On Oct. 25, the NCAA released the latests figures and statistics on the graduation rates, graduation success rates and academic success rates for Division I, II and III athletic programs. Excerpts from each divisional release are below along with related links.
DIVISION I
Men's Basketball, FBS Football Grad Rates Highest Ever
INDIANAPOLIS — Division I men’s basketball and Bowl Subdivision football student-athletes are finishing their college degrees at their highest rates ever.
And for the first time, the graduation rates in both high-profile sports have reached or exceeded 70 percent, according to the latest national figures from the NCAA.
In men’s basketball, the latest Graduation Success Rate has climbed to 74 percent, up 6 points from last year. In FBS football, the GSR has hit 70 percent, up 1 point. These figures reflect GSRs for student-athletes who started college in 2005.
“Our academic reforms continue to bear fruit,” said NCAA President Mark Emmert. “We are not satisfied, but we are proud that we have reached another milestone, as now seven of every 10 student-athletes in our highest-profile sports are earning their degrees.”
Emmert noted that only 1.3 percent of men’s basketball student-athletes and 1.6 percent of football student-athletes go on to careers in professional athletics. CLICK HERE FOR FULL RELEASE
• Search DI GSR by Sport, School, Conference and Year
DIVISION II
DII single-year ASR drops by a point; four-year average is constant
INDIANAPOLIS — A drop in graduation rates for two- and four-year transfers led to a small decline for the entering class of 2005 in the latest Division II Academic Success Rate.The overall Division II ASR for the 2005 cohort was 72 percent, down 1 percent from the previous report. The four-year average remained at 72 percent.
The single-year rate for men was 64 percent (down 2 percent); for women, it was 83 percent (also down 2 percent). Rounding accounts for the discrepancy between the overall figure and the gender breakdowns.The decline in ASRs for two-year and four-year college transfers has been exacerbated by an increase in the number of transfers.
Division II Presidents Council chair Pat O’Brien noted significant progress over the last several years with graduation rates but also expressed concerns over the transfer-student outcomes.
“This is the first decline we’ve experienced since our first ASR report six years ago,” said O’Brien, president of West Texas A&M University. “The fact that we’ve made such steady progress in such a difficult economic environment is encouraging. Still, some aspects of the most recent report are concerning, especially the declines among our transfer student-athletes.” CLICK HERE FOR FULL RELEASE
• SEARCH DII GSR by Sport, Conference and Year
DIVISION III
DIII graduation rates reflect student athlete success
INDIANAPOLIS — Data from the third year of Division III’s voluntary academic reporting program released Thursday once again demonstrate that student-athletes in general graduate at higher rates than their student-body peers.
Of the 128 Division III schools submitting data for the entering cohort of 2005 (the most recent available under the six-year graduation-rates calculation), student-athletes at those schools graduated at a 68 percent rate, compared with the 62 percent rate of their student-body counterparts.
The 68 percent student-athlete rate from those schools also exceeds the overall 64 percent Division III student-body rate calculated from the federal reports that all institutions are required to submit annually on student graduation.
The Division III Academic Success Rate, which accounts for transfer outcomes, shows that 88 percent of Division III student-athletes at the 128 reporting schools graduated within six years of initial enrollment. The federal government does not compile a comparable figure for the general student body.
Reporting on student-athlete graduation rates is voluntary in Division III, which is why the sample from year to year does not match the total number of Division III institutions. However, because the reporting samples in the first three years of the program have been representative of the Division III membership (based on public/private, sport sponsorship, enrollment, federal graduation rates and other indicators), researchers believe the rates gleaned from those schools reflect the success in the division overall. CLICK HERE FOR FULL RELEASE