Articles on NCAA participants' graduation rates

[WilsonBlvdHoya]

See enclosed---GU does reasonably well at 82%...Guess who's pulling up the rear and spouting off same excuses in the Washington Post??

www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2010/03/16/ncaa_fouls_on_grad_rate_commitment/

www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/15/AR2010031503309.html

[hoyaalf]

Funny how the mind works.

My memory had blessedly erased the recent championships of the Cruisin' Terps.

Have I ever told you ... I guess I have.

Do they all make a lot of money , Gary? For how long? Well-managed, is it? A coach can abuse a player more ways than standing in a dark shed.

[joey0403p]

Why do I take pleasure in this? I don't know...but I do.

[SFHoya99]

I can't believe Gary is actually arguing that because Bill Gates is rich, he shouldn't have to graduate his players.

[Giannicolus Jones]

What's wrong with that? Flawless argument.

[BigMike]

Gary's is right that when you have success on the court your graduation number is likely to go down due to early entries, but where he is way off is with 4 year players. If you have a player that stays four years and doesn't graduate (and its not just an isolated case but happens often) there is a problem. Just from this quote it looks like Blake, Dixon and Nicholas all stayed four yrs and didn't graduate. I think DJ Strawberry fits in there and I'm pretty sure I am leaving out a number of other Maryland guys. Don't think this has happened once since III has been coach, and we've had plenty of NBA and overseas guys in those years.


"Steve Blake, you know what he's doing. He's playing for a lot of money. Juan Dixon has made a lot of money during his career, and they both hopefully will come back and get their degrees. Chris Wilcox is a lottery pick, left after his sophomore year. Drew Nicholas did not graduate, but he's had a very successful year, still playing and making a lot of money."

[guru]

Hey, I love laughing at the Terps as much as the next guy, and those numbers are really, really bad. UMCP and its fans should be embarrassed, but I bet they aren't.

Thing is, though, the numbers from this study are from a decade ago. I'm afraid that over the next few years, with all our transfers and a couple of early departures, our numbers might get fairly ugly, too. Am I wrong about that?

[SFHoya99]

8% is 8%. No team has 12 players a year go pro.

[Dhall]

It's the student's reponsibility to graduate, not the school's. If the NCAA doesn't like kids who don't perform in class playing sports then they should increase the minimum requirements for participation.

If a non-athlete fails out of school or doesn't graduate, do we blame the professors or the administration? I'm sorry, but I don't blame Gary on this one. He is a jerk though.

[HoyaSinceBirth]

Nope as long as everyone who left/leaves are in good standing when they leave our numbers will be fine.

"the NCAA no longer penalizes schools in graduation-rate reports for players who leave early for the pros, as long as they were in good academic standing."
"The statistics cited in the study were the NCAA's Graduation Success Rates, which -- unlike federal graduation rates -- do not penalize schools for transfer students that leave in good academic standing. "

[GUJook97]

The students are to blame, but of course we should blame the professors, the administration and the coaches. Our alma mater isnt some basketball factory. It should graduate students that get $100,000+ to be there.

[GUJook97]

Mar 16, 2010 9:31:47 GMT -5 SFHoya99 said:

8% is 8%. No team has 12 players a year go pro.

Wouldnt this mean that from 1999-2002, Gary graduated 4 players? Wow.

[Dhall]

Mar 16, 2010 9:43:34 GMT -5 GUJook97 said:

The students are to blame, but of course we should blame the professors, the administration and the coaches. Our alma mater isnt some basketball factory. It should graduate students that get $100,000+ to be there.

I'm not sure I understand your logic. Yes, we should only accept players who look like they have a chance to graduate, but then it's up to them to go to class and do their work. On the economic side, they generate a lot more than they cost, so I don't buy that.

[SFHoya99]

Of course, the primary responsibility is on the players.

But there's something wrong with what your doing when other programs can have an 80%, 90%, 100% graduation rate and you have 8%.

Especially when you claim higher standards to get in.

Schools that care about their players offer tutoring support, put a priority on going to class and generally make grades and academics something important in their players' lives.

There are schools that don't -- they actively discourage studying because it takes time away from practice. They don't keep track of if they go to class. And in some awful cases, they simply do their work for them.

Anyone remember when Chris McCray just didn't show up for his finals at all his senior year? The rumor was no one knew for several weeks.

I just think Gary doesn't care. He doesn't see it as his responsibility and for a while, he recruited kids who didn't care at all. To me, it's one thing to tell Juan Dixon to go pro early. It's another that the majority of that team -- which isn't playing pro bowl -- doesn't have a degree.

Gary is just using them. You can say every school uses their players; but some schools actively try to make sure the players get something out of it. Anyone with an 8% grad rate isn't doing that.

[GUJook97]

Yeah, I might have said that incorrectly. My point is that for all students, the professors, coaches and administration are responsible for ensuring that students graduate. Why wouldnt that be the case? The students should go to class, but I'd be pretty upset if I was struggling at Gtown and someone said to me, "Well, it is not the professors and administration's responsibility to make sure you do better, it's yours."

[The Stig]

Mar 16, 2010 9:30:57 GMT -5 guru said:

Thing is, though, the numbers from this study are from a decade ago. I'm afraid that over the next few years, with all our transfers and a couple of early departures, our numbers might get fairly ugly, too. Am I wrong about that?

The transfers won't hurt us, as long as the kids left in good academic standing.

The early departures will hurt us, unless the player comes back and gets their degree within a certain amount of time (not sure what it is).

[jgalt]

Mar 16, 2010 9:30:57 GMT -5 guru said:

Hey, I love laughing at the Terps as much as the next guy, and those numbers are really, really bad. UMCP and its fans should be embarrassed, but I bet they aren't.

Thing is, though, the numbers from this study are from a decade ago. I'm afraid that over the next few years, with all our transfers and a couple of early departures, our numbers might get fairly ugly, too. Am I wrong about that?

This is what i thought too. But Gary's excuses are still lame and i dont think the number will be quite different when the next decades numbers come out.

And DHall, it is the the responsibility of the Student AND the School to graduate the student. The school should provide the means for the student to graduate, the student must make the decision to take advantage of those means.

You might say "hey hey John Galt, that doesnt sound much like you!" but it is. The situation is a deal, a trade. On one side the school gets the millions of dollars it earns by having a national athletics team; the student gets, at the very least, an education. If the school ignores their end of the trade they are breaking that deal and using the athlete for their own ends.

[Thomas]

Those numbers can't be true, I mean Maryland has such high admissions standards, only the best and brightest students-athletes are allowed in unlike Georgetown. HA! HA! Seriously though, you'd think Gary Williams and the Maryland fanatics would just give up on the BULL-SH@# excuses and not even comment at this point. How many times has Maryland been at the bottom or near the bottom of this list?? G.Williams excuses about Maryland having players leaving early or "concentrating on their pro careers" is hilarious, he's acting as if Maryland is the only school who has players leave early or go overseas to play.

[GUJook97]

Whenever I read other coaches like Boeheim and Gary in the paper, I just always think about how there is absolutely zero chance Coach would ever say that. Can you imagine Coach saying, "Well, I know graduation rates are low, but they are millionaires!" "I cant believe we had to get a double-bye in the Big East tourney. It is such a huge disadvantage!"

[hifigator]

Mar 16, 2010 9:35:18 GMT -5 Dhall said:

It's the student's reponsibility to graduate, not the school's. If the NCAA doesn't like kids who don't perform in class playing sports then they should increase the minimum requirements for participation.

If a non-athlete fails out of school or doesn't graduate, do we blame the professors or the administration? I'm sorry, but I don't blame Gary on this one. He is a jerk though.

I agree with you to a point, and I admittedly don't have the intense animosity towards Maryland that many others do. But you can't blanketly dismiss the responsibilities of the authorities on this one. Sure, anyone can strike out on a kid here or there. And any could be "victimized" by the ill-chosen acts of a 18 or 20 year old kid. But on the other hand, you can't just say that "boys will be boys," or that you can't blame anyone but the student-athletes -- and I use the term loosely -- themselves. Especially when you see numbers this striking, it is reasonable to place a significant portion of the blame, if not directly on the head coach, then at least on the program as a whole. And certainly the guy at the top who makes the most money, must shoulder much of the blame.