“Coaches, administrators and student-athletes were spending too much time filling out paperwork and entering data in multiple systems.  We needed to improve efficiencies with a unified solution for student-athlete, recruiting and compliance information,” said Russ Sharp, Senior Associate Athletic Director at West Virginia University.

With InControl^TM, each of West Virginia’s 17 sport programs will use a very powerful recruiting system, which will allow coaches to maintain accurate electronic records of all prospect information, recruiting activities and correspondence, effectively managing the recruiting process from start to finish.  In addition, use of InControl^TM will eliminate paper-driven processes such as submission of contact, evaluation and telephone logs.  The InControl^TM system then analyzes those activities to ensure compliance with NCAA rules, eliminating the need to spot-check and ensuring 100% monitoring of NCAA Bylaw 13 activities.

Once prospects become enrolled student-athletes, the roster management tools enable the department of intercollegiate athletics to administer required student-athlete forms electronically, greatly reducing the amount of time spent completing such forms and furthering the institution’s efforts to, “go green.”  InControl^TM also eliminates cumbersome processes such as student-athlete verification of daily and weekly hourly limitations (CARA logs), communicating roster changes and administering student-athlete complimentary admissions.

Sharp added, “With ACS, our staff will have immediate access to information that drives the student-athlete life-cycle and will be able to automate communications and processes in one integrated system. We’ve enjoyed working with ACS and have been impressed with their ability to adapt the system to meet our needs.”

ACS Athletics is the only company that provides all of these services in one integrated platform, ACS InControl^TM, allowing coaches, administrators and student-athletes to be more successful.  For more information, please contact ACS Athletics at (800) 343-6220 or sales@acsathletics.com.

ACS Athletics took time recently to sit down with Mike Hagen, Liberty’s assistant athletic director for compliance, to gain his perspective after two years of managing student-athlete information using ACS InControl™:

ACS:       What features of ACS InControl™ have you found to be the most beneficial?

MH:       We’ve really enjoyed the chance to centralize our information, and having everyone from the compliance, academics, and athletic training staffs viewing a single roster has reduced confusion.

ACS:       How has having a centralized student-athlete information management system benefitted the Liberty University athletics department?

MH:       Our department hasn’t been plugged in effectively to the University’s information management system for quite some time. The use of ACS has allowed us to simplify data management, from contact information to mass emailing, and the processes have greatly improved.

ACS:       How has converting your hard-copy student-athlete forms to a web-based process improved efficiencies?

MH:       We were able to get rid of quite a few filing cabinets. Most NCAA forms were collected once (per year) in a mass meeting at the beginning of the year, then filed and never seen again. Now we can confirm that the correct information was submitted within minutes and not worry about masses of paper. It’s also allowed us to spend more time on important information during pre-season meetings rather than talking students through the forms.

ACS:       Since implementing ACS, have you found that you and your staff now have additional time to focus in other key areas?  If so, what areas?

MH:       Absolutely. As most compliance professionals can probably relate, the NCAA required forms (that are completed) at the beginning of the year take days to sort through, verify, organize, and file. Since we’ve gone to the online system, we no longer spend time checking for signatures, tracking down student-athletes at practice to get missing signatures, and boring our student-athletes during beginning of the year meetings. We’re now able to spend August on more important things, a definite relief for that time of the year.

ACS:       Does anyone other than the compliance staff use the system?  If so, how, and what type of feedback have you received from those users?

MH:       We’re also using ACS for our complimentary tickets. We’ve set up a great system to pre-approve each guest prior to competitions and the ticket office has been very appreciative. This has reduced plenty of headaches from coaches, director of operations, the ticket office, and student-athletes.

ACS:       What would you say to someone that is considering purchasing the ACS InControl™ system if asked for your opinion?

MH:       It’s worth the time to explore which areas of your department are currently working inefficiently. ACS has several options which can make routine processes simpler and quicker. As our student-athletes are so familiar with online systems for every other area of their life, they adapted instantly to the online processes. They’ve grown to appreciate the system and so have our coaches.

If you would like more information about ACS InControl™, please contact us at (800) 343-6220 or via email at sales@acsathletics.com.

As the 2010 NAAC Convention Title Sponsor and Official Technology Consultant, ACS Athletics is proud to announce that it will sponsor one free NAAC Convention registration per month leading up to the event.  To be eligible, you must be a NAAC member and have registered with NAACConnect.com.  Winners will be selected each month via a random drawing by NAAC staff.  If you have not registered, please visit http://www.NAACConnect.com to sign up and become eligible to win!

Our January winner is Carolyn O’Connell of Loyola University Chicago.  Congratulations Carolyn!!  ACS Athletics is also excited to announce that Zachary Pendelton of Weber State University and Kate Charipar of the University of Utah are the big winners of a free NAAC Convention registration as part of a separate promotion in November.  Congratulations to Zachary and Kate!

Don’t delay in registering for the NAAC Convention being held on June21-22 at the Marriott Hotel in Anaheim, California.   Future winners of the drawing who are already registered for the convention will have their registration payments refunded.   Visit http://www.NAACConnect.com today!

It’s 2010, but are you still operating like its 1990? To stay ahead of the competition and control costs, athletic departments must break old cycles of operational inefficiency. Poor information management practice, communication bottlenecks and cumbersome paper-trails stifle coach productivity, increase compliance risks and add additional overhead. This all adds up to create a less than favorable environment and experience for student-athletes. During this webinar series, we will present on how ACS is helping athletic departments execute a plan for transitioning their student-athlete centric operations and information management practices into the 21^st century. Get the ACS Advantage in 2010. Change the game. Get InControl.

Please join, Bo Kerin, ACS Athletics Regional Director of Sales and former intercollegiate athletics administrator, on February 18^th or 19^th for a Webinar demonstration of ACS InControl Baseline, an integrated department-wide technology solution for recruiting, compliance monitoring and student-athlete information management.  You may register for the demonstrations by clicking on the links below.  We look forward to visiting with you!

ACS Athletics Informational Webinar
Date: Thursday, February 18, 2010
Time: 10:30 am, Central Standard Time
Register for this time slot at:

https://assistantcoach.webex.com/assistantcoach/j.php?ED=132988422&RG=1&UID=0&RT=MiM3

ACS Athletics Informational Webinar
Date: Friday, February 19, 2010
Time: 2:00 pm, Central Standard Time
Register for this time slot at:

https://assistantcoach.webex.com/assistantcoach/j.php?ED=132988527&RG=1&UID=0&RT=MiM3

The challenges begin during the recruiting process and often involve the interaction between the athletics department, admissions and financial aid office. “Communication is often the most pressing and constant challenge,” said Travis Feezell, a former Division III athletics director. “The crux of the challenge is that you are working often with three ‘independent’ but mutually dependent offices on campus. Each has its own mission and duties, and yet they rely on one another, particularly for information on individual student-athletes, to fulfill those things. It’s tough stuff.”  Chris Martin, Commissioner of the College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin, echoed those sentiments.  “The biggest challenge seems to be coordinating the various recruiting efforts across the various offices,” Martin said. “Ensuring that campus offices such as athletics, admissions and financial aid are communicating about various students is essential in recruiting success.”

Another challenge for Division III institutions during the recruiting process is developing a unique brand via marketing efforts and effectively building a “pool” of prospective student-athletes (PSA’s) that will be easily integrated into the institution.  “Because of the tuition-driven nature of some institutions, the roster size rather than the competitiveness of the team is most crucial,” Feezell said.  “And if this is the case, then building an appropriately sized pool of potential recruits is even more crucial. How do you appeal to a pool of this size? How do you make that pool ‘come alive’ and apply to the school? How do you differentiate yourself from others in the same boat? And ultimately, how in fact should you build that pool?”

Feezell also indicated that once student-athletes enrolled and began attending classes, coaches access to information was limited, as providing access to student-athlete information often also provided access to non-student-athlete information.  Creating a central location for coaches, athletics department staff members and campus administrators to access critical information can alleviate these day-to-day challenges.  “Technology (could provide) a central holding place of information that allows interested parties to access and input information … it should be a ‘one-stop’ shop in this case, the place EVERYONE goes to,” Feezell added.

Martin agreed, adding, “Any system that allows coaches and recruiters to streamline the recruiting process would be helpful and will continue to assist in the recruiting process.  Technology certainly can play a big role in allowing various campus entities, such as admissions and athletics, to be more efficient in their communications and marketing for PSAs.”

With the ACS InControl Baseline system for NCAA Division III institutions, coaches, admissions and financial aid directors will have the ability to effectively and collaboratively develop recruiting campaigns and manage prospective student-athlete information in order to meet institutional initiatives. Once the prospective student-athlete matriculates to the institution, all of the information collected during the recruiting process is carried over to the student-athlete database as the life-cycle continues.  ACS provides technology solutions and integrates all of the critical student-athlete information into one platform which may be accessed by any designated user.  From this integrated platform, all recruiting and student-athlete information is maintained and updated over the course of the student-athlete life-cycle, creating a complete record of all activities associated with that individual.  Further, with the ACS InControl software suite, student-athletes may complete and submit required NCAA and institutional forms electronically through a secure password-protected portal.  Not only does this reduce the need for paper, save time and improve communication, the collected data may be used to create various reports for use by the institution in identifying recruiting trends, demographics and much more.  Finally, for institutions looking for a higher level of integration, ACS Athletics offers an application programming interface (API) for InControl. This capability allows the athletics department to share data with other on-campus systems, helping to improve efficiencies and communication among all stakeholders across campus.

For more information, please contact ACS Athletics at (800) 343-6220 or sales@acsathletics.com.

“We are very excited about the ability for our entire senior staff to access a single database of student-athlete and prospect information,” said Melody Reifel Werner, EMU’s associate athletics director for compliance and special projects. “This will reduce duplication of efforts to collect and make use of the information. “  The ACS InControl™ Baseline product suite streamlines the gathering of prospect and student-athlete information, which can now be accessed electronically at any time and by any user with the proper permission.  InControl will also eliminate the paper-driven processes associated with student-athlete forms, practice and participation (CARA) logs, and complimentary ticketing to save coaches, student-athletes, and administrators time, energy and money.

In addition to having real-time information accessible to all stakeholders in one central location, Werner cited the coaches’ ability to improve communications and branding with prospective and current student-athletes through professionally designed email campaigns and text messaging, respectively.  “I think it is great that coaches will be able to send a text message to their entire team and that our academic advisors can reach all of the student-athletes quickly and efficiently through the text messaging capabilities,” Werner said.  ACS InControl™ makes it very easy to access student-athlete contact information and communicate either individually with a student-athlete or send an important email or text message to an entire team(s).  Previously, it could be quite common for different departments on campus to have out-dated student-athlete information.  InControl provides one consistent, accurate source for all student-athlete information.

EMU made the commitment to take a holistic approach to address not only the day-to-day challenges of the athletics department, but also empower its coaches with the most powerful recruiting tools on the market.  During these challenging economic times, institutions are making value-based decisions and finding an economical, innovative solution with ACS Athletics.  InControl allows coaches to manage all recruiting information and implement impressive branding campaigns.  Further, it allows coaches to gauge interest level using email tracking features.  Finally, as recruiting activities are entered into the system, an automatic “log” is created that eliminates the need for coaches to submit paper logs or spreadsheets.  The built-in rules engine then analyzes each activity to ensure compliance with NCAA rules.  “In this high-risk world of athletics compliance, institutions need every tool available to help manage and monitor the athletics program,” Werner said.  With use of the ACS InControl™ Baseline system, the Eagles are already ahead of the curve!

The University of Memphis athletics department sponsors 20 varsity sports.  The department serves over 400 student-athletes and competes in Conference USA.  With so many moving parts and the desire to maximize efficiency, the department chose to move away from products that provide a solution for only one area and instead approach the challenge from a broader perspective.  In this manner, ACS Athletics will help the athletics department solve multiple challenges, such as managing recruiting and student-athlete records, sending branded email campaigns and automating compliance monitoring, with one holistic solution.

InControl Baseline was released this fall as a bundled product that features a “best practices” build of the system, allowing for a more rapid, easy to adopt training and implementation program. The implementation timeline is typically 30-60 days, allowing customers like the University of Memphis to quickly see a return on their investment through improved operational performance, enhanced recruiting capabilities and increased compliance monitoring.

“We could not be more excited than to have a great program such as the University of Memphis join the growing ACS client family,” said Phillip Engle, President of ACS Athletics.  “The ACS team looks forward to a long and productive relationship, and to consulting and serving the Memphis coaches, support staff and administrators at a very high level.”

Today, athletics departments are much larger, staff may be scattered in several facilities and the day-to-day processes are much more complex. The stakes are much higher, as well. Information must be immediately accessible so that good decisions can be made quickly. Coaches need marketing and branding assistance and predominately depend on email campaigns to keep up with literally thousands of prospective student-athletes. The expectation to monitor recruiting and student-athlete activities continues to grow stride-for-stride with the size of the NCAA rule book. The consequences of not meeting such expectations can cost institutions hundreds of thousands of dollars and damage reputations.

In response to these challenges, the University of Akron is taking a holistic approach to improving the day-to-day operations of the athletics department. This past summer, Akron partnered with ACS Athletics and implemented a department-wide technology solution to improve efficiency and communication in the areas of recruiting, compliance monitoring and student-athlete information management. Kevin Klotz, Akron’s Assistant Athletics Director for Compliance, indicated that during the last five years, facility expansion created physical barriers to performing at an optimal level. “We knew we needed a solution that would allow us to seamlessly move information from one office to another in a timely fashion. We believe we have found such a solution with ACS Athletics,” Klotz said.

In addition, Klotz indicated that his coaches were searching for a, “better way of doing things,” as it relates to completing required paperwork. “They (coaches) were spending too much time completing forms, which they knew needed to be done, but (the process) ended up being repetitive because they were transcribing (recruiting information) from their own files to our forms,” Klotz said. From a coach perspective, Klotz indicated that some of the key features of the ACS InControl system include the ability to have the entire recruiting database at their fingertips, the automatic logging of phone calls, not having to sit down at the end of each month and fill out extra forms and the proactive notification of a potential violation when making recruiting telephone calls.

One of the first ways in which Akron realized the benefits of ACS InControl was to use the system to administer student-athlete participation forms. The compliance office sent email notifications to current student-athletes and incoming freshmen with instructions to log into a secure ACS Athletics student-athlete Web portal and complete the required forms. Over 6400 forms were submitted online, which saved the athletics department significant time and the cost of using paper. Further, in the event issues are identified via the information submitted on any of the forms, the appropriate institutional administrators can begin to resolve such issues prior to the student-athlete arriving on campus for the beginning of the term. Faster completion of these forms allows beginning-of-the-year student-athlete meetings to be more educationally focused and interactive.

The InControl system has also greatly improved compliance functions. Klotz noted that benefits were realized almost immediately. “We’re already spending much less time having to review every phone call, contact and evaluation,” Klotz said. “We also have the ability to mark the prospect’s signing date within ACS, which automatically adjusts the recruiting rules to the prospect’s new status as a signee. When a coach calls a prospect after they have already signed, my office doesn’t have to go back anymore and try to remember whether or not it is permissible to call this prospect more than once a week. You have no idea how much time we have already saved, which allows us to spend that time doing other things which will benefit our coaches.” Klotz also noted the benefits of using the recruiting rules engine to evaluate 100% of all Bylaw 13 recruiting activities, as opposed to only spot-checking. “We spend less time monitoring those activities because the system automatically approves activities that clearly fall within the rules. When we have to follow-up on an issue, it’s a focused follow-up.”

In addition to improving the recruiting and compliance processes, Akron has also improved efficiencies in student-athlete roster and records management by providing coaches and other stakeholders online access to critical roster information. “ACS allows us to produce an easy to read active roster in a matter of minutes which has greatly increased our ability to keep people informed of who is and is not on our teams – particularly at the beginning of the semesters when a lot of students are being added and deleted from the rosters,” Klotz said. Klotz also praised the system’s ability to track student-athlete complimentary admissions and cross-check student-athlete countable athletically-related activity logs. ACS InControl allows coaches to input student-athlete hourly participation logs for online submission to the compliance office staff, which then requests verification directly from student-athletes using the secure online portal. This eliminates the need for coaches to track down student-athletes to obtain verification signatures and allows student-athletes to submit confidential comments to the compliance office.

To further expand their holistic approach to software automation, The University of Akron is in the process of adding the ACS Athletics equipment inventory tracking software module. This integrated component will connect equipment operations with the official rosters while giving them the tools to track all issued, on-hand, and ordered inventory down to the penny.

When asked whether there were any challenges associated with convincing the athletics department staff to adopt a holistic, technological approach, Klotz indicated that once the administration had the opportunity to see the value in implementing the ACS InControl system, it paved the way to earn support from decision-makers outside of the athletics department, specifically, Information Technology. “We arranged for the Vice-President for Information Technology and his staff to observe a webinar with ACS Athletics. They came away very impressed with ACS Athletics and further pledged their support of the system and implementation.”

Bo Kerin, Collegiate Athletics Consultant; Regional Director of Sales

Kevin Bresser, Vice-President of Sales

Dates:

Monday, November 16th – 1:00 – 1:45 PM Central Time (To register for this session, click here)

Tuesday, November 17th – 10:30 – 11:15 AM Central Time (To register for this session, click here)

Mark your calendars! ACS Athletics will conduct two Webinar presentations to introduce the recently released InControl Baseline, a standardized technology solution for student-athlete records management, forms, recruiting, compliance monitoring and student-athlete life-cycle management. The presentation will provide a comprehensive overview detailing the following features of InControl Baseline:

Centralized Student-Athlete Records Management

Coaches and staff are constantly frustrated and confused when it comes time to find critical student-athlete information. InControl Baseline has taken an industry best-practice approach to consolidating critical student-athlete information related to eligibility, academics, admissions, sports medicine, roster management, employment, housing, and much more. InControl Baseline will reduce the duplicate spreadsheets and emails that typically litter the athletic department by having information in one location.

Student-Athlete Communication

InControl Baseline will allow coaches and approved department staff to quickly communicate with student-athletes through email, text messaging, and mail-merge capabilities. Whether it’s a slight change to a practice schedule or an important emergency notice, InControl will allow your athletics department to communicate with your student-athletes with a push of a button.

Student-Athlete Forms

InControl Baseline will allow your department to shed the piles of paper collected from student-athletes, and the system frees these student-athletes from the burden of completing information in duplicate copy. InControl Baseline has helped coaches and compliance reduce the time spent in beginning-of-year team meetings by having all forms completed well before student-athletes arrive at the team meeting.

Complimentary Admissions

Through their secure web-based portal, student-athletes can submit their complimentary admissions guest list and request tickets for an entire season at one time, if deemed appropriate by the department.

Practice Logs

Coaches and staff can submit practice logs for Countable Athletically Related Activities (CARA) online. These logs can be sent for student-athlete review and approval through their secure web-based portal. Compliance can then approve logs through the online system.

Recruiting

Recruiting is critical to the success of any athletic department. The top programs in the country are implementing the InControl suite specifically for the powerful and unique recruitment management tools. Coaches have the ability to manage their PSA data, access the information via their Blackberry/iPhone/Smartphone, send and manage email campaigns, tile prospects through recruiting depth charts, log compliance activity and more.

Compliance Monitoring

InControl is the leading software suite to collect and, more importantly, analyze Bylaw 13 recruiting activity. Coaches will have the ability to log phone calls through the Blackberry/iPhone/Smartphone application. The system proactively reviews each prospect’s previous recruiting activity and compares it with the NCAA rules and recruiting calendars. On the spot, your coaches will be alerted if that call would result in a potential violation. The system will analyze all recruiting activity and report any potential violations.

ACS Athletics employs a holistic approach in developing technology solutions for athletics departments of all types and sizes. Please join us on and discover how ACS Athletics can help your athletics department maintain a recruiting edge, meet industry standards in compliance monitoring and institutional control, and increase efficiency in managing the student-athlete life-cycle.

We hope you will join us to learn more about the new InControl Baseline bundled package!

Sincerely,

The ACS Team

http://www.acsathletics.com

(800) 343-6220 x302

8213-A Shoal Creek Blvd., Suite 204

Austin, Texas 78757