AUBURN FOOTBALL AMONG TOPS NATIONALLY IN ACADEMIC PROGRESS RATE
The Auburn football program posted an impressive multi-year academic progress rate of 981 which ranks in the 90th-100th percentile nationally, the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) released this month as part of its 2004-05 Division I Academic Progress Rate (APR) report.
Football received public recognition by the NCAA, as being in the top 10 percentile by sport, for its score. Auburn's football program is one of only four BCS schools to earn such recognition, joining Boston College, Duke, and Stanford, making Auburn the only public BCS institution to earn such distinctions.
The football programs to receive public recognition by the NCAA were: Auburn, Boston College, Brown, Bucknell, Colgate, William & Mary, Cornell, Dartmouth, Davidson, Duke, Eastern Kentucky, Furman, Harvard, Lafayette, Princeton, Navy, Dayton, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Villanova, Wofford, Yale.
The national APR average for football at public institutions is 920, while the national average for football at all Division I-A institutions is 929. Last year, Auburn's football academic progress rate was 960, which ranked in the 70th-80th percentile nationally.
Two other Auburn teams, men's cross country and men's golf, received public recognition by the NCAA as both programs posted a perfect APR of 1,000. The three Auburn programs to receive public recognition tied with the University of Florida for most by an institution in the Southeastern Conference.
A total of 12 of Auburn's sports: baseball, men's cross country, football, men's golf, men's swimming and diving, men's tennis, men's indoor track and field, men's outdoor track and field, soccer, softball, women's swimming and diving, and women's tennis posted an APR equal to or higher than the national average of public institutions. Last year, 10 Auburn programs were above the national average of public institutions.
The Academic Progress Rate, which is in its second year, is the fulcrum upon which the entire academic-reform structure rests. Developed as a more real-time assessment of teams' academic performance than the six-year graduation-rate calculation provides, the APR awards two points each term to student-athletes who meet academic-eligibility standards and who remain with the institution. A team's APR is the total points earned by the team at a given time divided by the total points possible.
