US secretary of education, Arne Duncan, expressed a desire to ban all teams with a graduation rate below 40% from the NCAA Basketball Tournament.
Among the teams singled out by Duncan in a conference call to select reporters are number one seed Kentucky and ACC representatives Clemson, Georgia Tech and Maryland.
According to the NCAA’s website, two methods are used to calculate student athlete performance: Graduation Success Rate (GSR) and Academic Progress Rate (APR).
The NCAA states that the GSR “credits institutions for transfers — both incoming and outgoing — as long as they are academically eligible, unlike the federal graduation rate. The GSR also accounts for midyear enrollees and is calculated for every sport.”
Also according to the NCAA, “The APR awards two points each term to student-athletes who meet academic-eligibility standards and who remain with the institution. A team’s APR is the total points earned by the team at a given time divided by the total points possible.”
As of right now, the NCAA punishes programs that consistently fail to meet the minimum APR by removing scholarships and can bar, as is the case with Centenary College, participation in the Tournament due to chronically substandard APR scores.
Carrie Leger, Director of Academic Support Program for Student Athletes for NC State, said that the University has been aware and expressed concern over the issue for some time. She said the University has already put programs in place to hold N.C. State student athletes to a higher standard than the NCAA currently requires.
“The University is always striving to make sure our athletes are performing above and beyond the academic standards of the NCAA and will continue to do so in the future,” Leger said.
NCAA records show that State was penalized for low APR when the wrestling team was forced to lose a scholarship in 2008 for substandard scores. However, the basketball team under Sidney Lowe has posted consistently high APR scores, with the State basketball team regularly scoring within the 80 and 90 percentiles for APR, according to these same records.
Jason McLarty, an academic tutor for student athletes, said the University is taking steps to ensure the athletes’ academic success.
“Administrative monitoring has definitely stepped up recently, at least on my end,” McLarty said. “There’s even more pressure to make sure the athletes do their own work and do it well.”
Duncan explained in the conference call that the idea of using a flat minimum graduation rate of 40% would be a move to “over time, hold players to a higher bar” and that “not many teams would be ineligible.”
Taylor Muir, junior in mechanical engineering said the potential policy has negative qualities.
“While the policy has good intentions, athletes who turn pro early should not be forced to graduate when their future does not require a degree just so that the school does not fall below an arbitrary line,” Muir said.
Josh Johnson, junior in computer engineering, said some students took a differing, more positive view of the proposal.
“I think it’s a good idea to set a strong standard for the academic quality of our athletes,” Johnson said. “I have no doubt that they could meet it and since they represent us, they should be held to a high standard.”
