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Nearly 5th of all college sports teams fail in classrooms

Despite optimism aimed at reforming the way college athletics play a role at universities, the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s new Academic Progress Rate system could prove detrimental for several institutions.

The APR assigns two points to scholarship students who meet academic eligibility standards and remain at an institution. The points contribute to a team score with a cutoff of 925 below which teams will be penalized.

Schools received their APR scores in February, though the NCAA plans to collect another year of data before implementing penalties for low scorers. However, almost 1,200 of the 5,720 Division I NCAA sports have APRs lower than 925.

Beginning in the fall of 2006, teams below the 925-point cutoff will lose a scholarship for each student athlete who leaves the institution without being academically eligible to return.

According to Jennifer Kearns, spokesperson for the NCAA, the association is still finalizing the details of punishments for schools continuing to score a low APR over time.

“If the team shows over time that they’re still struggling … that’s when the historical penalties take effect. Those are going to be more harsh penalties,” Kearns said.

According to Kearns, the historical penalties may affect recruiting, restrict financial aid and postseason competition and may even affect a school’s membership status.

Kearns also said the new scoring system marks the NCAA’s efforts to place more responsibility on institutions to ensure the success of their student athletes.

“I think this APR program really holds institutions accountable, and certainly the people who have the most influence over making sure student athletes get a good education are the people at the institutional level,” Kearns said.

Fortunately, the University of Wisconsin has not seen serious threats by the NCAA’s new standards since most of UW’s sports excelled at more than the median 925.

According to David Harris, University of Wisconsin associate athletic director for academic services, UW already provides athletes with excellent services to promote their academic success.

Harris said UW provides athletes with academic advisors, tutors and mentors. It also provides a life-skills program offering seminars and organizing community-service projects for the athletes.

“Our basic services are to help students graduate — number one — and develop as a total student athlete during their time here so they have great careers and be productive citizens once they leave,” Harris said.

More than one-third of UW’s 23 sports received perfect scores of 1000 for the 2003-04 year, and the school boasted an overall average of 960 — well above the Division 1-A average of 948.

But UW did not escape from one national trend — its APR score for football lagged at 916.

According to the data for all schools, more than 28 percent of football teams sank below 925.

Harris warned against misinterpreting the national trend. He said the size of football teams best explains why more football players are likely to struggle academically.

“In football you have many more student athletes so you’re naturally going to have a higher percentage of students who have academic issues,” Harris said.

Harris added the popularity of both football and basketball places its athletes under harsher scrutiny.

“Those are some of our most visible sports,” Harris said. “If [students] aren’t having success academically people see that and are aware of that more than with our non-revenue sports.”

Steve Malchow, associate athletic director of communications, said the NCAA’s new measurement system would not affect UW. He said the school has already shown a commitment to making its athletes well-rounded students.

“I think our department understands that academic success is the foundation for participation in athletics,” Malchow said. “The commitment to academics has been here as long as I’ve been here … this new measure won’t change that.”