Residence hall employee already had NCAA violations

University of Minnesota vice president McKinley Boston created a special position in a residence hall last year and gave it to a former University of Wisconsin NCAA compliance director who resigned after breaking the rules he was supposed to help enforce.

Anthony Adams, who was among the more than a dozen Badgers officials who broke NCAA rules by improperly spending booster-club funds, was hired last October to a 10-month position that paid $35,000. He was given use of an apartment in Wilkins Hall, which houses some of the school's most prominent athletes.

The explanations given for Adams' hiring and his responsibilities while on the job are unclear.

In his first response to written questions submitted by the Pioneer Press, Boston said Adams, who left Wisconsin in 1997, was hired to help him gain "better understanding of the living/learning environment for student-athletes in the residence halls, especially students at risk (academically)."

In answering a second set of written questions, Boston stated that Adams' hiring was prompted by "instances of social misconduct in Wilkins Hall by student-athletes and non student-athletes."

University records indicate that the number of alleged rules violations, ranging from disorderly conduct to smoking, recorded by Wilkins Hall staff and known as "incident reports," more than tripled while Adams lived in the dorm, from 27 the year before he arrived, to 92.

Unlike many other residence halls, where an increase in incidents over the last five years is being blamed partly on the presence of more first-year students, Wilkins Hall, the smallest residential

structure on campus, is reserved for juniors, seniors, and graduate students. It houses 126 students, half of whom are athletes, in one- and two-bedroom apartments.

Asked about the increase this week, Boston responded: "I have not attempted to measure or benchmark Mr. Adams' effectiveness based upon an evaluation of incident results."

Boston stated that he has known Adams for 11 years but did not know he had committed two secondary NCAA violations at Wisconsin as part of a scandal that resulted in the Badgers being placed on two years' probation last March for hundreds of booster-club spending violations, including cash payments to coaches.

Boston defended hiring Adams, saying secondary violations are like "parking tickets" and that he couldn't imagine anyone "who would have worked in college athletics for a period of time" not having committed a secondary violation.

Adams' violations consisted of twice using booster-club money to pay for golf outings, at a total cost of $100. Although the violations are considered secondary, the NCAA's Committee on Infractions stated the school received lessened penalties because it had already accepted Adams' resignation.

As compliance director at Wisconsin, Adams was responsible for ensuring that Badgers athletes and employees understood and were acting within the NCAA and Big Ten rules and that proper paperwork was filed. But the NCAA report stated that "there was a failure to monitor the athletics program" and that Wisconsin "either did not maintain or could not locate annual certification of compliance forms."

When Adams came to Minnesota, according to Boston, he reported to the academic counseling and student services director, and the department of housing and residential life. He was often seen with students in the Bierman athletic complex, and one employee in Boston's office said he thought Adams worked for the athletic department. His salary came out of the academic counseling budget.

But Adams, reached at Wilkins Hall before his position ended Aug. 31, said he never worked for academic counseling, where he occasionally attended staff meetings, or the men's or women's athletic departments. When asked to give his job title, he said: "I'm sitting at this desk. That's it." He did not return phone messages following that conversation.

Boston did not answer why Adams was paid $35,000 while live-in hall advisers hired for the 1999-2000 school year are paid no more than $30,000. Boston also did not answer a question about whether Adams had the advanced degree in counseling required of hall advisers this year.

In an earlier response, Boston said Adams' job description included these duties:

• Encourage student-athlete involvement in campus and residence hall activities.
• Encourage student-athletes in their academic and social transition to the resident halls.
• Assist with and help Housing and Residential Life's diversity agenda initiatives.
• Serve as a point of contact for student-athlete-related misconduct issues as they arise with hall security monitors.

Adams was also required to assist with special projects or complete other duties assigned to him by his superiors, who included Boston. Boston said Adams' input from his 10-month employment would be part of a report "on how to increase the effectiveness of student development programs."

Boston worked with Adams while the two were at the University of Rhode Island a decade ago. Boston, the Rams' athletic director from 1988-91, said "it was that familiarity and his availability that made him an attractive candidate for the position. Thus, I recruited him." Adams' title was "associate program director, student-athlete welfare," Boston said.

Adams' job at Minnesota was not posted to other candidates and no one else was interviewed for the position, Boston said. He added that university guidelines allow individuals to be hired without a search for a limited appointment period.

"I have known Anthony Adams for 11 years, and I have been an active mentor to him during this time," Boston wrote in one of his responses.

"I view mentoring as a professional obligation to get more people of color involved in athletic management and in higher education."

Boston has been under fire since the Pioneer Press in March reported allegations of alleged academic fraud by the men's basketball team. The Gophers face NCAA sanctions after preliminary findings from an internal investigation found "numerous, maybe even massive" amounts of academic fraud, according to President Mark Yudof.

Boston has maintained he was not aware of any wrongdoing.

Yudof has said he will determine the fate of athletic department officials after he reviews the academic fraud investigation's final report, expected in November.

During Adams' 10 months living in Wilkins Hall, the highest number of incident reports were filed for excess noise (15), disorderly conduct (10) and violations of the hall's alcohol policy (10). The men's and women's athletic departments receive copies of incident reports involving athletes.

In addition to the incident reports, if police action is necessary, a separate report is filed with the university police department. Police charged Wilkins Hall residents with 14 crimes, ranging from burglary to disorderly conduct in the 10 months Adams was living there. In that same period one year earlier, police filed charges 12 times.

Adams, hired by Wisconsin in 1995 after two years as Rhode Island's compliance director, resigned after two years at Madison and less than a year before an internal audit detailed the numerous violations of NCAA rules, mainly regarding the spending of booster-club money, from 1993-97.

Pat Richter, Wisconsin's athletic director, said he and Adams mutually decided he should leave the position.

"We kind of agreed that the best spot for him was not in compliance, but in a mentoring position with athletes," Richter said. "His strength is in the relationships he has with the student-athletes and I am sure that is the same thing (Boston) saw at Rhode Island."

At Minnesota, Adams acted as mentor of "life skills" for student athletes, said John Blanchard, the school's director of academic counseling and student development. Blanchard was Adams' superior for only a few months and said that Adams' job was "restructured" this summer and that Adams was no longer on the academic counseling payroll.

Elayne Donahue, who retired as head of academic counseling at the end of the 1998 school year, said she never heard of a position such as the one filled by Adams while she was director. She also questioned the salary for Adams, which she said was higher than most academic counselors made when she was director.

"This is a department that doesn't have the money to have sexual awareness training but has money to hire a mentor for student athletes," Donahue said. "It doesn't seem right."

Adams was hired when Colleen Evans was interim director of academic counseling, before Blanchard was hired. Evans could not be reached for comment, but one academic counseling employee said Boston created the position and placed Adams in it without informing academic counseling personnel.

Adams attended a few staff meetings, but the employee said no one in the department was sure of his job description. Blanchard said he never acted as an academic counselor or tutor.