In light of the NCAA's investigation into UNC's athletic-academic scandal, UNC's Faculty Council is tasked with determining how academics and athletics at the University should interact going forward.
Within the council is the faculty athletics committee, which recently announced new changes to the athletics department in light of the scandal.
Andrew Perrin, member of the faculty athletics committee and a professor of sociology, said the goal of the committee is to make sure UNC does the right thing with regards to athletics and academics. This oversight encompasses questions about student registration, student performance, admissions and advising.
“The role of FAC is to be the faculty oversight arm to pay attention to every aspect of the places where athletics and academics meet, which is obviously many places,” Perrin said.
Perrin joined after information about the scandal was released. Most of his time on the committee has been related to the NCAA scandal and working to prevent it from happening again.
“I think it’s really important that we monitor and make sure that athletics is done correctly,” Perrin said.
Kimberly Strom-Gottfried, vice chairman of the faculty athletics committee and a professor in the School of Social Work, said the committee has had many changes over the past couple of years, dealing with both current problems and issues as they arise. Moving forward, Strom-Gottfried said priority registration will most likely be addressed by the committee.
Lissa Broome, faculty athletics representative for the University, said this year the committee has been discussing the majors of student athletes, with respect to what major they begin with and what major they graduate with. They also want to work with faculty to ensure that student athletes can pursue what they want to study, and are discussing the status of priority registration for athletes.
In addition, the committee has been discussing lasting implications of the NCAA investigations.
“We can’t rest on our morals now or assume that everything is behind us," Broome said. "We still need to be vigilant, we need to understand what we learned from that experience, we need to be working closely with athletics going forward and trying to figure out where is the next pressure point."
"So I think it is nice that that particular chapter is behind us, but we need to not let up."
The next faculty athletics committee meeting will be on Nov. 28 from 3:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. in South 105.
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