Mills, head, Department of Community Learning Resources, Georgia Center for Continuing Education, The University of Georgia, Athens Georgia 30602-3603, 706-542-1756. E-mail: millsh@gactr.uga.edu

Return to the Table of Contents.

Web administrator:  webmaster@gactr.uga.edu

All contents copyright (C) 1996.
University of Georgia Center for Continuing Education
All rights reserved.

Last revised: 1/31/96; 4:07:38 PM

URL: http://www.gactr.uga.edu/GCQ/gcqsum95/ncaa.html