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  1. #1

    Student-Athlete Academic Challenges

    Tom Emma (Duke '83) writes an interesting and important article, combining his personal insights with plenty of specifics that certainly are applicable at Duke, as well as throughout the NCAA in both revenue and non-revenue sports. http://content.scholastic.com/browse...jsp?id=3749189

    Emma was a senior captain in '82-'83 when Coach K brought in that pretty decent recruiting class of Dawkins, Alarie, D. Henderson, Bilas and W. Williams. He is an accomplished author and strength and conditioning specialist, with a master's degree from Columbia University. He is the President of Power Performance, Inc., which he founded in 1991.

    Great article, Tommy!

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Asheville, NC
    An eye-opening article--really puts it into perspective. Thanks for the link.

  3. #3
    I realize most of us know the quality of student-athlete that Duke has historically recruited, and the Tom Emma article to me just put things in perspective. It's really, really hard to maintain the kind of athletic AND academic success that we have sustained through many years, especially given the incredible demands we place on our players.

    Here's a quote from the 2007 Athletic Department Annual Report:

    "Academically, our student-athletes continue to set the bar for not only other athletic departments around the nation, but other general student populations as well. Our athletes combined to register a cumulative 3.1 grade point average over the past two semesters, and 21 teams had a collective GPA higher than 3.0 during the spring semester. For 18 consecutive years, Duke student-athletes had more members on the ACC Academic Honor Roll than any other league institution."

    Here a few other facts from the same 2007 report:

    - Duke earned the top APR (Academic Progress Rate) score in the ACC
    - Duke led all ACC schools with 362 on the ACC Academic Honor Roll, leading the ACC for the 18th straight year
    - Duke Football has won the AFCA Academic Achievement Award 8 out of the last 15 years and 12 times overall, 5 more times than any other school in the nation

    Impressive...My hats off to the dedication and efforts of the Duke student-athlete in the face of the terrific challenges that our own Tom Emma has detailed in his article.

    I would be interested in others' take and comments, and how much this plays into how we might select a new AD, improve Football, and still maintain our sterling overall student-athlete performance across the board.

  4. #4

    Duke Top APR in the ACC....Again!

    According to the NCAA's just-released academic measurement index for sports teams, Duke has received honor and recognition once again for its student-athletes' Academic Progress Rate (APR). Duke again is the ACC leader.

    According to the NCAA, "The APR provides a real-time look at a team’s academic success each semester by tracking the academic progress of each student-athlete. The APR includes eligibility, retention, and graduation in the calculation and provides a clear picture of the academic culture in each sport."

    "High-performing teams receiving awards posted APR scores ranging from 965 to a perfect 1,000," said NCAA President Myles Brand.

    “Congratulations to these teams and their student-athletes for success in the classroom,” Brand said. “They are setting a great example for their peers and future student-athletes, as well.”

    Here are the ACC numbers:

    Boston College (10)
    Men's Fencing
    Men's Skiing
    Men's Track, Indoor
    Men's Track, Outdoor
    Women's Field Hockey
    Women's Skiing
    Women's Soccer
    Women's Tennis
    Women's Track, Indoor
    Women's Volleyball

    Duke (12)
    Men's Baseball
    Men's Basketball
    Men's Cross Country
    Men's Football
    Men's Golf
    Men's Soccer
    Men's Track, Indoor
    Men's Track, Outdoor
    Women's Fencing
    Women's Golf
    Women's Soccer
    Women's Volleyball

    Florida State (2)
    Men's Golf
    Women's Softball

    Maryland (2)
    Women's Gymnastics
    Women's Track, Indoor

    Miami (2)
    Men's Cross Country
    Men's Track, Outdoor

    North Carolina (6)
    Men's Baseball
    Men's Basketball
    Women's Fencing
    Women's Golf
    Women's Swimming
    Women's Volleyball

    Virginia (3)
    Women's Soccer
    Women's Softball
    Women's Volleyball

    Wake Forest (3)
    Men's Basketball
    Men's Track, Indoor
    Men's Track, Outdoor

    Clemson, North Carolina State and Virginia Tech were not represented.


    Here's the NCAA link: http://www.ncaa.org/wps/portal/!ut/p...emic%20Reform/

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Raleigh

    student-athletes

    Quote Originally Posted by Verga3 View Post
    According to the NCAA's just-released academic measurement index for sports teams, Duke has received honor and recognition once again for its student-athletes' Academic Progress Rate (APR). Duke again is the ACC leader.

    According to the NCAA, "The APR provides a real-time look at a team’s academic success each semester by tracking the academic progress of each student-athlete. The APR includes eligibility, retention, and graduation in the calculation and provides a clear picture of the academic culture in each sport."

    "High-performing teams receiving awards posted APR scores ranging from 965 to a perfect 1,000," said NCAA President Myles Brand.

    “Congratulations to these teams and their student-athletes for success in the classroom,” Brand said. “They are setting a great example for their peers and future student-athletes, as well.”

    Here are the ACC numbers:

    Boston College (10)
    Men's Fencing
    Men's Skiing
    Men's Track, Indoor
    Men's Track, Outdoor
    Women's Field Hockey
    Women's Skiing
    Women's Soccer
    Women's Tennis
    Women's Track, Indoor
    Women's Volleyball

    Duke (12)
    Men's Baseball
    Men's Basketball
    Men's Cross Country
    Men's Football
    Men's Golf
    Men's Soccer
    Men's Track, Indoor
    Men's Track, Outdoor
    Women's Fencing
    Women's Golf
    Women's Soccer
    Women's Volleyball

    Florida State (2)
    Men's Golf
    Women's Softball

    Maryland (2)
    Women's Gymnastics
    Women's Track, Indoor

    Miami (2)
    Men's Cross Country
    Men's Track, Outdoor

    North Carolina (6)
    Men's Baseball
    Men's Basketball
    Women's Fencing
    Women's Golf
    Women's Swimming
    Women's Volleyball

    Virginia (3)
    Women's Soccer
    Women's Softball
    Women's Volleyball

    Wake Forest (3)
    Men's Basketball
    Men's Track, Indoor
    Men's Track, Outdoor

    Clemson, North Carolina State and Virginia Tech were not represented.


    Here's the NCAA link: http://www.ncaa.org/wps/portal/!ut/p...emic%20Reform/
    Must be 'cuz Duke STILL gets all the calls(grades)

    Wonder if Greenberg is frothing over being left out...

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Northwest Ohio
    I looked this over rather quickly, but if I am correct, it surprises me greatly that no school has women's basketball in its list. I'll think more on this in the morning.

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Durham

    An interesting fact

    When I was reading Dick Weiss' piece on Dawkins leaving for Stanford, he put an interesting stat in there, one that I'm not so sure is correct:

    "Duke’s admission standards are more lenient than Stanford. The GPA of the average Duke player is 3.13 while the average GPA of the Stanford player is 3.46. The average SAT of the Duke player is 968 while the average SAT of the Stanford player is 1,123."

    Now personally, I find it hard to believe that Duke's average SAT score for basketball players is below 1000, in fact I think this stat is just flat-out wrong. Maybe I'm wearing my royal-blue-tinted glasses but something about that just seems inaccurate.

    Thoughts?

  8. #8
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Seattle, WA
    Quote Originally Posted by Verga3 View Post
    Clemson, North Carolina State and Virginia Tech were not represented.
    not particularly surprising there.
    Just be you. You is enough. - K, 4/5/10, 0:13.8 to play, 60-59 Duke.

    You're all jealous hypocrites. - Titus on Laettner

    You see those guys? Animals. They're animals. - SIU Coach Chris Lowery, on Duke

  9. #9
    Quote Originally Posted by Classof06 View Post
    When I was reading Dick Weiss' piece on Dawkins leaving for Stanford, he put an interesting stat in there, one that I'm not so sure is correct:

    "Duke’s admission standards are more lenient than Stanford. The GPA of the average Duke player is 3.13 while the average GPA of the Stanford player is 3.46. The average SAT of the Duke player is 968 while the average SAT of the Stanford player is 1,123."

    Now personally, I find it hard to believe that Duke's average SAT score for basketball players is below 1000, in fact I think this stat is just flat-out wrong. Maybe I'm wearing my royal-blue-tinted glasses but something about that just seems inaccurate.

    Thoughts?
    Kind of shocked me too. I expect a few outliers to drag down the average, but not well below 1000!

  10. #10
    Quote Originally Posted by Classof06 View Post
    When I was reading Dick Weiss' piece on Dawkins leaving for Stanford, he put an interesting stat in there, one that I'm not so sure is correct:

    "Duke’s admission standards are more lenient than Stanford. The GPA of the average Duke player is 3.13 while the average GPA of the Stanford player is 3.46. The average SAT of the Duke player is 968 while the average SAT of the Stanford player is 1,123."

    Now personally, I find it hard to believe that Duke's average SAT score for basketball players is below 1000, in fact I think this stat is just flat-out wrong. Maybe I'm wearing my royal-blue-tinted glasses but something about that just seems inaccurate.

    Thoughts?

    I question Dick Weiss' facts as well. I can't locate any NCAA published average SAT or GPA numbers from a quick search. But it was fairly simple to locate the following quote....

    "Earlier this month, the San Jose Mercury News, examining data from 1994-97 (the last four-year period the NCAA used for documentation of grades and test scores), found that freshmen entering Duke on basketball scholarships during that period had an average SAT score of 968. The average SAT score for Duke's freshman class as a whole is generally in the high 1300s."

    Very interesting coincidence on the 968 number.

    Here's the link to the 2001 article as it appeared in Slate.com: http://www.slate.com/id/101920

    Or maybe a quick email to Mr. Weiss to inquire would be appropriate? http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/wei...-not-duke.html

  11. #11
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Los Angeles

    Thumbs up Wow!

    Thank you for this great thread -- and thank you Tom E. for this great article. It should be published by S.I., ESPNMag, etc. My daughter (class of '01) who had classes with Shane, Elton, Avery, shared some of this with me firsthand.

    To ALL Duke athletes, I applaud you. And am honored by your commitment to meet all exhausting challenges on and off the court/field/links/gym/etc.

  12. #12
    Quote Originally Posted by Classof06 View Post
    When I was reading Dick Weiss' piece on Dawkins leaving for Stanford, he put an interesting stat in there, one that I'm not so sure is correct:

    "Duke’s admission standards are more lenient than Stanford. The GPA of the average Duke player is 3.13 while the average GPA of the Stanford player is 3.46. The average SAT of the Duke player is 968 while the average SAT of the Stanford player is 1,123."

    Now personally, I find it hard to believe that Duke's average SAT score for basketball players is below 1000, in fact I think this stat is just flat-out wrong. Maybe I'm wearing my royal-blue-tinted glasses but something about that just seems inaccurate.

    Thoughts?

    Also, interesting that in the latest APR study outlined in the earlier post, Stanford Basketball did NOT qualify.

  13. #13
    Quote Originally Posted by dukemomLA View Post
    Thank you for this great thread -- and thank you Tom E. for this great article. It should be published by S.I., ESPNMag, etc. My daughter (class of '01) who had classes with Shane, Elton, Avery, shared some of this with me firsthand.

    To ALL Duke athletes, I applaud you. And am honored by your commitment to meet all exhausting challenges on and off the court/field/links/gym/etc.

    Amen...and second the applause to ALL Duke student-athletes. Tom Emma does deserve props for his insightful (and firsthand) article. Surprisingly, I've never seen anything just like it.

    Congrats to your daughter....Go Duke '01!!!

  14. #14
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    San Diego, California
    Quote Originally Posted by Verga3 View Post
    I would be interested in others' take and comments, and how much this plays into how we might select a new AD, improve Football, and still maintain our sterling overall student-athlete performance across the board.
    I can offer some insight both from my student days and as a parent. One of my best friends at Duke ("back in the day") was a basketball player who was also an outstanding student. Through October 15, he was in great shape academically. He would only slip a little between the start of practice and when games started (the Big Four then). But he would really struggle (comparatively -- he graduated with a GPA in the 3.4 range) between Thanksgiving and the end of the semester. That process would reverse itself during the Spring semester. I had trouble sleeping after a big game at Cameron and couldn't get much (if any) studying done afterwards. His situation was much, much tougher.

    As a parent of an incoming D1 athlete this coming fall (football at Cal), I spent a great deal of time during the recruiting process evaluating how the various schools my son was considering handled academics. My son is fortunate in that he's close to the level of the Berkeley student body as a whole (2080 SAT). He will go to mandatory summer school before fall camp to get two courses completed before official practices start. That will allow players to begin to acclimate themselves to college in a "softer" and more controlled environment. It will allow students who may not be as well prepared as they ought to be to ease into the rigors of college and will allow all the freshman to get ahead so that they need "only" take four courses during the fall semester rather than the usual five. It's a great idea and one that other schools should emulate. That it provides for some great bonding for an incoming class of players and allows for these players to get some otherwise routine but significant matters (e.g., who to room with) dealt with and some good habits established before the campus is crawling with students in the fall is an added bonus.

    Moreover, the academic support program at Cal is incredible. Players are required to meet with their academic support leader five days a week when at school. All of a player's classes, tests and assignments are laid out for the semester in advance and he will be held accountable for each item specifically. Work is checked. Professors are called regularly and consistently. Each player also has a weekly meeting with his position coach to monitor academic progress throughout the school year. Study time is mandated. Tutoring is provided and many football-friendly profs offer regular review classes and sessions for players.

    I assume (without knowing) that Duke has a similar program, but many schools (as I know from first-hand investigation) do not. My son's day will begin with weight-training at 6:30am followed by classes. Practice and meetings come in the afternoon followed by training table. He'll be done around 8pm -- to get after his schoolwork. Fortunately, football games are played on Saturday, so missed classes are less frequent than in other sports.

    The amount of effort it takes to play a D1 sport is amazing. Non-revenue and lesser-to-no scholarship sports take even more effort because the scholarship benefits aren't there nor are the public attention and accolades at all similar. That's why I have so often commented upon the lack of fan (and particularly student) support of football at Duke. For players to work as hard as they do to represent Duke with so little support (especially from their peers) is incredibly disheartening. I'm hopeful that Coach Cutcliffe will be able to get that culture changed even before the winning comes (as I'm confident it will).

  15. #15

    Kudos to Duke!

    Kudos to Duke for demonstating such a strong commitment to our student-athletes while there are in school and for preparing them for their lives after athletics and after Duke. Here are a couple of examples of that commitment that you may not have heard about...pretty impressive.


    The CAPE Program...A unique program that prepares female athletes for careers in medicine. http://www.goduke.com/ViewArticle.db...41&SPSID=22634

    Emily Waner blog from Guatemala with CAPE. http://www.goduke.com/ViewArticle.db...46&SPSID=22760


    The Coach for College Program....A pilot program with the goal to enable student-athletes to use sports to bridge cultural divides and help program participants in Vietnam develop academic and life skills that will ultimately make higher education a more accessible option for them. http://www.goduke.com/ViewArticle.db...41&SPSID=22634

    Duke student-athlete blogs from Vietnam with Coach for College. http://www.goduke.com/ViewArticle.db...41&SPSID=22634

  16. #16
    This is probably an eyeopener for many people who always say that a student athelete has it made in comparison to other students. The reality is that most of them must be extremely focused in order to maintain their eligibity while competing at high level at their sport. These kids more than earn the money that their scholarships provide them.

  17. #17

    Paulus

    I definitely have a new found respect for Paulus. It's remarkable to get a 3.9+ at Duke for anyone. The fact that he's playing ball at the same time, crazy.

  18. #18
    Quote Originally Posted by jma4life View Post
    I definitely have a new found respect for Paulus. It's remarkable to get a 3.9+ at Duke for anyone. The fact that he's playing ball at the same time, crazy.

    Incredible...According to this link, Greg has a cumulative 3.3 as a Political Science major. Not too shabby. http://www.wral.com/sports/story/2491545/

    He's in good company, joining Mike Dunleavy (2002), Shane Battier (2000-01), Quin Snyder (1989), Mike Gminski (1978-80), Jim Spanarkel (1978-79), Bob Fleischer (1974-75), Gary Melchionni (1972), Dick DeVenzio (1971) and Jay Buckley (1963-64) as Duke’s Academic All-Americas....Proud of you, Greg!

  19. #19

    2008 NCSA Collegiate Power Rankings

    Our student-athletes are recognized once again. Duke has been a "Top 2" Division I school in this study for the last 4 years. Here's the NCSA combo power criteria:

    "The Collegiate Power Rankings from NCSA are calculated for each college and university at the NCAA Division I, II and III levels by averaging the U.S. News & World Report ranking, the U.S. Sports Academy Directors' Cup ranking and the NCAA student-athlete graduation rate of each college/university. The collegiate power rankings are based off of the U.S."

    Is there a better total package anywhere? Duke does it the right way.... http://www.goduke.com/ViewArticle.db...ATCLID=1568162

  20. #20
    As a former athlete in a non-basketball, non-football way I have to say we spent a LOT of weekends on buses and in hotel rooms, and a LOT of hours on the x-country trail and in the weight room and at practice. I cannot imagine how the guys who are even more invested, for example basketball, do it.

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