(Exploratory report and synopsis available today at kennesaw.edu.)
KSU President Daniel Papp:
- The school needs to continue to evaluate student support and public support (boosters, ticket sales, fund raising — no, he didn’t call them boosters). We can take this to mean deciding whether the school can afford to go Football Championship Subdivision or if it needs to shoot for non-scholarship. The Marietta Daily Journal says they've heard it's FCS or bust.
- Finding a conference -- we've discussed that here and here.
- School presidents must make many football metaphors. CHECK!
- "State funds will not be used," since that’s illegal in Georgia. Thus, all startup money must be raised privately.
- “It will be several years before we begin.” The Regents won't allow any new fees until after 2013, so 2014 it is. 2013 had previously been a perfect-world target date. Unless the school happens to be blessed by a "T. Boone Pickens," as Papp said.
- The university hopes to increase student, alumni, and community identity through football. With the state's third-largest enrollment and 5,000 students living on campus soon, raising regional awareness seems like a pretty decent first-decade goal. (Decade starting right this minute.)
- KSU is 47 years old, and it had been declared at some point that a major goal was to become a nationally recognized university “by the beginning of our second half-century.” So if the program's first year opens a couple eyeballs around the country, one way or another, then that goal is sort of met. “Particularly in the American South,” that’s what football's for.
- The school will need to come up with a package of Title IX considerations. Competitive cheer, lacrosse, and field hockey were mentioned today, with rowing having been discussed in earlier documents.