NCAA Releases Graduation Success Rates
10/26/2011 12:51:00 PM | General
STATESBORO, Ga. - The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) today released the Graduation Success Rates (GSR) for the cohort of Division I scholarship student-athletes who entered college in 2004. Georgia Southern's athletics programs cumulatively achieved a GSR of 66 percent with four individual sports recording graduation success rates that surpassed national GSR figures. Two Eagle teams, Women's Tennis and Volleyball, registered a 100 percent GSR for the cohort measured in this report.
Freshmen scholarship student-athletes who enrolled at Georgia Southern in 2004 posted a federal graduation rate of 55 percent, 10 percentage points higher than the graduation rate recorded for the University for the same term. The federal graduation rate for student-athletes across Division I was 65 percent with the GSR at 82 percent for the same cohort.
"We are continuing to make positive strides in terms of reaching and surpassing the benchmarks for academic success," said Georgia Southern Director of Athletics Sam Baker. "Last academic year, our entire program posted its highest-ever cumulative grade point average and had its highest-ever single semester GPA in the spring. These indicators of achievement, GPA and graduation rate, show our programs are succeeding in the classroom as well as in athletic competition. Our mission is to make sure every student-athlete has the opportunity to earn a diploma and win a championship ring, and we're committed to the on-going efforts to enhance our student-athlete's academic performance.
GSR was initiated by the NCAA at the request of college and university presidents who wanted to more accurately reflect the mobility among all college students. The rate measures graduation rates at Division I institutions, comparing the number of student-athletes who enrolled in a college or university and the number of those who graduated within six years. This percentage includes student-athletes who transfer into the institutions, a major difference from the federal government rate. The federal rate does not include incoming transfer student-athletes and calculates student-athletes who transfer to other institutions as non-graduates, regardless of their status.
The GSR differs from the Academic Progress Rate (APR), which calculates the year-to-year retention of student-athletes and provides a snapshot of their academic standing. GSR provides administrators with a comparative measurement of graduation rates while APR is the calculation the NCAA uses in the identification and reform of institutions that fail to meet a prescribed minimum score.
