Student-athletes meet to discuss time management, potential NCAA bylaws

The blessing and the burden of the student-athlete, as North Carolina track and field coach Harlis Meaders called it, is all-encompassing. 

But one of the bigger burdens? Time management, the subject of a public forum Wednesday night at Wilson Library. 

Meaders and several UNC athletes — including Justin Jackson of men’s basketball, Maggie Auslander of women’s lacrosse and Ezra Baeli-Wang of fencing — composed the forum designed to discuss potential new NCAA bylaws. 

“Obviously there’s a problem here that needs to be addressed in some way, shape, or form,” said Lissa Broome, a UNC Faculty Athletics representative who helped organize the forum. 

As it currently stands, student-athletes follow what Meaders termed "the 20-8 rule." They can spend 20 hours per week in-season on team athletic activities — that number drops to eight during the offseason.

But there’s an issue.

“Certainly we are not within the 20 hours,” Baeli-Wang said.

A 2016 NCAA survey backs that notion up. According to the study, which featured more than 7,000 Division-I athletes, athletes said they spend an average of 34 hours per week on their sports. 

That doesn’t include the 38.5 average hours reportedly dedicated to academics. 

“That’s a conflict that is pretty concrete,” Baeli-Wang said. “There’s a trade-off somewhere.

“I don’t really think it is possible to be the very best athlete you can be and the very best student you can be.”

The new NCAA bylaws discussed Wednesday are largely aimed at fixing that issue by regulating designated free time for athletes away from their sports.

Firstly, the proposals would grant student-athletes 14 days away from athletic obligations during the year, or roughly seven each semester. On top of that, when competitive seasons end, athletes receive seven additional days away from required athletic activities. The two ideas combined are referred to as "Flex-21." 

The other major proposal is that after home and away competitions, athletes will receive eight hours free from team obligations. 

Those proposals may work in theory, but the panel exposed some of their flaws, too.

“Even if we did get those extra days, with the ways that athletics are set up now with those voluntary workouts, they’re not mandatory, but they are mandatory to get better," Auslander said. 

Jackson agreed.

“For me, voluntary always means mandatory,” he said.

The proposals will be voted on at the next NCAA convention for the Power Five conferences (including the ACC, of which UNC is a member). That session is expected sometime in late January 2017. 

Until then, Meaders and the other athletes in the forum will go about their business as usual. And when the time finally comes to vote on those new bylaws?

“The rules are going to change,” Meaders said, “And whatever they come back with, we as coaches are going to have to adjust.”

@BrendanRMarks

sports@dailytarheel.com