SEATTLE – University of Washington athletic director Todd Turner calls the NCAA’s new academic performance ratio formula “extraordinary,” but that doesn’t mean he’s satisfied with the system.
Turner said the system is unfairly weighted against schools that go on a quarter system, such as Washington. The formula established by the NCAA is based on a semester system.
“I’m disappointed the NCAA put a fairly extreme adjustment for schools on the quarter system,” said Turner, who was the chairman of the NCAA working group that came up with the concept of the formula, called the Academic Progress Rate (APR). “We knew there would be a slight statistical difference between semester schools and quarter schools. We didn’t think it would be enough to warrant any changes, but obviously the NCAA felt differently.”
The APR was released Monday in an effort by the NCAA to put greater emphasis on academic performance by student-athletes. It was released as a way of showing schools where they stood based on the 2003-04 academic year. When the next report is released, probably in December with numbers based on the 2003-04 and 2004-05 school years, schools not receiving passing marks could suffer penalties.
Based on the report, Washington’s football (885), baseball (911) and men’s basketball (871) teams scored below 925, putting them in jeopardy of being penalized. The 925 score represents a 50 percent graduation rate over a four-year period.
“We’re going to be vigilant about this and take it seriously,” Turner said. “The entire department is going to be dutiful in monitoring the progress of our student-athletes. The concept is extraordinary. It’s the first time the NCAA has assigned competitive penalties for poor academic progress. We just have some problems with the details.”
In the system, athletes are awarded one point each semester for staying in school and another point for staying academically eligible. For example, the UW women’s basketball team has 15 players, so it would have a maximum of 30 points a semester. The APR is determined by calculating the points for each team and dividing by the highest possible total.
Teams that don’t score at least 925 could face penalties including losing scholarships of athletes who leave school because they are academically ineligible. Athletes who leave school but are still in good academic standing will only be penalized one point.
Even though the football and men’s basketball teams were below the passing mark, Turner said they wouldn’t be penalized because the players who left the program were not academically ineligible at the time. The baseball team would have been subject to penalties.
Washington’s other 15 sports all scored above 925, including perfect 1,000s by women’s golf, softball and volleyball. Men’s golf, men’s tennis, women’s basketball, women’s golf, gymnastics, women’s crew, softball and volleyball all scored above the national average for their sports.
“Anything that holds schools accountable for their academic performance is a good thing,” Washington men’s basketball coach Lorenzo Romar said. “And in order for people to take it seriously, there have to be serious consequences. And it doesn’t get much more serious than losing scholarships.”
Turner said he hopes the system as it currently stands isn’t how it ends up when it goes into active service next year.
“We feel the NCAA made assumptions about quarter schools that seem to be too aggressive,” Turner said. “We’ve got five schools in the Pac-10 that go by quarters, so that’s something that we as a conference are going to challenge. But the concept is great, and it gives us motivation to do the best we can to develop true student-athletes.”
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