BOWLING GREEN, Ky. — WKU Athletics continues to set new standards for its academic excellence, maintaining the highest Graduation Success Rate (GSR) in program history in the latest report released by the NCAA on Wednesday.
WKU posted an overall GSR of 85, matching last year's score that ranked as the department's top mark in the report's existence.
Additionally, five WKU sport programs – women's basketball, women's golf, women's soccer, women's tennis and women's volleyball – posted perfect GSR scores, marking the department's most 100 sport scores since 2011-12.
WKU's 64 percent Federal Graduation Rate is also the second-highest in program history, and 12 percent higher than the university's general student body (52 percent).
"These numbers reflect a tremendous commitment to excelling both on and off the field by our student-athletes, coaches and entire athletic department," WKU Director of Athletics Todd Stewart said. "To lead Conference USA with 25 total championships since joining the league in 2014, while our student-athletes are also graduating at all-time high levels, speaks volumes about their dedication in all facets of the total college experience."
Nine of WKU's 12 sports in the report either improved their GSR or maintained their very high scores from the previous year.
Volleyball extended its streak of perfect GSR scores to 14 years and has posted a perfect score every year the program has been eligible to report. Women's tennis posted a perfect GSR score for the fifth straight season and for the seventh time in program history.
Women's soccer and women's basketball also posted perfect scores in back-to-back years, and it marked soccer's eighth perfect score since 2001. The 100 mark was women's basketball's fourth all-time perfect score.
Women's golf jumped 12 points from an 88 to reach the 100 GSR mark for the second time in program history and the first since 2007-08.
The biggest mover within WKU Athletics was baseball, which jumped seven points to a 90 GSR – the highest mark in program history. Men's basketball moved up six points to a 91, which is the team's highest since the 2012-13 report.
WKU's 85 overall GSR is tied for the sixth-highest in Conference USA. WKU is also one of six league programs with at least five teams with a perfect 100 GSR score.
The GSRs released Wednesday are based on the four freshmen classes in Division I entering from 2009 to 2012. The NCAA calculates the rates based upon the number of student-athletes who graduated within six years after initially enrolling, in addition to those who left an institution prior to graduating but would have been academically eligible to compete.
ABOUT THE NCAA GRADUATION SUCCESS RATE
The Division I Board of Directors created the GSR in 2002 in response to Division I college and university presidents who wanted data that more accurately reflected the mobility of college students beyond what the federal graduation rate measures. The federal rate counts as an academic failure any student who leaves a school, no matter whether he or she enrolls at another school. Also, the federal rate does not recognize students who enter school as transfer students.
The GSR formula removes from the rate student-athletes who leave school while academically eligible and includes student-athletes who transfer to a school after initially enrolling elsewhere. This calculation provides a more accurate appraisal of student-athlete success.
The rate also allows for a deeper understanding of graduation success in individual sports than the federal metric, which provides only broad groupings.
The federal graduation rate, however, remains the only measure to compare student-athletes with the general student body. Using this measure, student-athletes graduate at the same rate as the student body: 68%. Student-athletes' federal graduation rate stayed the same between last year and this year, while the student body rate increased 2 percentage points.
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