The first major steps for an overhaul of the college football recruiting process will take place this Wednesday and Thursday at the Division I Collegiate Commissioner Association meetings at the Big Ten Conference’s headquarters in Chicago. While no final decisions are expected this week, we could have a good idea of whether or not there will be enough momentum to make these changes a reality. Here’s a look at what’s being proposed, the decision-making process and the likelihood of holistic reform coming to recruiting.

The proposal

On Oct. 6, the NCAA Division I Council unveiled components of a new model for football recruiting, proposing major cutbacks and restrictions to satellite camps, the introduction of two new early signing periods and changes to the official visit calendar.

MAC commissioner Jon Steinbrecher has been a driving force behind the early signing period moves. Stew Milne/USA TODAY Sports

The Council proposed legislation that would cut the days in a year from 30 to 10 that coaches were allowed to conduct camps. Only coaches permitted to recruit off campus could participate, and the camps would be required to take place on campuses or in the facilities used primarily for practice or competition by member schools, essentially ending lengthy nationwide barnstorming satellite camp tours like Jim Harbaugh's Summer Swarm Tour.

Those would be significant changes on their own, but most of the attention has been focused on new 72-hour signing windows that would open on the last Wednesday in June and at the time of the mid-December junior college signing period. The topic of early signing has long been debated in college football and was last tabled by the Division I conference commissioners in June 2015.

To coincide with the two new early signing periods, the NCAA said it would be willing to adjust the recruiting calendar to allow prospects to take official visits during the summer before their senior years. Recruits would be allowed to take official visits starting June 1 until the last Saturday before the June signing period begins. They would also be allowed to take visits from July 25-31.

The process

Northwestern athletic director Jim Phillips, the chair of the Division I Council, said there was a “mandate made very clear by university presidents to have the Council work on comprehensive, holistic recruiting reform, including how to address satellite camps, early signing and adjustments in the recruiting calendar.” From there, the Football Oversight Committee chaired by Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby and a Recruiting Ad Hoc Group that was chaired by Mississippi State head coach Dan Mullen and Nebraska athletic director Shawn Eichorst spent nearly 18 months formulating what changes should be made. It was from those two groups that the current proposal was developed.

While the all the different parts of the recruiting reform package are intertwined with each other, it’s important to note two different bodies will actually vote on various sections of the proposal. The Collegiate Commissioners Association controls the national letter of intent and when recruits can officially sign with a school, and the NCAA manages the recruiting calendar, official visit schedules and satellite camp rules.

The CCA begins its debate of the early signing period portion of the proposal this week in Chicago, could meet at the NCAA national convention Jan. 18-21 in Nashville and then again in early summer, where many commissioners expect a vote to take place. The NCAA portion of the package is expected to be a big point of emphasis at the NCAA convention, and Phillips believes it’ll eventually get to the Council for vote in April.

“That's where I feel we'll have a final agreement that will please hopefully a majority, if not all of Division I, FBS, autonomy and non-autonomy folks,” Phillips said.

Will it pass?

There hasn’t been much pushback from coaches, recruits and administrators to the restrictions on satellite camps, earlier official visits and other parts of the package, but it’s the early signing periods that have already sparked an intense debate. Even though football, soccer and water polo are the only NCAA sports without an early signing window for recruits, a majority of football coaches and conference officials remain in favor of an early signing period of some fashion but question when to have them. Other early signing period critics question what happens to recruits if they sign in June and one of their coaches -- whether it's a head coach, coordinator, position coach or recruiter -- leaves for another job?

MAC commissioner Dr. Jon Steinbrecher, who is also on the Football Oversight Committee and the Recruiting Ad Hoc Group, said those are all topics the CCA will have to sort through before it gets to a point where it feels comfortable for a vote. But Phillips, Steinbrecher and Bowlsby believe the package is “very student-athlete and family friendly” and “would fix a lot of what’s wrong with recruiting today.” Bowlsby said the proposal would also go long way toward cutting down on third-party influences in the process and also provide coaches with a better work-life balance.

“You don’t want to allow the perfect to get in the way of the progress,” Bowlsby said. “We got a proposal together that, if it stays together, it will be the most substantial change in football recruiting in decades.”

Phillips agrees and is confident the proposal will eventually pass through the NCAA and the CCA.

“Perfect should not be at the detriment of a very good, right, college football comprehensive recruiting package,” Phillips said. “We can't let perfect be the evil of that. Will it be perfect? I don't think any of this legislation can be perfect, but this is major progress and a very good package overall. It's a much needed package. I think everyone can live with that, and I’m confident we’ll have positive outcome that will empower prospective-student athletes and recalibrate the entire process to how it should be for everybody involved.”