Analysis: Athletes raise graduation rates

WASHINGTON, Sept. 7 (UPI) -- A new NCAA report on graduation rates may offer educators some hope for the future.

The report, compiled from numbers of student-athletes who received an athletic scholarships from Division I schools for the 1996-97 academic year, shows that the graduation rate among them rose to 62 percent. That percentage was three points higher than that of the overall student body.

The NCAA began measuring graduation rates with the Department of Education in 1984. Its latest report measured the number of students who graduated within six years of entering school in 1996. It said this was the first study compiled since more stringent academic requirements took effect.

The only declines were among white male basketball players (52 percent), and white football players (61 percent). Both rates dropped by one point from the report compiled last year.

Also, the New York Times reported that drastic improvements were reported among African-American athletes (up five percent among males), where scores lagged in the past, and gains were modest in high-profile sports, mainly basketball players.

NCAA President Myles Brand called the report "encouraging."

"This is great news," Brand said. "This shows that student-athletes will rise to the occasion and meet the challenges for academic success. This illustrates that changes in NCAA minimum standards can have a positive impact on academic performance of student-athletes in college. This also points to the high quality and accuracy of the data on which the membership relied to make some of these difficult decisions."

One official was more guarded.

"A one-year snapshot is not a real conclusive picture of college sports, but it's a real good sign," Richard Lapchick, director of the Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport at the University of Central Florida, told the Times. "I believe that universities have learned to put the resources into academic support for athletes and have discovered that their chance of classroom success is greatly enhanced."

Also, the report did not mention that women are ahead of men overall on the education curve.

"I think it's because (men) have lost their jobs in farming, they've lost their jobs in manufacturing, and they don't know what else to do," Thomas G. Mortensen, an education researcher who sees it as a brain versus brawn issue, told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

"We should have no subgroup graduating below the graduate rate of the general student body on their campus," Brand said. "There is still room for improvement. Academic reform cannot be considered a real success until we have reached that bar."

Also, the report seems to not have taken into account people, especially young white males, who do not aspire to go to college or earn a degree.

"(I) never wanted to be anything but a carpenter," Nick Hegel, 21, who graduated from high school three years ago, told the Post-Dispatch. "I like to work outside. I didn't think I could stand sitting in a classroom all that time."

Hegel will finish his second year of a carpentry apprenticeship program this year, and earns $17 an hour while learning. When he becomes a journeyman in two more years, he'll qualify for the union wage of $28 an hour.

"How many people make $28 an hour when they graduate from college?" he asks.

(NOTE: At the end of its report, the NCAA added the following disclaimer: Please note that pursuant to a new interpretation of the Family Education Right and Privacy Act (FERPA), information on any category containing only one or two students must be suppressed.)