KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- If college basketball coaches have their way, they will no longer be called college basketball coaches.

They will be "teacher-coaches."

"This isn't simply a public relations issue," said Michael Josephson, who moderated a 2½-day, closed-door meeting of some of the nation's top coaches and administrators that ended Wednesday.

"It's an issue of trying to identify the field of coaching in a way that's maybe been lost in recent years, to identify the coach as first and foremost a teacher."

Changing coaches to "teacher-coaches" was one of several recommendations that came out of the discussions of a group that included such well-known coaches as Roy Williams of Kansas, Kelvin Sampson of Oklahoma, Jim Boeheim of Syracuse and Tubby Smith of Kentucky.

Josephson, who heads the Josephson Institute, said at a news conference Wednesday that changing the label of coaches would be preferred for "all scholastic and non-scholastic coaches."

"The real serious coaches have really treasured that kind of teaching role," he said.

"It's an effort to harken back to that, of saying, `Wait a minute, let's remind ourselves, let's remind the world. Let's use that language all the time so it doesn't escape us that you have some job beyond X's and O's."'

Non-coaches taking part included Jack Jewett, incoming president of the Arizona Board of Regents, University of Tulsa president Bob Lawless, chairman of the NCAA Executive Committee, Big 12 commissioner Kevin Weiberg and Steve Baker, president of the NAIA.

Josephson said many of the non-coaches were at first skeptical of working for a name change.

"There was quite an interesting discussion on this," Josephson said. "The people who were cynical weren't necessarily coaches. They said, `Oh, nobody's going to pick this up. It's not going to work. It's just an artificial construct.'

"But the coaches said, `Not to me."'

In his autobiography, longtime NCAA head Walter Byers said the term "student-athlete" was concocted to draw attention away from the increasing commercialization of college sports. But Jim Haney, executive director of the National Association of Basketball Coaches, said relabeling coaches had nothing to do with that.

"It's not as much as a title as it is a frame of reference," Haney said. "It's about the everyday responsibility of teachers ... teaching ethics, core values, demonstrating the value of hard work."

Other recommendations of the group included: