3/23/2013: The NCAA Academic Progress Rate is a measure of the progress to graduation of “student athletes”. Explanation here. The most recent Pac-12 median was 962. The APR for UO’s basketball team has been steadily falling and is now below the 930 rate that will be required for post-season play in 2015-16.
Official report here. These are the 4-year APR’s. A 930 suggests a team is headed for a 50% federal graduation rate. USAToday reported in 2012 that the NCAA would ban teams with 4-year APRs below 900, or a two-year average below 930, from post-season play:
The most recent APR scores — what NCAA president Mark Emmert referred to as a “report card” on the call — are based on a multi-year rate that averages scores from the 2007-08, 2008-09, 2009-10 and 2010-11 academic years.
One in four men’s basketball teams in Division I (85 of 344 programs) had four-year APRs beneath the NCAA benchmark of 930, which projects a 50% graduation rate. Among them were UConn (889), Arkansas (894) and LSU (911).
The NCAA is the process of phasing in postseason penalties. This year and next, most teams falling beneath a four-year APR of 900 or a two-year average of 930 are subject to bans. By 2015-16, all teams must hit a four-year average of 930.
Squeaker. We’re now the worst in the Pac-12, by a comfortable margin:
Allie Grasgreen of Insidehighered.com has a lot of fun with APRs and the NCAA brackets, here. And, in the unlikely event anyone is reading this instead of watching the games, President Obama’s Secretary of Education calls for higher academic incentives for coaches here. Sure, that’ll fix the problem – Coach Altman will send them all to major in Doug Blandy’s Arts and Administration program.
A commenter claims that UO’s low APR scores are explained by players transfering after Dana Altman replaced Ernie Kent. But the NCAA only penalizes UO if the players leave in bad academic standing – otherwise they adjust the scores:
I know there is a very good argument to be made that Sport > Academics ’round these parts. (Gleason wouldn’t get it, of course… he struggles with the concept of revealed preference.) Yet, it occurs to me that the faculty probably do care about these trends. I’m guessing that UOM is (again) notifying the camus community of something that an admin somewhere should be on top of but isn’t. Can someone show me otherwise? Should the FAR be on top of this?
This is why we have a Senate committee, the IAC: so that while the admins are counting up the money (mostly outflow, but with visions of inflow), someone attends to the academic progress of student-athletes. Of course, it only works if the work of such a committee is valued and supported by its partners in the admin and atheletic dept.
I have had a number of basketball players in my classes over the last few years. They are always very mixed – some are decent students but many are uber-entitled and don’t have to do anything. I know quite a few that never graduated (Luke Ridnour never graduated, by the way, but he did go straight to the NBA and is still there) – but i don’t see an increasing trend this way. Now, a significant number of UO players have transferred in for 1-2 years of eligibility so I am wonder if that skews the data – this effect needs to be looked at.
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Finally – the Beavers beat the Ducks in something athletics related.
“Now, a significant number of UO players have transferred in for 1-2
years of eligibility so I am wonder if that skews the data – this effect
needs to be looked at.”
Exactly right, Dog. Programs are docked the same amount when a player transfers out – for whatever reason – as when a player does not graduate/flunks out. Not that I’d expect UOM to publish anything that would help explain something negative towards athletics.
And the basketball program had a large number of players transfer out (7 in the shake up of Kent leaving and Altman coming on), so they’ve taken a pretty huge hit in that regard.
Don’t think this is correct – the NCAA gives the team credit, if they transfer in good standing. Check the post for a new link on this.
Well two of the players (Teondre Williams and Bruce Barron) did not transfer to 4 year schools, if I remember correctly, so they don’t get a bump there. I think that addendum was added over the last year or two, but I could be wrong.
I know many cases where the GPA was less than 2.6 (in fact much less) – but this is only anecdotal evidence.