Definitions

Student-Athlete: A student-athlete is a student who is enrolled at a four year institution and whose enrollment was solicited by a member of the athletics staff or other representative of athletics interests with a view toward the student's participation in the intercollegiate athletics program.

Prospective Student-Athlete: A "prospect" is a student who has begun classes for the 9th grade. A student who has not started classes for the 9th grade becomes a "prospect" if the institution provides the individual (or the individual's relatives or friends) any financial assistance or other benefits not generally provided to prospective students.

Contact: Any face-to-face encounter between a prospect or their parents, relatives or legal guardian(s) and an institutional staff member or an athletics representative during which any dialogue occurs in excess of an exchange of a greeting. A meeting that is prearranged or takes place at the prospect's school, competition site or practice site is considered a contact regardless of the conversation that occurs.

Evaluation: Any off-campus activity designed to assess the academic qualifications or the athletic ability of a prospect. This includes any visit to a prospect's school (during which no contact with the prospect occurs) or watching a practice or competition at any site where the prospect participates.

Quiet Period: Period of time when it is permissible to make in-person recruiting contacts only on the institution's campus. No in-person, off-campus recruiting contacts or evaluations may be made during a quiet period.

Dead Period: Period of time when it is not permissible to make in-person recruiting contacts or evaluations on or off campus. In addition, there can be no official or unofficial visits to the campus by a prospect. However, it is permissible for a staff member to write or phone a prospect during this period.

Extra Benefit: Any special arrangement by an institutional employee or a representative of its athletics interests to provide a student-athlete, their friends or their relatives with any benefits not expressly authorized by the NCAA. A benefit is not considered a violation if it is demonstrated that the same benefit is generally available to the institution's students or others determined on a basis unrelated to athletics ability.

Representatives of Athletics Interests: An individual, independent agency, corporate entity, or any organization who is known (or who should have been known), by a member institution's executive or athletics administration to:

• Have participated in or to be a member of an agency or organization promoting the institution's intercollegiate athletics program;

• Have made financial contributions to the athletics department or to an athletics booster organization of that institution;

• Be assisting or to have been requested (by the athletics department staff) to assist in the recruitment of prospects;

• Be assisting or to have assisted in providing benefits to enrolled student-athletes or their families; or

• Have been involved otherwise in promoting the institution's athletics program.

Once an individual is identified as such a representative, the person retains that identity indefinitely.

Recruiting: Any solicitation of a prospect or his/her family by an institutional staff member or by a representative of the institution's athletics interests for the purpose of securing the prospect's enrollment and participation in the institution's athletics program.

Activities that constituting recruitment include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Providing transportation to the prospect to visit the campus

• Entertaining the prospect in any way on campus. However, the institution may provide a complimentary admission to an on-campus athletic contest when the prospect is visiting as a member of a group tour that is unrelated to athletic recruitment

• Initiating or arranging telephone contact with the prospect or his on more than one occasion family for the purpose of recruitment

• An arranged, off-campus encounter with a prospect or any members of their family for the purpose of recruitment

• Entertaining the family members of a prospect on campus

• Sending correspondence to a prospect, other than a generic letter that requests general information

• The arrangement of meals, housing, transportation or academic interviews during an unofficial visit.

Official Visit: A visit financed in whole or in part by the institution.

Unofficial Visit: A visit made at the prospect's own expense. The institution may provide only limited benefits to the prospect during his visit. These benefits include complimentary admissions to an on-campus athletics event in which the institution's team competes and transportation to view off-campus practice or competition sites within a 30-mile radius of the institution's campus when accompanied by a staff member. The provision of any other expenses or entertainment shall require the visit to become an official visit.