Notre Dame faculty supports joining CIC

By Jennifer Yachnin
Daily Staff Reporter

The University of Notre Dame Faculty Senate voted Tuesday to support a resolution to join the Committee on Institutional Cooperation, a higher education body composed of the Big Ten constituents and the University of Chicago.

"The recommendation is that we enter negotiations to join the CIC," said Gregory Sterling, chair of the Notre Dame academic affairs committee, in a report in The Detroit News. "We didn't address the issue of the Big Ten, but the two are inseparable."

Created in 1958, the CIC guides programs in library usage, information-technology, international activities including study abroad programs and human resources services, said CIC Director Roger Clark.

"We coordinate and direct and encourage and facilitate cooperation at all levels at those universities, except intercollegiate athletics," Clark said.

The last body to join CIC was Penn State University in the early '90s, Clark said, concurrent with its membership in the Big Ten. Penn State is the eleventh and last school to join the Big Ten.

"It has traditionally been the Big Ten universities," Clark said. "The membership is over 90 percent the same as the Big Ten athletic association."

There is no structured application process to join CIC, Clark said, but Norte Dame administrators "have not inquired about joining CIC.

"Obviously they have made inquiries of the faculty since the senate voted a few nights ago ... It's certainly a possibility," Clark said.

Although many Norte Dame athletic teams are currently members of the Big East Conference, which includes University of Miami (Fla.), University of Pittsburgh, Temple and Boston College among its members, the Irish football team is still independent from any conference.

Even if Notre Dame joins the Big Ten, its football team would not participate as a conference member until 2006 because of contracts held by NBC for exclusive broadcasting rights to home games. The Big Ten is contracted with ABC for broadcasting rights of football games.

"We have a contract now that would not change," said Ed Markey, NBC's vice-president for sports press. "We have always said that we value our relationship with Norte Dame and this contract has been very successful for us.

"We would renew it in a minute if we had the chance," Markey said.

The NBC contracts currently pay Notre Dame about $8 million annually.

Markey would could not comment on whether NBC would make a bid for the Big Ten contracts, but said "we would love to stay involved in Notre Dame by televising their homes games," regardless of if the body joins a conference.

12-11-98