Despite decision made by NCAA Division 1 Council to extend eligibility clock, Ivy League chooses not to amend policy that would allow graduate student-athletes to compete with one-time waiver in spring sports during 2020-21 school year 

By Erik Boal, DyeStat Editor

Near the top of the Ivy League Web site are the words, “Storied Tradition.”

The Ivy League decided Thursday not to break from that tradition, despite the NCAA Division 1 Council agreeing Monday to extend the eligibility clock and provide scholarship relief for spring sport student-athletes who had their seasons canceled March 12 as a result of the ongoing Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

Since Ivy League universities have never allowed graduate students to participate in sports, the decision made by the NCAA Division 1 Council created a window of opportunity for the conference to allow a one-time exemption for the 2020-21 school year, even though the conference does not provide athletic scholarships.

But the presidents of the schools decided not to change the conference’s existing policy.

In order for a one-year waiver to have been agreed upon, six of the conference’s eight presidents would have needed to support the exemption in order for the guideline to be amended.

“After a number of discussions surrounding the current circumstances, the Ivy League has decided the league’s existing eligibility policies will remain in place, including its longstanding practice that athletic opportunities are for undergraduates,” the conference said in a press release.

At the center of the decision is University of Pennsylvania director of athletics and recreation M. Grace Calhoun, who is also the chair of the NCAA Division 1 Council.

“We had hours of conversation, since it’s an extraordinary circumstance,” Calhoun told the Associated Press.

“We discussed allowing institutions to work with student-athletes up to and including allowing them to be grad students. Or do we hold tight and say our founding principles are what they are.

“(The conference believes in) undergraduate eligibility and despite the circumstances, we’ll stick with that.”

As of Friday, more than 70 Ivy League senior student-athletes who compete in spring sports had entered the NCAA transfer portal, although the individuals had not publicly announced their decisions prior to the conference’s decision.

If senior student-athletes decide to take advantage of the extension of the eligibility clock and return to participate in a spring sport during the 2020-21 school year, they do not count against the scholarship limit for their team.

But if an Ivy League senior student-athlete transfers schools in order to compete in a spring sport for their final season, they will count against the scholarship limit for their new program, including outdoor track and field.

For a fully funded Division 1 track and field program, women’s teams are allowed 18 scholarships and men’s teams have 12.6 scholarships available.

There are ways in which a student-athlete could remain at their existing Ivy League school, without exhausting their undergraduate eligibility, although Calhoun indicated it wasn’t a recommended course of action.

The first would be by adding a second major or extra minor, thus extending their academic schedule and delaying their graduation beyond eight semesters.

The other includes a decision to withdraw from the university and return during the 2020-21 school year, but in order to do so, the student-athlete would have to first regain admission and then receive a special waiver from conference officials to allow participation in their sport.