CLEVELAND - The National Association for Athletics Compliance (NAAC) has announced its 2020 award winners:

• Frank Kara Leadership Award – Bracky Brett, Mississippi State University;
• Mike Cleary Organizational Leadership Award – Greg Christopher, Xavier University;
• Rising Star Award – Massey Arnold, Lindenwood University & Grace Kroner, University of Cincinnati;  
• Division II Excellence Award – Amanda Conklin, NCAA; and
• Creative Education Award - Xavier University

The award winners will be honored virtually this year due to the cancellation of the NAAC Convention.

"I am honored to announce the 2020 NAAC Award recipients, especially the inaugural Creative Education Award winner," stated Membership and Awards Committee Chair and Assistant Athletics Director for Compliance at the University of Connecticut, Eric Schneider. "On behalf of the NAAC Board and Awards Committee, we want to congratulate all of our winners on their admirable achievements. We are honored to have so many deserving individuals, thank you to those who took the time to nominate them."

The Frank Kara Award is NAAC's premier award. It is the highest honor that may be bestowed upon compliance professionals. This award, given annually, is named in honor of former University of Minnesota Director of Compliance Frank Kara who was a leader in the compliance field and best known for hosting the inaugural NAAC Workshop in 2006. Sadly, Frank lost his battle with cancer at the age of 40.

Bracky Brett, who currently serves as the executive senior associate athletics director, started at Mississippi State in 2002 and has demonstrated leadership and vision for compliance initiatives at the university, in the SEC and nationally. Throughout his tenure, Brett has continued to be at the forefront of implementing meaningful and effective compliance education and monitoring to protect the institution's interests and integrity. Brett has been active in NAAC and has served as a mentor to many. To see his complete bio, click here.

The Mike Cleary Organizational Leadership Award is named after former NACDA Executive Director, Mike Cleary, and is given to an organizational leader (i.e., athletics director, general counsel, provost, president, commissioner, NCAA executive) who has demonstrated NCAA compliance leadership and a strong commitment to fostering a culture of compliance to NCAA rules within their organization.

Xavier's Greg Christopher, who has been at the helm of the athletics department since May 2013, was promoted in July 2018  to vice president for administration and director of athletics. In this role, he serves on the president's leadership cabinet and oversees three university divisions. Since 2012, Christopher has served on the Committee on Infractions (COI) and took over as chair of the COI in 2017. While at Xavier, Christopher has worked with partners across campus to improve compliance education and processes related to athletics within the offices of financial aid, registrar, bursar and admissions. He also campaigned for and added a second full-time compliance staff person in 2018. Additional biographical information on Christopher may be found here.

The Rising Star Award recognized young compliance professionals who are considered to be emerging leaders within the compliance profession.

Massey Arnold, who serves as the assistant director for compliance at Lindenwood, has been in compliance full time since October 2015 and previously interned in the compliance office at Arkansas-Little Rock from 2013-15. Arnold has been active in NAAC, serving on the Division II Committee and is also the liaison to the NAAC Professional Development Committee. He has been integral in all facets of the compliance department at Lindenwood and has positioned himself to be a mainstay in the field. Arnold has been To learn more about Arnold's path, click here.

Grace Kroner began her career as an intern in Temple's compliance office prior to joining the Cincinnati compliance team as a graduate assistant in 2016-17. In each of the following years, Kroner has received title changes, working her way up to her current role as director of compliance. Currently, Kroner oversees the day-to-day compliance for women's basketball, women's golf, lacrosse and track & field and cross country. Kroner's complete bio may be found here.

The Division II Excellence Award is a prestigious annual award given to a compliance professional who is a leader in the compliance field at the Division II level.

Amanda Conklin, who prior to her current position as the director of Division I governance at the NCAA, served on the NCAA Division II team as an associate director of academic and membership affairs. During her time in Division II, Conklin supported several committees in the NCAA governance structure and also served as the staff liaison across all three divisions while working with the Student-Athlete Advisory Committees. Conklin developed the idea for Division II University, an online coaches eduation program focused on recruiting, eligibility and health and safety modules, which successfully launched to the membership in May 2018. To learn more about Conklin's path to her current position, click here.

The Creative Education Award, a new award in 2020, is given to an athletics compliance department for their commitment to creativity and ingenuity in rules education throughout the academic year. The department must be able to demonstrate how its educational document is creative and helpful in explaining pertinent rules education to the selected group.

The inaugural recipient of the award is Xavier University and the compliance department's transformation of the popular Netflix show 'Stranger Things' into 'Compliance Things,' with the goal of 'Avoiding the Upside-Down i.e. Ineligibility.' Check out the winning video here.

About NAAC: NAAC is in its 23rd year and serves as the professional and educational association of compliance administrators. For more information on NAAC, please visit www.naaccompliance.com. NAAC is administered by the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics (NACDA), which is in its 55^th year. For more information on NACDA, the 17 professional associations and/or three foundations it manages, please visit www.nacda.com.