Thirteen institutions left the Southern Conference to form the Southeastern Conference during 1932. Why did these schools leave the Southern Conference? Previous historical research portrays the large size of the Southern Conference and the desire to pass academic reforms as reasons for the Southeastern Conference’s formation. This article argues that the university presidents and other administrators at Southeastern Conference institutions formed it to enhance the legitimacy of their member institutions. Throughout the Great Depression, the conference’s administrators pursued increased legitimacy by attempting to reform academic eligibility rules, allowing football games to be broadcast over the radio, awarding athletic scholarships, allowing member institutions to compete in emerging postseason football bowl games, and hiring a commissioner. This instance of conference realignment is historically significant because some of the policies implemented by the Southeastern Conference contributed to its rise as one of the top revenue-generating conferences in college athletics.

This article investigates whether an association existed between the clustering of NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) student-athletes and the reporting lines of athletic academic support departments at their institutions during the 2017-18 academic year. Academic reform groups and university faculty members have argued that student-athletes cluster into a major at a higher rate when athletic academic support departments report to athletic department officials instead of university administrators not employed by athletics. The authors contacted athletic academic support directors at NCAA Division I FBS institutions to determine whether their departments reported to an administrator employed by or outside of the athletic department. Then, the authors used annual football media guides provided by athletic departments to ascertain the amount of student-athletes that were enrolled in each academic major. Finally, the authors used an ANOVA to calculate whether an association existed between an athletic academic support department’s reporting lines and the rate that football student-athletes clustered into one or more majors. The results indicated that the association between the rate that football student-athletes clustered into one or more majors and the reporting lines used by athletic academic support departments at their institutions was insignificant.

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