As a favor to the head of the University of Tennessee academic services unit for men's athletics, history professor Robert Bast last year allowed a football player into an evening class that already was full. Since the player needed the class to fulfill a degree requirement, and an official had intervened on his behalf, Bast figured the player would take the class seriously.

Five weeks into Medieval History, the starting offensive lineman stopped coming to class -- unless you want to include, Bast said, a tutor who showed up once on the player's behalf. Bast prepared to fail the player, who hadn't turned in the required papers.

That, however, was not the end of it. Bast said that as has happened with other Tennessee athletes, the player approached him near the end of the semester and asked that, instead of an F, he be given a grade of Incomplete.

"I said, 'No,' " Bast said, who nonetheless believes he understands why such requests are commonly made. "These (athletes) learn that there are faculty who will do that for them."

Making friends

In a practice common in other college programs, the University of Tennessee athletic department offers a range of gifts and benefits to faculty members whose classes typically include athletes. Faculty members say the gifts include media guides, lunches in the athletes' cafeteria, pre-game tailgate parties hosted by the academic-services staff, and all-expenses-paid trips to road games. "I have no problem with it," said John Hodges, a Religious Studies and African American Studies professor who has twice gone to road games with the football team. "I can go to a game, and if necessary, still fail students." Hodges and other instructors ESPN.com spoke to said the athletic department has not asked for special favors in return, beyond accommodating the usual requests to provide regular academic progress reports on athletes and to reschedule tests when the athletes are out of town for games. Concerned about conflicts of interest, the Tennessee Faculty Senate in 1991 passed a resolution requesting that faculty members on committees monitoring the athletic department no longer accept free watches, tickets, bowl game trips and other perquisites. The issue arose again last spring, after it became apparent that some members continued to accept tickets to games. But that issue relates only to members of faculty senate committees. Some argue that it is improper for any faculty member to take gifts. "I don't accept them, just as I don't think the university should be offering free tickets to legislators," said sociology professor Sam Wallace. -- Tom Farrey

How often instructors change grades for athletes -- and whether they do it more than for regular students -- will be the focus of a new study by the Tennessee Faculty Senate, said Burton English, chair of the athletics committee of the faculty group. The 12-member body voted Monday to set up a subcommittee to conduct the study.

"If things were done to make an athlete eligible, that's wrong," said English, an agricultural economics professor.

The subcommittee on academic integrity also will examine the tutoring program and the special needs program for learning disabled athletes, English said. The study comes in response to concerns raised by the English Department since 1991 -- which came to light in a Sept. 26 ESPN.com report -- about tutors doing too much work for players, some of whom were diagnosed as learning disabled.

The Tennessee faculty senate has no power over the athletic department, serving only in an advisory capacity. But the information it discovers could be used to influence decisions made by the university about the athletic department, since the faculty group has access to student records necessary to do comprehensive studies.

The study of grade changes came at the urging of Carl Asp, Tennessee's faculty athletic representative to the NCAA. In an August interview with ESPN.com, Asp said there have been "very few" cases in which he has denied the eligibility of an athlete because of a suspicious grade change, but that evidence is hard to come by since instructors are not likely to concede that they were giving an athlete a special favor.

"It's my feeling that in all universities you have friendly faculty," said Asp, who estimates that he investigates about 10 percent of athletes' grade changes because they appear suspicious. "There's a percentage of faculty who feel sorry for the athletes because they work 20 hours a week (at their sport), and they want to help out, and probably help out more than they should."

That's a problem for any school, he said, because "friendly faculty can be looked at as boosters by the NCAA."

The University of Tennessee currently is conducting an internal review of whether NCAA rules were broken by the members of the academic services unit of the men's athletic department, who failed to pass to proper school authorities internal memos alleging acts of plagiarism involving tutors. The NCAA has issued no comment on its plans, although Tennessee president J. Wade Gilley declared early into the university probe that there will be "no NCAA investigation."

The most common form of suspicious grade is an incomplete, Asp said. An "I" can be valuable to athletes with marginal grades, because such a mark does not affect the grade-point average of the athlete until the work is completed, and students have up to one year to finish that work. Those advantages can help the athlete meet NCAA minimum-GPA eligibility standards.

According to the Tennessee undergraduate catalog, grades of incomplete are supposed to be granted under "extraordinary circumstances" and only to a student "whose work is satisfactory but who has not completed a portion of the course." In reality, Tennessee administrators say, some professors give them out more liberally and to failing students.

Sam Wallace, a sociology professor whose classes are popular with athletes, said he has given incompletes to athletes who otherwise would have received failing grades. He cited a recent case in which he gave a Vols basketball player an "I" instead of an "F" after the player turned in a paper that was unsatisfactory. But he insists he has done the same for regular students, even if he does have sympathy for athletes.

"These kids are from poor educational backgrounds, and they're exploited mercilessly by the university," said Wallace, who suspects he has granted a disproportionate number of incompletes to athletes but mostly because of their busy schedules. "I can't imagine having to do schoolwork with the time they put into their sport."

Bast is less swayed by that rationale. "There are a lot of students at the university who work 30 to 40 hours a week," he said.

Asp declined to name the instructors he has questioned about suspicious grades.

Academic advisors in the Tennessee athletic department often are keenly aware of the grades players are about to receive. Minutes of a June 1995 staff meeting of the Office of Student Life, acquired by ESPN.com, show that Carmen Tegano, head of the academic services unit, instructed staff members to contact faculty members about the progress of 13 football players with eligibility concerns, including one player with two outstanding incompletes and another with three.

Most of the Tennessee instructors that ESPN.com spoke to who often teach athletes said they never have been asked by academic advisors to change a grade, or for other special favors. Instead, they say, advisors usually want to know how the student is doing in the class.

"The requests for incompletes almost always come from the (athletes)," Bast said. "But I have gotten requests from (football academic advisor) Judy Jackson to 'do something' to help a player fix a grade, or from Carmen to get a player into a course that's already closed."

Catherine Higgs, another history professor, said Tegano asked her to allow a starting linebacker to make up a test he had missed -- allegedly because of an injury in a recent game -- in the fall of 1996. The request was denied after Higgs explained to Tegano that the test was given before the player was hurt, Higgs said.

Tegano and Jackson did not respond to ESPN.com requests for comment.

The faculty senate report is expected to be completed by mid-February, English said.

ESPN.com Senior Writer Tom Farrey can be reached at espnet2@espn.com