By embarking on a full−fledged look at its philosophy over the last year, Div. III's membership put to rest — at least temporarily — talk of splitting up. It instead pursued an agenda aimed at discovering and better articulating what the division's diverse institutions share in common, culminating in the launch of its so−called identity initiative.
But the continued growth of the NCAA's largest membership group begs the question: Is the restructuring debate dead for good? People around Div. III certainly don't think so.
By the year 2020, the division is projected to have approximately 480 active and provisional members, or more than double the number of institutions that were present when it was created in 1973. The continued growth will likely only exacerbate practical issues — the increasingly dwindling access to championships, for instance — which were cited in 2008 as potential reasons for Div. III to split up. As growth continues to strain the division, discussions to restructure may inevitably reopen.
"Looking at history, [2008] was not the first time in the history of Div. III that restructuring came up, and so I'd imagine that in some number of years, if we continue to grow, that it will come up again," said Keri Alexander Luchowski, acting executive director of the North Coast Athletic Conference. "I think these types of issues come up periodically as an organization grows and moves into the future."
The prevailing thought, however, seems to be that the division has done enough to stabilize its growth in the short term and that it will not have to consider restructuring anytime soon. Among the solutions it pursued in the past was a two−year moratorium on accepting new institutions and, more recently, a limitation on the class size of provisional members and reclassifying members to four schools per year.
While Div. III's recent identity initiative may not have directly implemented solutions to the growth problem, it may have at least made its membership more amenable to future additions. Administrators hope that expressing the division's core philosophical beliefs will mean that prospective institutions will approach membership with a clear understanding of what Div. III stands for.
"I'm not a strong believer in excluding people just to exclude them," Tufts Athletics Director Bill Gehling said. "It's really important that if someone wants to join Div. III that they understand what it is. If someone truly understands what it is and embraces what it is, then my view is we can absorb any increase in the near future without causing real problems."
"To new members or to institutions that are looking to go to Div. III, [the identity initiative] sends a really strong, clear message about what we are and what the core values are," said Andrea Savage, executive director of the New England Small College Athletic Conference.
For the immediate future, Div. III will address its continued growth by building off the results of its identity initiative and encouraging member institutions to consider how well they align philosophically with Div. III's central tenants. In that vein, a handful of schools have recently been reclassified to Div. II. Indeed, it is more likely that these types of solutions will be given more serious consideration in coming years than restructuring will.
"That issue's always been there, and I don't think it will ever go away. But the question really is will the membership overall decide that that's an appropriate method or a necessary method?" Div. III Vice President Dan Dutcher told the Daily. "I don't think structural change focused solely on Div. III is something I anticipate being actively engaged in between now and 2020."
