Big-Time Sports Programs Tighten Rules on Athletes With Sexual-Assault Records

Beth Nakamura / The Oregonian

Two months ago, Brenda Tracy sent a letter to every college president and athletics director in the “Power Five,” a group made up of the five wealthiest collegiate athletic conferences. Ms. Tracy implored them to do something she sees as common sense: ban athletes with a history of sexual misconduct.

She has launched a national campaign against violent athletes because she doesn’t want other students to have the experience she did at Oregon State University. In 1998, she reported to police that four men, including two Oregon State football players, had gang-raped her.

The response from institutions has been mixed, Mr. Tracy said. Some didn’t respond to her; others said they already had a campuswide policy on past student misconduct and didn’t need to go further. But a few colleges indicated that they were looking into the possibility.

Institutions like Baylor University, the University of Oregon, and Vanderbilt University have faced scrutiny for high-profile sexual-assault cases, including situations in which athletes facing serious allegations were allowed to continue playing. As such cases have attracted public attention, some universities and athletic conferences are now trying to head off future scandals by keeping problem players off of their campuses to begin with.

A patchwork of policies determining eligibility for athletes with histories of sexual violence has emerged. Tackling the issue through policy isn’t easy, as few sexual assaults are reported to campuses or to the police, and fewer still result in a finding of responsibility or guilt.

Moreover, there isn’t consensus on how athletics departments should define “history.” Some coaches have said they believe only felony convictions should disqualify an athlete from competition, but many players who end up in trouble for sexual assault in college showed signs of misbehavior long before; it just wasn’t formally reported.

Three of the Power Five conferences (the Southeastern Conference, the Pac-12, and the Big 12) have approved restrictions on players with a record of sexual assault — though their policies vary. The two others (the Big Ten and the Atlantic Coast Conference) have chosen to leave the decision to individual campuses.

In the Big Ten, one institution — Indiana University at Bloomington — created its own policy earlier this year that applies to both prospective athletes and those who transfer in. Another — the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign — signaled last month that it will soon follow suit.

It’s encouraging that more colleges are talking about the issue of sexual assault in college athletics, Ms. Tracy and other anti-rape advocates say, and taking a stand against violent athletes is a good public-relations move. But, they ask, will these policies work in practice?

Another question is what role the National Collegiate Athletic Association should play in this debate, and whether it should step in and create consistent rules across campuses on the eligibility of players with sexual-assault records.

The association recently formed a Commission to Combat Campus Sexual Violence, and the group presented to the association’s Board of Governors this week.

Heightened Awareness

The Southeastern Conference was the pathfinder within the NCAA on this issue. In 2015, the chancellors and presidents of the SEC’s 14 member institutions passed a rule banning transfer athletes who had been disciplined by a previous college for “serious misconduct,” which was defined as sexual assault, domestic violence, or other forms of sexual violence.

Last year the conference expanded the policy to include other forms of misconduct, such as stalking and interpersonal violence. This academic year, the SEC will review its rule again and discuss whether the ban should apply to incoming freshman players, said William King, the conference’s associate commissioner for legal affairs and compliance.

Campus officials within the SEC were initially concerned that athletics staffs wouldn’t have access to all of the information they needed to make a judgment about freshman recruits, given that most of them are minors, Mr. King said. Mark E. Keenum, president of Mississippi State University, leads the SEC campus officials’ group. “I think there is a hyper-awareness of the need to put policies in place that are effective both in changing student-athlete attitudes and in influencing their behaviors,” Mr. Keenum said in a statement provided by a university spokesman.

The SEC’s initial actions prompted conversations across college athletics, and the Big 12 and Pac-12 conferences both approved new policies related to athlete misconduct last year.

The Big 12 went a step beyond the SEC, covering both freshmen and transfer athletes in a rule requiring its institutions to “exercise diligence” to identify potential misconduct problems among prospective players. If they have committed “serious misconduct,” which includes “sexual assault, domestic violence, and other similar crimes involving moral turpitude,” they can’t play within the conference. (Baylor is a Big 12 institution.)

The Pac-12’s rule prevents transfer athletes from receiving athletic scholarships or competing at a Pac-12 institution if they aren’t eligible to re-enroll at a previous college because they’ve been found responsible for behavioral problems like assault, harassment, or academic fraud. A conference official said the policy relies on athletes to self-disclose those past disciplinary issues.

Student leaders at Washington State University, which plays in the Pac-12, have asked campus leaders to enact an outright ban on athletes with a sexual-violence record, similar to the policies of Indiana and the Big 12. “If these people have a history of sexual misconduct, you don’t want to glorify and elevate them beyond the rest of our campus,” said Jordan Frost, the student body president.

For Indiana’s athletics director, Fred Glass, including freshman athletes in his institution’s policy was a no-brainer. Mr. Glass couldn’t understand why the SEC would prevent misbehaving athletes from transferring in but would allow players with a similar profile to join the team as freshmen.

“We want to have young people representing IU and IU athletics that everyone can be proud of,” he said.

The policy also provides substantial due process for the athletes, which was important, Mr. Glass said. “Our policy only kicks in after an adjudication process,” whether it’s in a school, college, or court, he said, and the athlete must have the chance to present his or her side of the matter.

Prospective athletes can appeal, and that’s a process a university panel would handle, not the athletics department, he added. “We don’t pretend to have this be a silver bullet and be right every time.”

Illinois is still drafting its policy on athletes and sexual misconduct, said Kent Brown, a spokesman for the university’s athletics department.

“A policy on not accepting student-athletes with a history of domestic or sexual violence is being put in place as a way to make our student experience on campus a safer environment,” Mr. Brown said. “This can be a complicated issue, but we feel having a policy in place would make it clear that the University of Illinois will not accept this type of behavior.”

Cultural Change

Ultimately, Ms. Tracy wants to bring about cultural change by tying athletes’ conduct more closely to their eligibility. (After she reported her sexual assault to the police in 1998, the four men were arrested and the Oregon State football coach suspended two of the players for a game, but criminal charges were not filed because, for various reasons, she was reluctant to participate in a trial.)

“What we’re saying to our prospective athletes is that not only do your grades matter, but your behavior matters,” she said, and the handful of policies that have been enacted so far are a step in the right direction.

Still, Katherine Redmond Brown, founder of the National Coalition Against Violent Athletes, questioned the effectiveness of the policies. In terms of athletes with past felony convictions for sexual misconduct, “you’re talking about less than a fraction of a percentage point of any population,” she said.

It’s more likely that athletes would be investigated and found responsible by their college for sexual misconduct, so preventing such athletes from transferring to other institutions might root out a few more problem players. Still, only a small percentage of campus sexual assaults are reported.

Even the policies adopted by Indiana and the Big 12, which cover freshmen and transfers, might not do much to prevent prospective athletes who behaved badly in high school but have no formal record of misconduct, Ms. Redmond Brown said. While most colleges have improved their policies on responding to and preventing sexual assault in recent years, in response to pressure from the federal government, the same shift hasn’t happened at the K-12 level.

But a criminal conviction or formal disciplinary finding for sexual violence “is not the only basis on which we’d deny admission to people,” Mr. Glass said.

He pointed to a less-discussed piece of the policies that Indiana and a couple of conferences have adopted: a “due diligence” requirement that adds another layer of scrutiny to the mix. Indiana officials must specifically ask athletes about any previous discipline involving sexual violence, he said, and they also must interview teachers, coaches, administrators, and others about individual players, which could include discussions about sexual misconduct and other behavioral concerns.

The most effective way to keep problem athletes out of the collegiate athletics system is by focusing on the recruitment process, Ms. Redmond Brown said. “It all falls into the laps of coaches and scouts,” she said. “They know who to talk to and where to go to get the information that will tell them whether or not an athlete poses a behavioral risk.”

But if you’re a college coach, particularly for big-time football or basketball programs, you tend to have about three years to start fielding a winning team, Ms. Redmond Brown said.

“You’re not thinking, I need to make sure that I recruit players that are emotionally sensitive and empathetic,” she said. “Fans and boosters are not concerned about the culture. They’re concerned about the wins.”

Sarah Brown writes about a range of higher-education topics, including sexual assault, race on campus, and Greek life. Follow her on Twitter @Brown_e_Points, or email her at sarah.brown@chronicle.com.