My alma mater has announced the two finalists to be the next president.  And regardless of who is chosen, ACU can’t lose with either one.

Phil Shubert s executive vice president at ACU. He is responsible for the development and coordination of university-wide strategic planning; he oversees operational areas including ACU’s admissions and recruiting, marketing, university relations, finance, information services, facilities and human resources.

Rick Lytle is dean of ACU’s College of Business, a position he has held since 2000. He also serves as professor of marketing. He helped secure AACSB accreditation for COBA in 2004, then again in 2009.

I know both of these candidates.  And I know that these two outstanding men make for two outstanding candidates.  The real winner in all this is ACU.  In 2010, ACU will have a new president and a bright future.

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As we conclude our series on the NCAA investigation of ACU athletics and launch our new ebook, here is the link to the official NCAA report:

NCAA report on ACU

When the NCAA announced its findings on the ACU athletic department in February 2009, ACU President Royce Money responded:

“To be clear, we maintain that these infractions do not include intentional violations. While we had systems in place at the time of the infractions, this investigation has led us to strengthen our compliance education.”

Fair enough. But what was missing from this statement was an explanation of why these “major” infractions took place and how many of them were consistent with ACU’s values.

Crisis communications experts often talk about how its important to focus on results, not process. The statement ACU gave in response to the NCAA findings tended to focus on process. “We had systems in place,” Dr. Money said.

In retrospect, wouldn’t it have been better to say something like: “We have a values system in place”?  And then go onto to describe the church Christmas party as an example of Christians simply showing some Christian charity to the student-athletes?

I think ACU missed an opportunity to describe to the nation why it is different than any other college in the country.

Today we continue our series on the NCAA sanctions against ACU’s athletic department. And let me be clear: ACU is guilty of these charges. I just don’t think these charges are worthy of the punishments.

Or, to put it another way, what ACU did might have been illegal, but it wasn’t immoral.

Take the case of the church Christmas party. This party was going to be held whether the athletes came or not. Since they also attended the church, why shouldn’t they have gone? Just like when I was in college, my professor, Dr. John Willis, hosted a meal at his house every Sunday night than any student could attend. What’s wrong with that? I talked to a person who was at the Christmas party who said the athletes talked about how far they were from home and what Christmas was like in their home countries. He said it was one of the most moving experiences of his life.

Or take the case of the track athlete who got medical treatment paid for by a friend at church.

At the Indoor Nationals, the athlete got a massive blister that covered the entire ball of his foot.  It was cleaned and treated at the meet. The large flap of skin was laid back and the bare raw area was treated by the training staff. Once back in Texas the injury became worse and medical help was needed…and fast. With no one  turn to–athletic trainers were gone due to Spring Break–a Christian sprinted to the rescue and took him to the urgent care center and paid for his treatment. This is not out of the ordinary for any student at “No Ordinary University”.

Like I’ve said before, this would all be funny if it weren’t so sad.

And how did the NCAA become so obsessed with all these minor infractions at a little school like ACU?

It turns out they had an inside source. We’ll talk more about that tomorrow.

And the hits just keep on coming…

Here are some more of the “major violations” that the ACU athletic department committed, according to the NCAA:

“During the summer of 2007, two members of the football coaching staff assisted prospects 3 and 4 with their correspondence coursework.”

And what is the evidence the NCAA cites to back up this claim?

“Because assistant coach C knew prospect 3 needed to be pushed in his school work, he phoned the young man regularly to urge him to study.”

Oh, the horror of it! A college coach actually encouraging an athlete to study. Come on. Isn’t this what all coaches should be doing? Not just coaching on the field but encouraging academic pursuits off the field, too?

Here is another “major violation” according to the NCAA:

“The scope and nature of the violations detailed in Findings B-1, B-2 and B-3 demonstrate that the head coach failed to maintain an atmosphere of compliance within the men’s and women’s track and field program and failed to monitor certain aspects of the program to ensure compliance with NCAA legislation.”

And the evidence?

The track coach “gave each of the young men, who had expressed a desire to compete on his team, a pair of running shoes.”

Tell me again how a pair of running shoes is a “major violation” of the rules?

I do know this NCAA report is a major joke. When you consider that many major colleges pay athletes (remember Rhett Bomar’s “job” and how OU got a slap on the wrist?) then the ACU violations don’t seem very major at all.

How absurd are the NCAA sanctions against Abilene Christian University’s athletic department?

Consider the case of the church party. Let me quote directly from the NCAA report:

“Many members of the institution’s track and field teams are international student-athletes who are unable to travel to their home countries during the Christmas holidays. During the holiday seasons in both 2006 and 2007, “pot luck” suppers organized by a local church [Hillcrest Church of Christ] were held for some of the international students at the home of an assistant track coach (”assistant coach A”). During those parties 15 student-athletes (”student-athletes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12,13, 14 and 15,” respectively) were provided impermissible benefits including small appliances, DVD’s, CD’s, food items, gift cards, personal items, clothing items and cash. The items were donated by members of the church.”

Are you kidding me? ACU is being punished because a local church gave out some CD’s and gift cards at a Christmas party? Is this a joke?

But it gets more absurd. Also from the NCAA report:

“Once prospect 3 finished his assignments, assistant coach C mailed the completed correspondence course work to the institution through which the course was offered so that it could be graded. Assistant coach C paid the postage fee to send the assignments. Prospect 3 passed the class and competed for the institution.”

I thought coaches were supposed to support the academic pursuits of athletes. How is mailing in the correspondence work a major violation?

Tomorrow, we’ll go through some more of the greatest hits of this absurd report. Be prepared to be shocked at how silly the violations were and how heavy-handed the NCAA’s response was.

This week we are kicking off a new blog series entitled: “No good deed goes unpunished.”

This is the story of how ACU’s athletic department got into trouble. Not for paying recruits. Not for fixing grades. But for basic human kindness.

Do you think a track athlete from Africa should be allowed to get a Christmas gift from a local church? I do, too. But the NCAA doesn’t.

In this series, we’ll show you how the NCAA treated jaywalking like it were first-degree murder.

And, we’ll show you how ACU’s response was not nearly strong enough. By not standing up for itself, ACU set the stage to get attacked again…and for other small colleges to get attacked, too.

So be sure and check out our series all this week!

This week, Royce Money announced he's retiring as president of my
alma mater, Abilene Christian University.

I've always loved ACU; and I love the great work that Dr. Money did
there during the last 20 years.  Under his leadership, ACU became a
perennial presence on the US News and World Report list of best
colleges.  Under his leadership, programs were expanded and the
endowment increased.  And under his leadership, ACU reached new
heights while remaining firmly committed to its roots.

I know that ACU will find someone who can succeed Dr. Money.  But it
won't find anyone who can replace him.

There is something special going on at the College of Business Administration at Abilene Christian University. And I want to be a part of it.

If there is one word that defines the difference at the business department at ACU it is: entrepreneurship.  ACU now has a full-time entrepreneur-in-residence, Jim Porter.  Jim brings years of business experience, including successfully started two companies and being involved in the merger of 25 others.  As I’ve written before on this blog, innovation is creating or doing something new before there is a market for it.  ACU’s business school has certainly provided a fine example of innovation with its entrepreneur-in-residence concept.

There are even talks around town that Dr. Rick Lytle, the Dean of the College of Business Administration, is exploring the idea of an Entrepreneurial Incubator.  This is a great time for this project since I believe economic downturns are always fertile ground for new innovation and entrepreneurship.

And there are talks that COBA is exploring the possibilities of a Center for Global Ethics and Leadership. That’s a perfect fit since at ACU students are not only taught how to make a profit, but how to make a difference. In fact, students are taught that the two go hand in hand. I was reminded of how special this approach to business education is earlier this year when I was asked to speak at the ACU Leadership Summit:

Randy Hill YouTube Channel:  Hill Speaks on the topic of “Leadership” at ACU Leadership Summit

This is why I’m so proud of my alma mater.  Lots of schools talk about making a difference; my alma mater actually does.

-Randy Hill

The biggest shortcoming of the recently passed stimulus package is that it does little for the most important people in the economy: entrepreneurs.  So says a great article in this week’s Wall Street Journal:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123544318435655825.html

As readers of this blog know, I have long believed that entrepreneurs are the key to turning the economy around.  But does anyone around the president know that?

Here is what the Journal article said:

“At its best, the stimulus legislation is an immensely expensive attempt to restore what the U.S. economy has lost in the last few months. But the world is already moving on. The only way the American economy is going to regain its lost health and vitality is to lead the world into the future. Entrepreneurs are the only people who can get us there.”

Amen.  And that’s why so many colleges are beginning to move their business departments more in the direction of entrepreneurship.  My alma mater has an entreneuer-in-residence right now.  He brings his real world know-how into academia.  And the winners are the students who learn how their classroom knowledge can work in the corporate boardroom.

The bottom line is that economic downturns create opportunities for entrepreneurs.  So why not help the entrepreneurs create new ideas? I’ll have more to say on this in a few days when I unveil my first e-book devoted to this very topic.

-Randy Hill

Sometimes nice guys do finish first.  That certainly is the case for Bob Hunter.

http://m.reporternews.com/news/2009/feb/21/family-friends-help-open-hunter-welcome-center/

Most of us only dream about the kind of career Bob has had: college official, state representative, husband, father.  The thread that weaves these different aspects of his life together is his love for God and his love for Abilene Christian University.  And so it’s a perfect tribute that ACU opened a new building in his honor: The Hunter Welcome Center.  This past weekend, more than 700 invited guests, including 57 Hunter family members, were on hand for the festivities.  The new building is a $15.7 million 57,000-square-foot facility.  And as someone who was there for the opening, I can assure you it is a beautiful place.

Which is at it should be since Bob and his wife Shirley are beautiful people. As a college administrator, he helped transform his alma mater from a small college into a major university and was the driving force behind innovative ideas like Sing Song. As a state representative, he coordinated passage of the Texas Tuition Equalization Grant program, which has provided more than $1 billion to students to help them attend private colleges in Texas. And as a man, he simply has no equal.  His grace is matched only by his compassion.

This past weekend, I was proud to see Bob honored by the university he has honored so long and so well.

As a young student in the late 1980s, I was always impressed with the little man with such a possitive attitude that I often met as I crossed the campus heading to classes. Soon his optimistic personality began to rub off on me. When I graduated I took with me many things that I had learned durring my time at ACU.  One of those was the possitive attitude that I learned from Bob. Twenty years later, when asked how I am doing, I still tell people: Great! Never good, fine or ok. But great! Why?  Because that’s what Bob always says.

A few years ago I was invited to Austin for a meeting at the Capital with the Govenors office. Before the meeting I decided to stop by Bob’s office and pay him a visit. As I walked in the door I ask if Bob was in. From the back office I heard him say, “I hear a friendly voice.” Aand I thought to myself, “so do I.”

-Randy Hill

I guess my “major” complaint about the sanctions leveled by the NCAA against ACU is the adjective “major.”

How can the NCAA look at the facts and decide these were “major” violations?  A Christmas party for international students?  Letting an athlete borrow a pair of running shoes? Someone getting a pair of socks as a gift at a church party?

This is “major”? No, this is absurd.

Let’s keep some perspective on this:

First, ACU is a Christian institution.  As such, it has close affiliations with many local churches.

Second, churches do charity.  All the time.  If an international student visits a local church, he/she is going to receive some hospitality.
Third, the NCAA rules covering recruiting are not as simple as some might think.  Here is how ACU Athletic Director Jared Mosley described it:

“The one thing I can say, and I’ve said this multiple times and been consistent, it’s a very complex issue, NCAA compliance. So there are opportunities to misinterpret or just not enough steps in your research to find out the exact approach or method in moving forward in certain situations.”
http://www.reporternews.com/news/2009/feb/15/qa-with-jared-mosley-acu-athletic-director/

So the combination of well-intentioned hospitality with confusing guidelines led to some “major” violations, according to the NCAA.

Here is what is a major violation: when your star quarterback is getting paid by a local backer’s car dealership for a job he doesn’t even do.  That was Rhett Bomar and OU.  And that was a major violation.  Giving out socks at a church Christmas party is anything but major.

Someone at the NCAA needs to learn the difference.

-Randy Hill

I’ve always agreed with Martin Luther King’s statement that the measure of a man is found not in times of comfort but in times of challenge.  I believe that’s true of organizations as well.

Take my alma mater: Abilene Christian University.  Few places mean more to me than ACU.  It’s where I went to school, met friends for life and found the girl of my dreams.  But that’s not to say it’s perfect.  You may have recently read about some problems in the athletic department:

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2009/02/13/sports/Abilene-Christian-NCAA.php

What’s interesting to me about this story is that ACU comes across in a good light, not a bad one.  ACU investigated itself, turned itself in and even disciplined itself.  And if you look at some of the violations, they certainly don’t seem so bad.  A Christmas party for international athletes who couldn’t return home? Come on.  On some of these violations, the NCAA should be saluting ACU, not sanctioning it.

Even in this challenge, my alma later looks like what it really is: a school that does things right and does the right thing.

-Randy Hill

Just finished watching an incredible game where Abilene Christian beat West Texas A&M 93-68.  Oh, and that’s in FOOTBALL (not BB in case you were wondering.   Here’s proof I was there.

ACU wins 93-68

- Randy Hill, Texas