ASU’s academic progress on the rise

Perhaps the biggest indicator of Arizona State’s performance in the NCAA’s academic progress rate was not in the most recent numbers, which were released on Tuesday.

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ASU has been cited by the NCAA for its APR improvement strategies, and Jean Boyd, associate athletic director for student-athlete development, has been invited to share the school’s approach at an upcoming regional compliance conference in Boston.

“We have become a model nationally on understanding how the APR works and what to do to help sports improve their scores,” Boyd said. “We’ve employed some specific and pointed strategies on improving our APR, and the results have shown.”

Nineteen of Arizona State’s 22 athletic squads achieved multi-year APR scores above the required minimum of 925. The numbers are based on the academic years 2003-04 to 2006-07.

The three that did not — wrestling (921), baseball (915) and men’s basketball (905) — will not be subject to penalties (such as scholarship losses) because they did not have an athlete leave school in poor academic standing during ’06-07.

Boyd said that those sports should post multi-year scores above the minimum next year.

“We are close to the end of this reporting year,” Boyd said. “By the summer, we know what our (2007-08) numbers will be, and we expect to be above 925 in every sport.”

Based on ’06-07 data only, the baseball squad posted a score of 989, men’s basketball 977 and wrestling 958.

Among other state schools, five teams at Arizona scored below 925, and the men’s indoor track squad will lose one scholarship as an immediate penalty. Northern Arizona received no penalties despite having three teams below the minimum.

The football teams at UA and NAU were below 925 but avoided penalties because the NCAA indicated that both programs had “demonstrated academic improvement.”

Each scholarship athlete is given a maximum of two points per semester, one for being academically eligible, another for staying in school. A team’s point total is divided by the highest total possible.

A 925 score is based on a point percentage of 92.5, which correlates to an expected graduation rate of 60 percent, according to the NCAA.

Fifteen of ASU’s 22 teams raised their multi-year APR scores. Of those that did not, the biggest decrease was seven points, and women’s tennis could not have improved — the team posted a perfect 1,000 multi-year total for the third year in a row.

Football posted a score of 933 (up from 926), which ranked sixth in the Pac-10. Ten teams, eight of them women’s squads, had multi-year scores above the conference average in their sports.

In 2006, a low APR score cost ASU men’s basketball two scholarships (one retroactive).

School officials believe the multi-year APR for some of ASU’s squads is weighted down by low scores in the first two years. Boyd cited men’s basketball, which had four player defections from the 2004 recruiting class that affected the team’s multi-year figure.

Next year, when the 2007-08 academic year is part of the APR, ASU’s first year will no longer factor into its data.

“We’ll see improvement across the board,” Boyd said. “We feel really good about where we’ll be next year at this time.”