UI sends lengthy report to NCAA

By JODI HECKEL April 30, 2005

Excerpt:
URBANA – The NCAA will spend the next few months reviewing information about how American Indian symbols are used by the University of Illinois and other schools.

The UI this week sent a self-evaluation of its use of Chief Illiniwek to the NCAA. Any response by the NCAA likely won't be made before August, when its executive committee meets to review recommendations on the issue.

The NCAA has been looking at the use of American Indian imagery by athletic teams for the past few years. It asked 31 schools with American Indian mascots, logos or nicknames to conduct a self-analysis to determine if they can be seen as offensive. Information from the schools is due Sunday.

The UI provided materials from the last 15 years of debate on the issue, including resolutions passed by the board of trustees; the report of former Cook County Circuit Judge Louis B. Garippo, who presided over two days of dialogue in 2000; and the report by former trustee Roger Plummer, who was asked to explore options for resolving the controversy.

UI spokesman Tom Hardy, who worked with the Urbana campus on the response, called it an "encyclopedic review" of the history of the Chief Illiniwek debate.

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