<p>midatlmom,
I have gone back thru the information that I found on the initial link and the link that you provided and I think you’re right and that my earlier interpretation was inaccurate. I think you are correct that the NCAA reported figures for student-athletes take transfers into account. </p>
<p>There is one additional hitch in making comparisons, and I’m not certain of this, but the NCAA numbers match exactly to the 2007 USNWR graduation rate numbers and those don’t take transfers (in or out) into account. So, there is a little bit of apples and oranges going on, the severity of which is driven by the degree to which institutions take in transfers (quite large in some cases, particularly UC Berkeley-I created a thread on transfers several months ago which I can resurrect if you are interested). </p>
<p>While the absolute numbers of student-athletes are too small to be the dominant source of “weaker” students at these top colleges, they are very likely more so than I previously thought. I still believe that the academic quality of the student-athletes at these top schools is better than generally acknowledged and I would like to see some Ivy stats to make a full comparison, but there is little doubt that this transfer clarification undermines the arguments that I have made supporting the quality of the Division I scholarship colleges and their-student-athletes. I think you have made an important contribution and I think I owe an acknowledgement of my error, which I offer now, to you and other posters who have taken a more skeptical view of the quality of the Division I scholarship athletes. </p>
<p>Here are the numbers again for student-athletes and the schools that we have been discussing:</p>
<p>Stanford
USNWR (2007) & NCAA 6-year Graduation Rate for school = 94%
NCAA Student-Athlete Grad Rate for all student-athletes = 89%</p>
<p>Duke
USNWR (2007) & NCAA 6-year Graduation Rate for school = 93%
NCAA Student-Athlete Grad Rate for all student-athletes = 91%</p>
<p>Northwestern
USNWR (2007) & NCAA 6-year Graduation Rate for school = 93%
NCAA Student-Athlete Grad Rate for all student-athletes = 90%</p>
<p>Rice
USNWR (2007) & NCAA 6-year Graduation Rate for school = 90%
NCAA Student-Athlete Grad Rate for all student-athletes = 69%</p>
<p>Vanderbilt
USNWR (2007) & NCAA 6-year Graduation Rate for school = 88%
NCAA Student-Athlete Grad Rate for all student-athletes = 80%</p>
<p>Notre Dame
USNWR (2007) & NCAA 6-year Graduation Rate for school = 95%
NCAA Student-Athlete Grad Rate for all student-athletes = 86%</p>
<p>USC
USNWR (2007) & NCAA 6-year Graduation Rate for school = 83%
NCAA Student-Athlete Grad Rate for all student-athletes = 60%</p>
<p>Wake Forest
USNWR (2007) & NCAA 6-year Graduation Rate for school = 88%
NCAA Student-Athlete Grad Rate for all student-athletes = 74%</p>
<p>PUBLIC UNIVERSITIES</p>
<p>UC Berkeley
USNWR (2007) & NCAA 6-year Graduation Rate for school = 87%
NCAA Student-Athlete Grad Rate for all student-athletes = 69%</p>
<p>U Virginia
USNWR (2007) & NCAA 6-year Graduation Rate for school = 93%
NCAA Student-Athlete Grad Rate for all student-athletes = 74%</p>
<p>UCLA
USNWR (2007) & NCAA 6-year Graduation Rate for school = 87%
NCAA Student-Athlete Grad Rate for all student-athletes = 74%</p>
<p>U Michigan
USNWR (2007) & NCAA 6-year Graduation Rate for school = 86%
NCAA Student-Athlete Grad Rate for all student-athletes = 78%</p>
<p>U North Carolina
USNWR (2007) & NCAA 6-year Graduation Rate for school = 84%
NCAA Student-Athlete Grad Rate for all student-athletes = 73%</p>