All criteria attached.
Ethics and Compliance Programs
Write a 5–7 page paper in which you:
Determine the fundamental ways in which the NCAA’s ethics program failed to prevent the scandals at Penn State, Ohio State, and the University of Alaska.
Support your response with one example from each of these schools’ scandals.
Examine the principal ways in which the leadership of the NCAA contributed to the ethical violations of Penn State, Ohio State, and the University of Alaska.
Support your response with one example from each of these schools’ scandals.
Predict the key differences in the scenarios that occurred at Penn State, Ohio State, and the University of Alaska if an effective ethics program was in place.
Provide a rationale for your response.
Postulate on three actions that the NCAA leadership should take in order to regain the trust and confidence of students and stakeholders.
Recommend three measures that the HR departments of colleges and universities should take to prevent similar incidents from occurring in the future.
Provide a rationale for your response.
The specific course learning outcome associated with this assignment is:
Propose leadership actions and ethics program revisions to prevent ethics violations and regain stakeholder trust.
1. Use the attached Three case studies as references
1. Please complete a heading for each individual criterion.
1. Number all Pages
1. Use 3 sources
Ohio State
The NCAA has notified Ohio State that it will face a “failure to monitor” charge in addition to more allegations of rules violations by its troubled football program.
Ohio State will strip itself of five total football scholarships over the next three years in response to the further alleged violations, the school announced Thursday.
The Buckeyes, who were awaiting a ruling after appearing before the NCAA committee on infractions Aug. 12 for the tattoo-for-memorabilia scandal, received another notice of allegations from the NCAA on Nov. 3. Those allegations revolved around a Cleveland-area booster who provided extra benefits to players.
“Failure to monitor” is among the most serious allegations the NCAA can bring against a member school.
Ohio State president Gordon Gee expressed disappointment Thursday in athletic director Gene Smith for not properly monitoring the actions of the ex-booster, Robert DiGeronimo.
In a letter to Smith, dated on Thursday, Gee wrote, “I am disappointed that this is where we find ourselves. You know I find this unacceptable.”
School officials are scheduled to appear before the NCAA infractions committee again on Dec. 10 to answer to these latest charges. However, Ohio State has asked to have the charges reviewed during a conference call the week of Nov. 28 — the final week of the football regular season.
The NCAA alleged that DiGeronimo provided a total of $2,405 in extra benefits to nine football players. That included payments of $200 each to four players who attended a charity event in February, and five players who were overpaid a total of $1,605 for work they did not perform in summer jobs at DiGeronimo’s excavation company.
DiGeronimo has admitted giving $200 to running back
Jordan Hall
, cornerback Travis Howard, defensive back
Corey Brown
and former Buckeyes quarterback Terrelle Pryor at the charity event.
Hall, Howard and Brown were each suspended earlier this season. Running back
Dan Herron
, receiver
DeVier Posey
and offensive lineman Marcus Hall were suspended for their role in the summer job case. Herron and Posey had their five-game suspensions stemming from the tattoo scandal lengthened.
DiGeronimo and Posey have disputed the allegations of overpayment for jobs.
Ohio State disassociated itself with DiGeronimo on Sept. 20 and announced it was taking measures to enhance its education and compliance monitoring.
But the NCAA said the school “failed to take appropriate actions to determine if DiGeronimo continued to employ student-athletes or host them at the charity event despite concerns about his interaction with the football program.”
In addition, the NCAA said Ohio State “failed to educate football student-athletes about DiGeronimo, encourage them to cease interaction with him or inquire about their potential employment with DiGeronimo and attendance at the charity event.”
DiGeronimo’s charity, called Cornerstone of Hope, was involved with a secondary violation involving a lack of paperwork in 2006. In its response, Ohio State said it told DiGeronimo to stop interacting with coaches, visiting athletic facilities and being around the program.
However, the school still allowed athletes to work at DiGeronimo’s company and attend his charity events — though it said players were strongly encouraged to fill out the necessary paperwork to do so.
DiGeronimo had been an Ohio State booster since the 1980s, when he was part of a group known as the “committeemen” who helped recruit players before such practices were outlawed.
DiGeronimo contributed more than $72,000 to the athletic department since 1988 and had been a season ticket holder for years, the report said.
DiGeronimo was one of a group of outsiders who had access to Ohio State’s locker room on game days, a practice that coach Jim Tressel stopped after taking the job, according to the NCAA report.
Ohio State football players celebrate their January Sugar Bowl win, one of the victories now vacated.
Ohio State University is vacating all of its football program’s 2010 wins, as well as its Sugar Bowl victory over Arkansas in January 2011, in the wake of a scandal that cost head coach Jim Tressel his job.
The move was part of a formal response to the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s official notice of allegations to the school in April, after discovering Mr. Tressel failed to report that some star players had swapped memorabilia for cash and tattoos.
Other steps included changing Mr. Tressel’s resignation to a retirement, self-imposing a two-year probation and suspending five players for the first five games of next season.
Mr. Tressel said in a statement that he was thankful for the opportunity to retire, thereby collecting the salary and benefits owed him through June 30. He added that he would remain a Buckeye “forever,” continuing to cooperate with and assist the school in the future.
Former star quarterback Terrelle Pryor was also suspended but left school to pursue a job in the National Football League after Mr. Tressel resigned in May.
In a statement, Ohio State athletic director Gene Smith said, “We are taking a very hard look on our own at all aspects of our athletic programs to identify and implement improvements designed to ensure that we uphold the highest ideals of honor and integrity. Throughout the entire process since we discovered possible infractions, Ohio State has consistently acted to investigate any allegation, self-report its findings to the NCAA, communicate transparently about its findings, and take necessary remediation steps.”
But the question remains whether these penalties are sufficiently tough. Ohio State came under fire this winter for its relatively tepid initial response to the crisis, in which it suspended Mr. Tressel for two games and slapped him with a $250,000 fine, which has since been waived. A university spokeswoman declined to comment on the reason for the waiver.
One weapon the NCAA has in its arsenal is restricting schools’ television appearances.
In its April letter to Ohio State, the NCAA requested a review of the school’s obligations concerning live telecasts of games for the next three seasons. The TV revenue generated by a major football program generally helps to subsidize a school’s less profitable sports like golf and swimming.
Gerry DiNardo, a former head coach at Louisiana State, Vanderbilt and Indiana universities, said he thought Ohio State’s response was appropriate based on the disclosures of wrongdoing to date, though he added that “future penalties,” such as revoking scholarships, are generally “more effective than vacating wins.”
“If nothing else has come out, I think this is fair. But do I think this is over? No I don’t think this is over,” said Mr. DiNardo, an analyst for the Big Ten Network. “The NCAA still has to respond, and if the NCAA does more, I might be OK with that.”
Former Ohio State quarterback Stanley Jackson said he thought his alma mater’s response may have been too harsh.
“I’m not sure we had to vacate the Sugar Bowl victory—the NCAA knew what the players had done at that point and still allowed them to play,” said Mr. Jackson, now a color analyst for Ohio State games.
But, he added, “there’s always a consequence to your action, and we had a handful of guys that made some poor decisions.”
The university said it will have no further comment on specific allegations.
Write to Hannah Karp at
hannah.karp@dowjones.com
The University of Alaska
The University of Alaska Fairbanks will face a variety of penalties—including a $30,000 fine, a postseason ban in several sports and reduced scholarships—stemming from a series of NCAA infractions first discovered by the Nanooks in 2011.
UAF received word Wednesday morning of final decision from the NCAA’s Committee on Infractions.
The infractions spanned the 2007-2008 through 2011-2012 academic years and involved 40 student-athletes in nine of the Alaska Nanooks’ 10 sports teams. Only women’s cross-country was unaffected. The university self-reported the infractions to the NCAA in 2011 and 2012 and instituted some self-penalties at the time.
“These infractions are the result of university errors, not any wrongdoing by student-athletes,” said UAF Chancellor Brian Rogers. “Our student-athletes are high academic achievers who display integrity in their sport.”
The issues that prompted the infractions deal with student-athletes’ eligibility in four areas: transfer credit requirements, eligibility of pre-majors, declaration of majors and progress toward degree.
In general, to be eligible to compete, student-athletes must be enrolled in a baccalaureate degree program, take at least 12 credits each semester toward their degree, earn at least a 2.0 GPA and be making progress toward their degree of record. The infractions happened when the university failed to identify students who had not earned the required number of countable credits or who had informally switched majors but not filed the appropriate forms to do so officially. In addition, some students were admitted to UAF as “pre-majors,” which isn’t a baccalaureate program under NCAA rules.
The university first reported the infractions to the NCAA in June of 2011 and then made additional reports of infractions in November of 2012. Since then, the university has made major changes in the way it certifies student-athletes and the resources dedicated to those efforts. In the past, that responsibility fell only to the compliance coordinator. Today, a team of trained professionals in athletics, advising, admissions and the registrar’s office collaborate to ensure that student-athletes are taking the courses they need to earn their degrees and remain academically eligible.
“Clearly we needed, and now have, a well-defined, supportive compliance and advising system,” Rogers said. “I am proud of our Alaska Nanooks and sorry that our university let them down. Our students—and student-athletes—deserve the best. Discovering this issue has allowed us to become a better university and a better athletics program.”
The NCAA imposed the sanctions after a hearing in mid-September. The sanctions include some of the self-imposed sanctions the university instituted after discovering and self-reporting infractions in 2011. Those self-imposed sanctions included increased reporting to the NCAA and the temporary suspension of nine scholarships in five sports over three years.
The University of Alaska
The University of Alaska Fairbanks will face a variety of penalties—including a $30,000 fine, a postseason ban in several sports and reduced scholarships—stemming from a series of NCAA infractions first discovered by the Nanooks in 2011.
UAF received word Wednesday morning of final decision from the NCAA’s Committee on Infractions.
The infractions spanned the 2007-2008 through 2011-2012 academic years and involved 40 student-athletes in nine of the Alaska Nanooks’ 10 sports teams. Only women’s cross-country was unaffected. The university self-reported the infractions to the NCAA in 2011 and 2012 and instituted some self-penalties at the time.
“These infractions are the result of university errors, not any wrongdoing by student-athletes,” said UAF Chancellor Brian Rogers. “Our student-athletes are high academic achievers who display integrity in their sport.”
The issues that prompted the infractions deal with student-athletes’ eligibility in four areas: transfer credit requirements, eligibility of pre-majors, declaration of majors and progress toward degree.
In general, to be eligible to compete, student-athletes must be enrolled in a baccalaureate degree program, take at least 12 credits each semester toward their degree, earn at least a 2.0 GPA and be making progress toward their degree of record. The infractions happened when the university failed to identify students who had not earned the required number of countable credits or who had informally switched majors but not filed the appropriate forms to do so officially. In addition, some students were admitted to UAF as “pre-majors,” which isn’t a baccalaureate program under NCAA rules.
The university first reported the infractions to the NCAA in June of 2011 and then made additional reports of infractions in November of 2012. Since then, the university has made major changes in the way it certifies student-athletes and the resources dedicated to those efforts. In the past, that responsibility fell only to the compliance coordinator. Today, a team of trained professionals in athletics, advising, admissions and the registrar’s office collaborate to ensure that student-athletes are taking the courses they need to earn their degrees and remain academically eligible.
“Clearly we needed, and now have, a well-defined, supportive compliance and advising system,” Rogers said. “I am proud of our Alaska Nanooks and sorry that our university let them down. Our students—and student-athletes—deserve the best. Discovering this issue has allowed us to become a better university and a better athletics program.”
The NCAA imposed the sanctions after a hearing in mid-September. The sanctions include some of the self-imposed sanctions the university instituted after discovering and self-reporting infractions in 2011. Those self-imposed sanctions included increased reporting to the NCAA and the temporary suspension of nine scholarships in five sports over three years.
Ethics and Compliance Programs
Write a 5–7 page paper in which you:
Determine the fundamental ways in which the NCAA’s ethics program failed to prevent the scandals at Penn State, Ohio State, and the University of Alaska.
Support your response with one example from each of these schools’ scandals.
Examine the principal ways in which the leadership of the NCAA contributed to the ethical violations of Penn State, Ohio State, and the University of Alaska.
Support your response with one example from each of these schools’ scandals.
Predict the key differences in the scenarios that occurred at Penn State, Ohio State, and the University of Alaska if an effective ethics program was in place.
Provide a rationale for your response.
Postulate on three actions that the NCAA leadership should take in order to regain the trust and confidence of students and stakeholders.
Recommend three measures that the HR departments of colleges and universities should take to prevent similar incidents from occurring in the future.
Provide a rationale for your response.
The specific course learning outcome associated with this assignment is:
Propose leadership actions and ethics program revisions to prevent ethics violations and regain stakeholder trust.
1. Use the attached Three case studies as references
1. Please complete a heading for each individual criterion.
1. Number all Pages
1. Use 3 sources
