2008 Woodie Awards
NCAA changes methods
Eric Ransom ; Daily Texan (U. Texas-Austin)
Issue date: 3/2/05 Section: Sports
- Page 1 of 1
AUSTIN, Texas - The NCAA will release Academic Progress Rates for all Division I institutions Monday in order to give the schools a look in the mirror before penalties are handed out.
The APR rate will serve as the basis for academic reforms, focusing on athletes meeting their school's eligibility requirements and schools retaining athletes every semester.
"We have had only a clumsy way of measuring academics in the past, on data six years old," NCAA spokesman Wally Harrison said. "We're looking at data that is real, on terms that have just finished. The goal is not to penalize, but to change behavior."
Per the APR, every scholarship athlete has the potential to earn two points a semester, one for meeting eligibility requirements and another for being retained the next semester. A team's points will be divided against the total possible to create its APR percentile.
A team could earn 1,000 points if every scholarship athlete earns four points a year. The NCAA has created a 925 cutline formed by multiplying a team's percentage by 1,000. The 925 requirement will be averaged over a five-year period, which equates under the formula to a 50 percent graduation rate.
The information to be released Monday on the NCAA Web site will be composed only of the 2003-04 school year, and institutions will not face any penalties due to the data. Another set of APR reports will be released in the fall with two years' worth of data and the first round of penalties. The NCAA will begin instituting penalties for schools not meeting the APR cutline in any sport.
"The material released on Monday will be used to understand what is a fairly complex process," Harrison said. "When we began this level of academic reform a few years ago, those who had observed this would mark this as the first time the association put teeth into academic reform. It is the first time schools and teams are accountable for those they recruit."
The penalties, beginning in fall 2005, involve preventing schools from replacing a scholarship for players who lost both possible points per semester. A team can not lose more than 10 percent of its scholarships, and the loss of scholarships will be structured around the sport's offseason and recruiting periods. Thus, no person who has already signed with a team can have their scholarship taken away because of these new policies.
With the first round of APR reports coming Monday, schools will be able to apply for waivers in March in order to adjust their scores before the second round of scores come out in the fall.
The APR rate will serve as the basis for academic reforms, focusing on athletes meeting their school's eligibility requirements and schools retaining athletes every semester.
"We have had only a clumsy way of measuring academics in the past, on data six years old," NCAA spokesman Wally Harrison said. "We're looking at data that is real, on terms that have just finished. The goal is not to penalize, but to change behavior."
Per the APR, every scholarship athlete has the potential to earn two points a semester, one for meeting eligibility requirements and another for being retained the next semester. A team's points will be divided against the total possible to create its APR percentile.
A team could earn 1,000 points if every scholarship athlete earns four points a year. The NCAA has created a 925 cutline formed by multiplying a team's percentage by 1,000. The 925 requirement will be averaged over a five-year period, which equates under the formula to a 50 percent graduation rate.
The information to be released Monday on the NCAA Web site will be composed only of the 2003-04 school year, and institutions will not face any penalties due to the data. Another set of APR reports will be released in the fall with two years' worth of data and the first round of penalties. The NCAA will begin instituting penalties for schools not meeting the APR cutline in any sport.
"The material released on Monday will be used to understand what is a fairly complex process," Harrison said. "When we began this level of academic reform a few years ago, those who had observed this would mark this as the first time the association put teeth into academic reform. It is the first time schools and teams are accountable for those they recruit."
The penalties, beginning in fall 2005, involve preventing schools from replacing a scholarship for players who lost both possible points per semester. A team can not lose more than 10 percent of its scholarships, and the loss of scholarships will be structured around the sport's offseason and recruiting periods. Thus, no person who has already signed with a team can have their scholarship taken away because of these new policies.
With the first round of APR reports coming Monday, schools will be able to apply for waivers in March in order to adjust their scores before the second round of scores come out in the fall.