Cal State East Bay University Athletics

COMPLIANCE & ELIGIBILITY

Boosters, Donors & Representatives of Athletics Interest

The NCAA enforces strict rules on representatives of athletics interests, often called "boosters." Individuals are often either unaware of their status as a booster or not even sure what a booster is. Please take the time to peruse the following questions and find out the answer for yourself:
 

• Have you ever given money or any type of donation to any portion of the CSUEB Athletics Department?
• Are you a corporate sponsor of CSUEB Athletics?
• Have you been generous enough to volunteer your time to CSUEB Athletics in any way?

If you were fortunate enough to answer “YES” to any of these questions, the NCAA considers you to be a representative of athletics interest at Cal State East Bay! Once you have triggered booster status at an institution, you are ALWAYS and FOREVER a booster of that institution. (But who wouldn't want to be a Pioneer for life?!)

IMPORTANT INFORMATION FOR BOOSTERS

NCAA rules prohibit any representative of athletics interest from:

• Contacting prospective student-athletes (PSAs) or families in person or off campus. This includes writing, calling, texting etc.
• Providing transportation to a PSA, their family member or coach to visit CSUEB, or reimbursing them for their travel expenses to reach CSUEB.
• Providing free tickets or discounted tickets to PSAs or their relatives or friends to attend a CSUEB athletic event.
• Attending a PSAs sporting event for the purpose of providing an evaluation to CSUEB coaching staff per their request. 

However, as a booster, you are PERMITTED to:

• Notify CSUEB coaches about prospects in your area who may be strong additions to our teams.
• Attend high school or two-year college athletic contests or other events where PSAs may compete. However, you may not have contact with the PSAs or their relatives for the purpose of providing information on CSUEB.
• Continue relationships with a PSA and/or his/her parents or relatives, provided the relationship pre-dates the PSA entering ninth grade and the relationship did not develop as a result of the PSA's athletics participation. However, you may not recruit them to participate in CSUEB Athletics.
• Continue involvement with local youth sports that may include PSAs, provided you do not solicit any prospect's participation in CSUEB Athletics.

The best way to protect CSUEB Athletics, our coaches, prospective student-athletes, and yourself from NCAA sanctions is to ASK BEFORE YOU ACT! The Compliance Office is happy to provide you with the information you need to make the right decision to avoid negatively impacting prospective student-athletes or CSUEB Athletics. Below are several relevant NCAA bylaws pertaining to boosters and athletic donors, including an FAQ section at the bottom.

Representative of Athletics Interest (NCAA Bylaw 13.02.12)
A Representative of Athletics Interest (booster) is anyone who is known (or should be known) by a member of the institution’s executive or athletic administration to:

• Participate in or have been a member of a sport support group or booster club.
• Provide or have helped arrange employment for student-athletes or provided benefits to enrolled student-athletes.
• Have been involved in the promotion of CSUEB’s athletics program.
• Participated as a varsity athlete at CSUEB.
• Make or have made a donation to CSUEB.

 Note:  Once an individual is identified as a Representative of the Institution’s Athletics Interest, the person retains that identity forever.

Institutional Control and Compliance (NCAA Bylaw 6.01)

• Institutional Control of athletics is a fundamental requirement of NCAA Legislation.  Specifically, the NCAA Constitution provides that each institution shall be responsible for:
• Controlling its intercollegiate athletics program in compliance with the rules and regulations of the NCAA.
• Monitoring its program to insure compliance, identifying and reporting to the NCAA any instances in which compliance has not been achieved and taking appropriate corrective actions.
• Insuring that members of the institution’s staff, student-athletes and other individuals or groups representing the institutions athletics interests comply with NCAA rules.

Rules Governing Recruitment of Prospective Student-Athletes (PSA’s) (NCAA Bylaw 13)

• A prospective student-athlete is defined by the NCAA as any person who has begun classes in the ninth grade.
• A prospective student-athlete remains a prospect even after he or she has signed or accepts an offer of financial aid to attend CSUEB.
• The prospect remains a prospect until they report for the first day of classes for a regular term (fall or spring).
• Only coaches and athletic department staff members can be involved in the recruiting process off campus.  A contact is defined as any face-to-face encounter between a prospect or the prospect’s parent or legal guardians during which time any dialog in excess of an exchange of a greeting occurs.
• In general, all representatives of the institution’s athletics interest who are not employed by CSUEB are prohibited from contacting off campus a prospect or prospect’s family to encourage the prospect to participate in intercollegiate athletics at CSUEB.

You are prohibited from:  (NCAA Bylaw 13)

• Contacting a prospect or a family member in person on or off our campus. This includes writing, calling, texting etc.
• Making arrangements for a prospect or the prospect’s relatives or friends, to receive money or financial aid of any kind.
• Providing transportation to a PSA, their family member or coach to visit CSUEB, or reimbursing them for their travel expenses to reach CSUEB.
• Providing free tickets or tickets at a reduced cost for prospects or the prospects relatives or friends to attend an athletic event.
• Entertaining high school, prep school or community college coaches.
• Attending a PSAs sporting event for the purpose of providing an evaluation to CSUEB coaching staff per their request. 

 
As a representative of the institution’s athletic interest, you are permitted to:  (NCAA Bylaw 1.2.3)

• Notify our coaches about prospects in your area that may be strong additions to our teams (if not directed to do so by members of the CSUEB coaching staff).
• Attend high school or two-year college athletic contests or other events where prospects may compete; however, you may not contact the prospect or the prospect’s relatives.
• Continue relationships with a PSA and/or his/her parents or relatives, provided the relationship pre-dates the PSA entering ninth grade and the relationship did not develop as a result of the PSA's athletics participation. However, you may not recruit them to participate in CSUEB Athletics.
• Continue involvement with local youth sports that may include PSAs, provided you do not solicit any prospect's participation in CSUEB Athletics. 

Rules Governing Contacts and Benefits for Student-Athletes (NCAA Bylaw 16)
In addition to regulating contact of our representative of athletics interest with prospects, the NCAA also regulates contact with current CSUEB student-athletes, as well as their relatives and friends.

An extra benefit is any special arrangement by an institutional employee or a representatives of athletics interest to provide a student-athlete, prospect, or their relatives or friends a benefit not expressly authorized by NCAA legislation.

In general, you may not provide a benefit that is not authorized by NCAA legislation or make special arrangements for student-athletes and prospective student-athletes that are not available to the general student population.
 
Examples of prohibited extra benefit not allowed by NCAA rules, but are not limited to, are as follows:  (NCAA Bylaw 16)

• Providing cash or loans in any amount, or signing or co-signing for a loan.
• Providing gifts of any kind, including birthday cards, gift cards and holiday gifts.
• Providing special discounts for goods and services (e.g. car repairs, legal services, meals).
• Providing free rent or reduced rent-housing.
• Purchasing complimentary admissions from a student-athlete.
• Providing an honorarium to a student-athlete for a speaking engagement.
• Use of a car or other personal property (i.e. house)
• Promise of employment after graduation
• Employment for a prospect's friends or relatives.
• Payment of registration fees for athletic camps

As a representative of the institution’s athletics interest, you are permitted to:  (NCAA Bylaw 16)

• Invite a student-athlete into your home for an occasional meal, but please coordinate such activity with the compliance office.
• Make a donation to CSUEB
• Provide summer employment for enrolled student-athletes 

 
Rules Governing Student-Athlete Employment
Student-athletes receiving grant-in-aid will be eligible for employment during the regular academic year as well as during the university’s official vacation periods (winter and spring break) and the summer.

The following rules are applicable to student-athlete employment:

• The student-athlete is compensated only for work actually performed
• The student-athlete is compensated only at the “going rate” for the work performed
• The student-athlete has not been hired based on his or her athletic ability

Rules Governing Promotional Activities for Student-Athletes:
All charitable, educational, and nonprofit promotional activities involving student-athletes must have prior approval from the Athletic Director.

Student-athletes are not permitted to be involved in the advertisement, recommendation or promotion of sales or use of a commercial product or service of any kind.
 
Rules Governing Agents and Amateurism (NCAA Bylaw 12)
A student-athlete who loses his or her amateur status shall not be eligible for intercollegiate competition in a particular sport if:

• The student-athlete or family member negotiate, sign or enter into any written or oral agreement with an agent.
• The student-athlete or family member accepts or receives any extra benefits from an agent or anyone who wishes to represent the student-athlete.
• The student-athlete competes with a professional sports team or competes as a professional in any individual sport and receives any compensation for participation.
• The student-athlete uses his or her skills for pay or promise of pay.

 

FAQs

Q:  What if a prospect approaches/calls me with questions about playing for CSUEB?
A:  You should not speak with him/her in excess of a friendly greeting and explaining that NCAA rules prohibit you from talking with them further. You can tell them they will need to contact the coach and then take steps to end the conversation.

Q:  What if a prospect knows I am a CSUEB graduate and calls me with general questions about CSUEB?
A:  If a prospect initiates a phone call to you, a booster, you may answer questions regarding various aspects of attending CSUEB as long as NO discussion occurs regarding the CSUEB athletics program. If a prospect asks about CSUEB athletics, you must refer him/her to the appropriate coaching staff member.

Q:  If I have family friends with a son or daughter who is a prospect, do the rules change my relationship with them?
A:  Not necessarily. The rules are not meant to alter relationships that started for reasons unrelated to athletics. You may continue relationships with family friends who have a son or daughter of recruit-able age and is considered a prospect (e.g. backyard BBQs, picnics). But, you cannot encourage the PSA's participation in CSUEB athletics or provide benefits that you were not providing before he/she became a prospect.

Q:  Do the extra benefit rules also apply to enrolled student-athletes and their families and friends?
A:  Yes. You are not allowed to provide any benefit or special arrangement to an enrolled student- athlete (e.g. tickets to a sporting event or concert, a meal or snack, an award or gift for athletic performance, special discounts). Again, the rules are not meant to alter pre-existing relationships, but note that the benefits provided must be the type of benefits that you provided prior to the student-athlete's enrollment at CSUEB.

Q:  I am a parent and would like to host my son's team at my home for a meal while they're traveling to our hometown. Is that ok?
A:  Yes. Parents of current student-athletes can provide an "occasional meal" to their son/daughter's team.
Other types of boosters can provide student-athletes with an "occasional meal" too, BUT there are restrictions on where they can provide the meal. Boosters can provide student-athletes with a meal in their home, on campus, or at a facility that is regularly used for home competition. The meal can even be catered but it can only happen "occasionally" and with prior-approval from the compliance office. The meal cannot be at a restaurant.

Q:  Can an Athletics Representative be involved in any way when a prospect is on an official or unofficial visit?
A:  Yes. However, the Athletics Representative may have contact only on campus during the prospective student-athletes official or unofficial visit.  Off campus contact is prohibited.

Q:  Is it permissible for an Athletics Representative to provide summer employment for student-athletes?
A:  Yes.  Please remember that compensation must be paid only for work actually performed and at a rate commensurate with the going rate in that locality for services of like character.
 
Q: Can I contact prospects to encourage them to attend the institution?  
A:  No, any such contact could result in the prospect being declared ineligible to participate in athletics at CSUEB.
 
Q: May I engage in evaluation activities on behalf of the institution?  
A:  Yes, you may view a prospect’s contest on his/her own initiative, provided no contact is made with the prospect or his/her family.  However, this evaluation may not take place at the request or direction of an institutional staff member, and you are not permitted to contact anyone associated with the prospect in an effort to evaluate him/her.
 
Q:  May I attend a public event (e.g., high school awards banquet or dinner) at which prospects are in attendance?  
A:  Yes, however contact with prospects or their families may not occur, and no attempt can be made to recruit the prospect.
 
Q:  May a student-athlete’s name, picture, or appearance be used in a promotional activity?   
A:  It depends on the situation.  Please contact the Compliance Office with your specific question. 
 
Q: May a student-athlete’s name or picture be used to directly or indirectly advertise, recommend, or promote the sale or use of a commercial product or service?
A: No. Such activity would jeopardize the eligibility of the student-athlete. The NCAA membership has always maintained that student-athletes not be involved in the promotion of a commercial product.
 
Q: Is it permissible for a booster to pay in whole or in part registration fees associated with sport camps?
A: No.
 
Q: Is CSUEB responsible for the acts of boosters and booster support groups?
A: Yes. Boosters are governed by the same NCAA and institutional rules and regulations as those placed upon all institutional athletics staff members.
 
Q: When is a prospect considered a student-athlete?
A: A prospect is considered a student-athlete when he or she reports for regular squad practice or attends classes in any term at the college.
 
Q: Is it permissible for a booster to provide an enrolled student-athlete with professional services (for which a fee would normally be charged) for personal reasons?
A: No. Professional services provided at a fee less than the normal rate or at no expense to a student-athlete are considered extra benefits.
 
Q: May a student-athlete make a public appearance at a business establishment for any purpose such as signing autographs etc.?
A: No. Such appearances can be construed as a direct or indirect endorsement of the commercial establishment, thus jeopardizing the eligibility of the student-athlete. It should be noted that student-athletes may make appearances at schools, hospitals, or other nonprofit or charitable organizations provided they do not receive compensation (other than expenses) and such activities are authorized by the athletics department.
 
Q: Is it permissible for a booster to provide gifts or awards to a student-athlete for his or her athletics performance?
A: No. All awards must conform to NCAA awards legislation and must be approved by CSUEB.