Much has been made of the fact that in its shopping trip to find new members, the Big 10/11 has been committed to taking in only members of the American Association of Universities (AAU). So just what is this association?

It’s a club of leading universities that do some heavy lifting on the academic front. As the “about” page says, “The 61 AAU universities in the United States award more than one-half of all U.S. doctoral degrees and 55 percent of those in the sciences and engineering.” Membership is not necessarily a mark of a high-quality undergraduate education, but of achievement at the level of  faculty and graduates. Of the 9 indicators mentioned in a membership document (PDF), only one has to do with undergraduate education. Membership is by invitation only, and three-quarters of existing members must approve of any new members.

MOST AAU INSTITUTIONS HAVE D-1A FOOTBALL

Does this emphasis on scholarship and research mean that there’s no room for big-time sports? Not at all.

A “big-time sports university” is one that fields a football team in what we used to call “Division IA.” Of the 61 U.S. members of AAU (there are two in Canada), 38, or 62 percent, qualify.

AAU INSTITUTIONS WITHOUT MAJOR FOOTBALL PROGRAMS

First up, here’s a list of the members that don’t have a Division IA football program. (The parenthesis refers to the year the institution became a member of AAU).

  • Brandeis University (1985)
  • Brown University (1933)
  • California Institute of Technology (1934)
  • Carnegie Mellon University (1982)
  • Case Western Reserve University (1969)
  • Columbia University (1900)
  • Cornell University (1900)
  • Emory University (1995)
  • Harvard University (1900)
  • The Johns Hopkins University (1900)
  • Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1934)
  • New York University (1950)
  • Princeton University (1900)
  • Stony Brook University-State University of New York (2001)
  • University of California, Davis (1996)
  • University of California, Irvine (1996)
  • University of California, San Diego (1982)
  • University of California, Santa Barbara (1995)
  • The University of Chicago (1900)
  • University of Pennsylvania (1900)
  • University of Rochester (1941)
  • Washington University in St. Louis (1923)
  • Yale University (1900)
That’s some pretty serious egghead power there.
Some  of these institutions (perhaps all, I don’t know) field football teams–just not in D1-A.

AAU MEMBERS WITH DIVISION 1-A FOOTBALL

Which Division 1-A football conference is the geekiest? To answer that question, let’s rank the conferences by the percentage of their members that belong to the AAU. The list below reflects conference membership lists as of the beginning of this week, not the end. (In other words, before Colorado and Nebraska signaled a move out of the Big 12.)

Big 10. Geekiness: 100%

  • Indiana University (1909)
  • Michigan State University (1964)
  • Northwestern University (1917)
  • The Ohio State University (1916)
  • The Pennsylvania State University (1958)
  • Purdue University (1958)
  • University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (1908)
  • The University of Iowa (1909)
  • University of Michigan (1900)
  • University of Minnesota, Twin Cities (1908)
  • The University of Wisconsin-Madison (1900)
PAC 10. Geekiness: 70%
  • Stanford University (1900)
  • The University of Arizona (1985)
  • University of California, Berkeley (1900)
  • University of California, Los Angeles (1974)
  • University of Oregon (1969)
  • University of Southern California (1969)
  • University of Washington (1950)
BIG 12. Geekiness: 58%
  • Texas A&M University (2001)
  • Iowa State University (1958)
  • University of Colorado at Boulder (1966)
  • The University of Kansas (1909)
  • University of Missouri-Columbia (1908)
  • University of Nebraska-Lincoln (1909)
  • The University of Texas at Austin (1929)
ACC. Geekiness: 42%
  • Duke University (1938)
  • Georgia Institute of Technology (2010)
  • University of Maryland, College Park (1969)
  • The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (1922)
  • University of Virginia (1904)
Big East. Geekiness: 38%
  • Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey (1989)
  • Syracuse University (1966)
  • University of Pittsburgh (1974)
SEC. Geekiness: 17%
  • University of Florida (1985)
  • Vanderbilt University (1950)
Conference USA. Geekiness: 17%
  • Rice University (1985)
  • Tulane University (1958)
MAC. Geekiness: 8%
  • University at Buffalo, The State University of New York (1989)
Conferences with no geekiness:
  • Mountain West
  • Sunbelt
  • WAC