Colleges weigh background checks for athletes
By Andy Gardiner, USA TODAY
The National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics believes background checks for scholarship athletes are the wave of the future, and it wants to catch that wave now.
NACDA is working on a contract with risk and security management company GlobalOptions Group to establish a system that would allow schools to research the histories of potential athletes.
We think this is something that three or four years down the road will be obligatory before scholarships are offered," says NACDA executive director Bob Vecchione.
NACDA's framework would be similar to the NFL, which provides background checks to its clubs on 300 to 400 draft prospects each year.
Colleges have no wide-ranging system, although Oklahoma and Baylor have instituted checks independently.
"The stakes are high," says Oklahoma athletics director Joe Castiglione. "But I think the responsibility is high."
The chairman of GlobalOptions is Harvey Schiller, former executive director of the U.S. Olympic Committee and former commissioner of the Southeastern Conference. GlobalOptions recently acquired Confidential Business Resources Inc., an intelligence-gathering and surveillance company, and would use that firm to conduct the checks.
"What institutions can't afford today is to be blind to things, to not ask questions to which they're afraid to hear the answers," Schiller says. "It is in the best interest of everyone to get more background."
Access to juvenile records is restricted, but Schiller says background checks still could give schools a clearer picture on a prospective scholarship athlete.
"A check would not always mean turning up something detrimental or negative," Schiller says. "You could put a rumor to rest or alleviate a lot of suspicions.
"The price point has to be attractive to an institution, but we're not talking about thousands of dollars or what a school might want to expend on a coach or staff member. My guess, depending on the numbers (of athletes), it would be less than $100 (an athlete)."
Matt Mitten, a law professor and director of the National Sports Law Institute at Marquette, believes the checks would stand up to challenges of invasion of privacy and equal protection.
"All a court would say you have to have is a rational or reasonable basis for doing this for athletes but not for the student body as a whole," Mitten says. "My sense is that a court would have no problem finding ... that student-athletes are much more high profile than a typical student."
Story taken from the following website: http://www.usatoday.com/sports/college/2005-07-14-background-checks_x.htm
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