Big 12 to provide multi-year scholarships and full cost of attendance
The Big 12 will join other Power Five conferences in providing full cost of attendance and multi-year scholarships, the conference announced Monday. Additionally, student-athletes who leave school early will have the ability to return to their respective university on full scholarship in order to complete their degree requirements.
"Today, the Big 12 Conference continued its leadership in college athletics by adopting these student-athlete enhancements," said commissioner Bob Bowlsby. "Enacting these measures is an important step in the process of implementing a twenty-first century model that is responsive to the needs of our student-athletes. The Big 12 Conference will continue to be at the forefront of being a change agent in college athletics, and I am proud we have moved forward with these actions."
The decision to provide these services to student-athletes was approved unanimously and will go into effect August 1, 2015.
Providing the full cost of attendance for student-athletes goes beyond the usual providing of tuition, room and board and books. Now the schools will cover “other expenses reasonably related to attendance at the institution.”
With multi-year scholarships, a student-athlete is guaranteed full aid until an athlete’s eligibility has expired instead of having the scholarship renewed on a year-to-year basis.
"The progressive measures undertaken by our Board of Directors, Faculty Athletics Representatives, Athletic Directors, Senior Woman's Administrators, and Compliance Directors will enhance the lives of our student-athletes," said Big 12 Board of Directors chairman, and Oklahoma State University president Burns Hargis. "Each group has put forth tremendous time and effort to ensure that student-athlete welfare continues to be a priority in the Big 12. To underscore the importance of these steps, they are being adopted as Conference bylaws."
Previously, the Big Ten, ACC, SEC and Pac-12 have all formally recommended providing the full cost of attendance for their student-athletes.
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