The transcript of staff writer Brad Townsend's interview with Texas coach Mack Brown.

DMN: In the past couple of weeks, you, DeLoss Dodds and university president William Powers have taken accountability for the off-the-field incidents of the past year. In the interest of transparency, I was wondering if you could discuss your support system and recruiting practices, how much they have changed in recent years and how might they change in the future in light of what has happened.

MACK BROWN: We've put a lot of thought into it, and 99 percent of these problems are over the summer. So the first thing we have to do is try to re-evaluate when our coaches are gone. I remember three years ago, I asked to have a team meeting about taking care of their business in the summer and all of that.

[NCAA rules] wouldn't allow me to because school had already been let out. I can't even meet with the team because summer school is not part of the regular year. I can't have a team meeting in the summer anymore, which is a difficult thing, and then you add bringing freshmen in that window of starting their college career, the first time away from home, without the support of the coaching staff. Your support staff becomes even more important.

We started a thing last fall, called MACK 7 [Making Advances and Caring for Kids].

And that committee is everyone who's in this building who is not a football coach but is a boss. So it's Brian Davis, who is head of academics; Jean Bryant, who is head of our Life Skills; Jeff Madden, who is our strength coach; Cleve Bryant, who is associate athletic director for football operations; George Wynn, who is assistant athletic director for football operations; Chip Robertson who is our equipment manager; and Kenny Boyd, our trainer.

They meet every Monday, now for a year and a half. They go over every player on the team. And they go over what they are concerned about.

What we found is that our coaches are around the kids only in their meetings, and they text them at night and they call them at night. But it is our support staff that surrounds them in the summers, are the ones who see them walking the halls every day. And they are in charge of our drug-testing; they are in charge of our study hall.

We have two assistant coaches who are graduate assistant-type coaches who live in the dorm. They walk the dorm floor every night and talk to them.

And, again, our kids live off-campus in the summer, so we don't have control. We probably have 30 kids now, scholarship kids, who live in dorms [freshmen and sophomores]. They have a right, if they've earned that right, then they move off-campus in their junior and senior year.

We started that at Tulane because a lot of our kids were getting off-campus after four years, and their parents were griping because the kids didn't know how to pay rent, they didn't know how to turn on the electricity, they didn't know how to get cable. We felt like that should be part of the learning experience.

We've tried to really get the parents involved here and develop a family atmosphere. But also, if you're really trying to help kids with life after football, keeping them in a dorm and not letting them walk outside without a coach standing next to them for four years isn't very realistic.

And we're trying to help them learn to have a good experience when they get through, not just when they're here. I've tried really hard over my 23 years to have diversity within that support staff, as well as the coaching staff, so you'd like to have African-American, young and old, white and female. You'd like to have a diverse enough group so that if some young man needs someone to go talk to, he can find someone in that group he relates to. And at the same time, we want those people in that group to be great role models.

It's better for us if they have children, because they understand that children have problems, that children make poor decisions sometimes and it is a learning process.

I can remember when I first got married to Sally about 16 years ago. We had a young guy make a poor decision. I was so upset by it. I'll never forget, she came to me and said, 'You know, these are pieces of adults. That's what they do. They're in a stage of their lives when they go through trial and error. They're going to make some mistakes. You need to understand that. Your job is to help them not make that mistake, but if they make it, then you have to be supportive of that family and that young man and try to help them learn from the mistake and hopefully it won't change the course of their life and they won't do it again.'

Our standards are set higher here than most people's. We understand that. And that's fine.

There's an expectation here that is higher than most athletic departments and universities across the country. You're not sitting in any other office today. So we understand that, and that's one of the reasons we came here.

And then what I've done is I hold myself more accountable, and therefore our staff more accountable than most to the actions of players on and off the field. And it's really important for us here that they graduate, that they go to school, that they represent their university well. This university takes a tremendous amount of pride in its class and integrity. That's why we came. Everybody we've hired understands that and feels that way and that's not going to change.

When you do have an incident, any incident at Texas is too many. When you have one, much less a number, what it usually does is make you come out much stronger because of the scrutiny you're under. Because you've already put a tremendous amount of effort into trying to educate kids to kids to keep it from happening.

In the recruiting process, to make sure every kid you bring in here fits, and he has an opportunity to be successful. And if you make some mistakes in any of those areas, when you have public scrutiny like we've had, you tighten everything up, and you go back to work, and you make yourself, your program, the players around you, with zero tolerance even tougher and make them understand that the demand on them to act right at this school is really, really important and even more urgent now than it would have been in the summer.

Because what happens is if a young man gets in trouble and he's the only one in 10 years, there's not a lot said about it. You hate it for him. When you have two or three get in trouble, then all of a sudden the next one is held much more accountable than maybe one at another school or [here] five years ago.

So the players understand that. That's life. That's the way it is. It may be piling on, but that's what we've got.

DMN: You talked about the support staff. Within the team, are there mentoring programs, since kids sometime seem to respond better with peers?

MACK BROWN: Oh, yeah. We have big brothers that we assign to every player when they get here as freshmen. That big brother is responsible for sitting down and talking to him, helping him with homesickness, taking him to all his classes, and coming to us if he is having any kind of problems at all.

We text most of our kids just about every night. We even have kids that we know have struggled some with class, or are a little bit down, maybe dropped a pass, we have different staff members call every night to make sure they are comforted.

This summer, after we had the DUI in June, I think it is fair to say we texted every player and said, 'There's zero-tolerance, so you need to make sure that you get yourself in your room and take care of yourself because there is no question there is a problem with drugs and alcohol in society – and because of that, you cannot do some of the things you are doing. And you can't do that if you're going to represent this football team.'

And we still do the same. We have a constant e-mail system with their parents, where we're constantly e-mailing them and talking with them about the things we think are important for them to get the message back to the players.

We have a thing in place where if our players are leaving town for the weekend, they have to tell us that they're leaving and where they're going, especially in the off-season. And when they get to wherever they are going, they have to call us and tell us that they are safe.

And also, we've learned that like in the case of Cole Pittman, that if someone left and didn't tell their parents and we didn't know where they were, and their parents said there's an emergency in the house, 'Where are they?' We want to know where they are at all times, so we can tell their parents, 'Here's where he is.'

And I think all of our kids now have cellphones. I think every one of them do. We had one at one time who didn't, and now all of them are on a text system that we've got now like Virginia Tech [which used the system to contact students during last year's shooting tragedy].

We've constantly talked about Facebook and MySpace because that's a new problem every day, and we're learning new stuff. We've told our players that they either have to give us the code or they have to get rid of it.

It's a new issue, and they think it's totally private. They think that MySpace means 'my space.' Well, we're not going to have 'my space' on our team. And if they're not going to help us with that, they won't be part of the team.

That's just part of it. Their lives are different from the other students. They're treated different. They work different. They're scrutinized different. They made a choice to do this. We made a choice to have them do it, so my life's different from some of the faculty. That's just the way it is.

DMN: You mentioned parents. When some of the incidents were happening over the summer, what kind of feedback did you get from parents whose kids were not getting into trouble?

MACK BROWN: We have probably the best group of kids we've ever had, and therefore the best parents we've ever had.

That's why it's been so unfair for the kids who have not allegedly done anything wrong to be under scrutiny. We've always had good kids, but this group has been extraordinary.

It hurts their feelings when they are grouped in a group of a very few, some of whom are wrong and some allegedly wrong. I think it pulls you closer together. The parents understand how we run our program. They know that we call them with good grades, we call them with bad grades, we call them if the kids miss class. We're in constant contact with our parents. They know that if somebody does mess up, we're going to fix it. They know it really bothers us. And they know it will be fixed immediately.

Every kid that has been involved in an incident has been suspended for something. That's all we can do until the legal system takes its course. Then after that, we can take away the right to play. We can take their scholarship away if they are guilty and if the athletic department and president agree. But we can only suspend them from play if they are accused of something or been charged with something.

Because there's been a lot of times when young people, or people in general, are charged and they're not guilty. We go no further than the Duke case with the lacrosse players that did away with the whole team. There's probably some people second-guessing that decision.

DMN: You talked about kids needing to learn lessons from their mistakes, not just being punished for them. Was having Joyce Adejumo, mother of Mitchie Mitchell, who was paralyzed in a DWI wreck, meet individually with Sergio Kindle and Henry Melton, part of that thinking? And then I understand you had her speak to the entire team.

MACK BROWN: At the University of Texas there's an awful price to be paid when especially a football player is accused of something wrong because he is ridiculed publicly, not only around the state by the media, but nationally. It's national attention if one of our student athletes is accused of anything, the minute he does it.

So that's a tremendous amount of punishment. That's not discipline. It punishes his family. It punishes him. In some cases, if everybody was wrong, there's not near as much attention in the rebuttal, or saying, 'Sorry, we missed it.'

People will remember that the rest of their lives on that kid, and that's really unfair. Secondly, suspending them from the team is a huge loss in their life because you're separating them from their support system and their best friends. That's a tremendous loss to them.

Thirdly, when you take away a fourth of their season, like we did the two young men who had DUI's, I don't know if anybody has ever had that harsh a penalty.

I'm not sure that I was right, but again it was about message. It was about what we talked about. The timing was very poor. At a time where I'm concerned as a guy who may be a grandfather here pretty soon, I'm concerned about drinking on college campuses for kids. I'm concerned about drinking and drugs in our society, so it's not just about our football team.

We felt like maybe we could get someone's attention, not just about drinking, us, because leaving the world my grandkids and your grandkids and everybody else's grandkids is going to be different. It's going to be a different world than when I grew up, and we all need to be aware of that.

For Joyce to have hands-on experience of a crippling accident – for her to have this happen to Mitchie at 3 and then he died at 22, and for the pain that she's had, what she feels like she can do is give back to families and not have it happen to anybody else.

I'm going to tell you, I sat in there and cried. I don't know how long she talked to the team, 45 minutes. She had pictures. And we keep his picture downstairs in our dressing room. I get scared every Thursday night on college campuses. I get scared every Friday night, every Saturday after ballgames.

There's so much drinking around a football game, across the country. And there's so many people who get in cars after football games while they're drinking, and it scares me absolutely to death.

And we talk about Mitchie and his picture after every ballgame because those kids are exhausted, and they've been out in that heat, and it's a vulnerable time for them. And after a loss, people are going to ridicule them. After a win, they're going to buy them drinks. It's a very difficult time for them, even after a ballgame, you're absolutely scared to death and talk to them after every game. We talk about, 'You get with friends, you get with family, don't do anything that can harm your body, you get in bed as soon as you can.'

In fact, I'm sure our kids get tired of me saying, 'Great win. Listen now, you be careful, you be smart.' First thing I said after the national championship game: This is the most visible time of your life, you're excited, don't go out there and do something that's going to embarrass you or change this night for the rest of your life.

And she had an impact on me. She said, and I'll never forget this statement, if you have a wreck and it's an accident, it's an accident; if you have a wreck because you are drinking, it's a crime. I thought, 'Wow.'

Every parent and every teenager needs to talk to Joyce. And we gave her the game ball after the opening game. That's how impactful it was. She came in the dressing room and cried and has written me since.

So instead of just the public scrutiny, instead of just the suspensions, we'd like to learn something from a really bad situation because our whole premise is to take a crisis and turn it into a positive. Taking bad and turning it to good.

When Cole Pittman died, that's when we started calling the kids, having them call us when they get there. Because I got the call from the Highway Patrol that Cole was dead and I had to call his dad. And I don't ever want to do that again in my life.

So if a young man does mess up, as devastating as it is for a university that cares so much about integrity, and for me who had spent my whole life trying to go by the NCAA rules and making sure we do things right and I brag on it all the time ... as devastating as that is, it's really more about the kid and the change of his life and his parents – and hopefully the lesson they can learn from it to move forward in their life, more than the embarrassment to me. I mean, I didn't get arrested.

So we do want not only them to learn, but if there is anyone on our team or a high school program that is even thinking or on the edge of something, maybe the public scrutiny of one of ours will help deter him away from it.

And I do think, as painful as the incidents we've had happen to us, it will help us get stronger. It will bring more attention to it.

DMN: You mentioned the summer being a problem. And you see what is happening around college football. In our paper on some days, much of the college football roundup seems to be filled with jurisprudence. Is there anything you think college football coaches should address with the NCAA?

MACK BROWN: It's worse right now, I think, than ever before. And I don't think it's just our area. I'm like you. You can't turn on a ballgame anymore without looking at the ticker tape and seeing somebody that is in trouble. It's just unbelievable what is happening.

And I'm not sure why. I don't know why it has changed. I don't know if we have less control, I don't know.

I know that we are looking really, really hard at our summers. We're looking really hard with our committee, to change. Because we felt like we were a year ahead. We felt like we were doing everything right. We felt like we had done a better job this year, with all the issues and keeping our hands on kids that were struggling some, than ever before. And we've had more problems.

There's definitely an issue with early recruiting. Because now people are starting to offer sophomores. And people are offering freshmen. And we don't have enough information academically. People are offering scholarships before we get to know the families, as well.

And there's no question that that's a concern of mine. We will have to do a better job of going back. Because we have a profile in place of who we want, exactly what we want. And if we stay within that profile, we usually do really well.

When we step outside of that profile – and sometimes it's a gut feel for me, that there's a young man who hasn't had the same chances and others, and I just want to help him – usually if I've done that, it's been 50-50. It hasn't been as good as when I stayed with what I know is best.

The good thing is 50 percent of the time, if I've taken that risk and it works, what a wonderful story for the young guy who didn't have the chances I had. It worked for him. And if it doesn't work, I feel really guilty that I brought someone here who might have been put in a position where he didn't make as good of decisions because he didn't have the support at home.

I have to make the decision of every kid who is here, and I'm responsible for them. There is no doubt, every night before I go to bed, I worry about the young people on this team. Every night. That's part of coaching. I fear a young person being hurt badly. Always. That's been a fear of mine since before Cole, but especially [after] a tragic end to a 21-year-old's life.

I always have feared the breaking of an NCAA rule, not by our staff or coaches, but anyone out there because we have no control over people that are out there who support Texas football, other than to ask them not to [break rules].

I fear any moment a young man either makes a poor decision or gets accused of one and his life changes before he has a chance to clear it up.

And then, it's just a personal thing, losing [games] is not as bad, but it goes in that group. Because I don't think the experience of the kids can be as good if you don't win games. That's another thing that's very, very important because I've been on both ends of that – the depression and the scrutiny, with as much time and effort as they put into this, for it not to work out on the field makes it very difficult, too.

DMN: On the subject of recruiting, do you think that will be more of a focus as you move forward? You talked about the gut calls. Will you be less likely to take that 50-50 chance?

MACK BROWN: There's no question I'll scrutinize our coaches and myself and our decisions even more. Sometimes we have not been given all the information because people have felt like our program was so good, and has such strong values, that a young man who might have struggled some would come here and make it, because we have so much structure in the program.

We've just got to ask people who are around a young man [whether] there's something in his background that we can't find out about. Because you can't have background checks. They're too young. You have to base what you know on family members, friends at school, teachers, coaches, alums in the area who have friends who may know the kid.

Every coach, every principal, every teach and every family member wants that young guy to have that chance, and a lot of them want to be at the University of Texas.

DMN: So they put the positive spin on the player?

MACK BROWN: They really do. And that's what I meant when I said it's all on me. Because I do make the final decisions in this program. We will be stronger because of these things. Someone asked, 'Could this happen again tonight?' No question. I mean, you've got 130 kids. There's no question it could happen this afternoon that a kid makes a poor decision. They do, in just about all of their lives, at some point.

For people to think that you can just wave a wand and say, 'OK, nothing's going to happen again.' ... We've been so good in this program for so many years, and our North Carolina kids are so good. But no question, it could happen again.

What I've got to do is continue to look at what we're doing. But with the scrutiny that we've been under, and the zero-tolerance, if a young guy messes up he shouldn't be part of our team. That's what I've told them. That's on him. Because right now, we're doing everything within our power on our kids on this team to make sure they understand this is about getting an education, this is about playing football, this is about acting right, and if you make a poor decision, then it's on you.

DMN: And when players get kicked off the team, it affects graduation rates.

MACK BROWN: It does, over time. And that's why, over time, if someone messes up and they shouldn't be part of our program, the graduation rate will take a hit unfairly. But that's back on me because I made the decision to bring the young man in and he couldn't make it. And it wasn't about academics, but it still suffers in the APR and the academic world because of social issues.

Someone asked me about, after a national championship, why were seems to be more problems with those teams. I don't know why, except that it seems like it's out there, period.

We talk about it every day. We talk about an issue after practice, nationally, just about every day. There's a [bulletin] board downstairs of every incident in the country.

DMN: Are Longhorn arrests on the board?

MACK BROWN: No. They know about it. I address every one of them with the team. I tell them exactly what I know. And I tell them not to discuss it because it's a legal matter, and I can't discuss it in-depth, but for you to know and for you to tell your parents, here's the information I have.

And that's why, if I can't get to our team first, I won't speak publicly about it because I want them to hear it from me first before they see me on TV.

We talk with every family of every young man who gets into trouble. We constantly stay in touch with them. And we stay in touch with the kids who are indefinitely suspended from our team. Because again, they're not guilty until they are found guilty.

A lot of times, our other kids aren't aware. They study; they work hard [on the field]. The other day, when I talked to them about the James Henry thing that came back up from summer, I'll bet you two-thirds of them didn't know what I was talking about.

They have their lives, they have their work. Everybody thinks it affects the team. The only thing it affects is the public image of the team, and therefore their public image. It doesn't affect them personally, other than they are disappointed for their friends.

DMN: Would you think that over time, with peer pressure within the team, the good would squeeze out the bad?

MACK BROWN: No question. Which is why if they do something, if it's bad enough, they should be held accountable. What happens is that myself, President Powers and DeLoss talk about every issue and every disciplinary action. We feel like we want the young man to have a chance in his life, regardless of whether it is here or somewhere else

But if at some point the young man shouldn't stay here, then we will help him get somewhere else. We're not going to just throw him out. We'll help them transfer to a place where he can start over.

DMN: Some of the things that seem to make UT a draw for recruits – large university, Austin itself – also seem to mean more temptations. Do you agree?

MACK BROWN: I don't think so. Even in small towns, drugs and alcohol are everywhere.

I think for anyone to say they are immune to drugs and alcohol right now, in any community in America, I think right now, from what I see, we have a really, really big problem in America with our youth. And we all need to step up to it. It's not just an athletic issue. They're just the ones that are on the bottom of TV.

I think it's out there. I think it's problematic, and I know parents are concerned about it. And that's one good thing about parents. They know good and well, the kids who are around them in high school, they understand what's out there.

Every minute of every day, it's new stuff. The Facebook issue is not just an athletic issue. We have some issues that we all need to take a strong look at, and they're not just athletic issues. Athletic issues get more attention. But they're not just athletic issues.

So what I would say, to be fair, is our problems have been very well documented. I still stand by this group of kids. This is as good a group as we've ever had. I sure can't say we won't have another one make a poor decision because as long as I coach, there's going to be kids who make poor decisions. I make poor decisions. We're all human.

But nobody, no university, no support staff, no team and no coaching staff cares more about the welfare of a kid, or how he acts, or what happens to him when he gets out of here, than the University of Texas. I'll stand by that as strongly as ever.

Nobody's been more embarrassed. I move forward, but I don't move on. And that's really important to know. I think about those kids every day that are in trouble. Now, it should not take away from all those kids who are doing everything right. And the 51 who were over a 3.0 and made the academic honor roll last spring, and all the kids who are doing everything right on this football team.

The experience shouldn't be bad for them because of the choices of a few, or the alleged choices of a few. And that's where I have to make sure that I move forward to help our team. And our fans have been great. But there's so many kids who are doing everything right, they're the ones we need to focus on right now.