Graduation Rate at USC Ranks Low : Academics: Study shows six of 24 football players who started school in 1984 graduated. University calls sample too small.

USC’s football team was ranked among the 20 lowest in an extensive survey of graduation rates of Division I schools published today by the Chronicle of Higher Education.

Cal State Fullerton, UC Irvine, Cal State Northridge and San Diego State also posted dismal numbers in some programs.

The survey covered students and recruited athletes who entered Division I schools in the fall of 1984, and followed their progress for five years to the end of the 1988-89 academic year. The formula is the same one used by the NCAA to determine graduation rates.

In the Chronicle’s study, the numbers reflect those who entered in 1984 and graduated within five years. Transfers and others were not taken into account.

USC’s graduation rate for football was 25%, or six of 24 players graduating. It was the lowest figure among Pacific 10 Conference schools except for Arizona, which failed to provide a team-by-team breakdown.

Margaret Gatz, USC’s faculty athletic representative, said 1984 marked a low point in the Trojans’ graduation record. But she said using one year for comparison fails to present an accurate portrait of how a school is performing.

Said Trojan Athletic Director Mike McGee: “From 1984 to 1988, the mean entering SAT score for the football team improved 190 points. You will see the results of that factor in subsequent years.”

Fullerton, which has addressed its graduation problem the past two years, had an 8.3% rate for football and 0% for men’s basketball. Those percentages represented 12 football and six basketball players.

Irvine had a 0% rate in men’s basketball for five athletes. Northridge had a 12.5% rate for football and a 10.7% overall figure for 56 athletes who started in 1984. Northridge’s regular student population rate for the same period was 15.5%.

Only Texas Southern (9.4%) and the University of Texas-Pan American (10%) had lower rates for athletes of the 262 schools that participated in the survey. San Diego State was eighth from the bottom on the overall athletic list at 15.8%. San Diego State officials refused to release a team-by-team breakdown.

Nationally, Notre Dame and Duke were two model programs. Notre Dame’s rate was 81% in football and 75% in basketball. Duke’s rates were 92.3% in football and 100% in basketball, although the basketball figure represented only two players.

Cal State Long Beach’s rate was 12.5% for eight basketball players, Loyola Marymount’s was 50% for four, the University of San Diego’s was 0% with one, Northridge’s was 50% for two and UC Santa Barbara’s was 40% for five. Pepperdine was one of 33 Division I schools that refused to participate in the survey.

During the same period, UCLA graduated 12 of 24 football players, or 50%.

“It is quite clear to me and to many others at USC that our graduation rates should be better than they are,” Gatz said.

But she said putting too much emphasis on any given year is unproductive.

“This is just the normal kind of variability one would expect in calculating with a very small number,” she said.

Gatz said a report in April of 1990 by the school’s Faculty Senate Committee on Athletic Affairs raised questions about whether USC was doing enough to help academically troubled students.

The report stated that USC is not spending enough money educating its athletes in comparison to other schools with big-time football programs.

“Part of it is who we are admitting and what we can do to provide support for them,” Gatz said. “But this is not just football. We have to ask, ‘Are we doing enough for the academically unprepared student?’ ”

A major reason the Trojan program had a lower rate than the rest of the Pac-10 involves the players who leave school to try out for professional football, officials said. McGee has initiated a program that allows players who quit early to return to the school to earn their degrees.

“The USC football rate does get very complicated with the push to go pro,” Gatz said.

USC officials say a more reliable figure would encompass a six-year span instead of the five-year period now used by the NCAA graduation rate formula.

Dolores Vura, director of analytical studies at Cal State Fullerton, agrees. She noted on the survey that 25% of all Fullerton students need six years to graduate.

Beginning next fall, the NCAA will use new criteria in collecting information to determine graduation rates of Division I and II schools. A federal law requires schools to publish graduation records of athletes and other students.

The new reporting form will use a six-year figure.

Among other items, the survey found that male basketball players graduate at a much lower rate than athletes and students from other sports. But the survey showed that overall, athletes graduated at a higher rate than regular students. Athletes had a 56% rate compared to regular students at 48%.

Murray Sperber, author of “College Sports Inc.: The Athletic Department Vs. the University,” challenged those figures.

“One thing that makes me mad about grad rates, is they love to compare it to regular student rates,” said Sperber, a professor of American Studies at Indiana. “It is like comparing apples to alligators.”

Sperber contends that students and athletes lead such different lives that it is impossible to make a valid statistical comparison.

“The main reason why students drop out of the university is financial,” he said. “Their reasons are so far from the reasons that athletes don’t graduate. You’ve got to go behind these numbers.”

GRADUATION RATES

PACIFIC 10 CONFERENCE

All Students Football Basketball School Fresh./Grad. % Recruits/Grad. % Recruits/Grad. % Arizona 4,162 36.0 * * * * Arizona State 4,106 37.6 22 27.3 6 33.3 California 4,401 65.0 31 51.6 3 33.0 Oregon 2,250 44.2 25 40.0 3 66.7 Oregon State 2,077 26.3 19 31.6 6 16.7 Stanford 1,604 88.8 28 71.4 3 66.7 UCLA 3,948 62.6 24 50.0 3 33.0 USC 2,763 53.5 24 25.0 1 100.0 Washington 4,032 51.4 29 31.0 4 25.0 Washington State 2,837 43.2 21 61.9 3 66.7 * Did Not Complete List

BIG WEST CONFERENCE

All Students Football Basketball School Fresh./Grad. % Recruits/Grad. % Recruits/Grad. % Cal State Fullerton 1,929 27.4 12 8.3 6 0.0 Fresno State 1,457 31.0 8 25.0 3 33.0 Cal State Long Beach 2,196 17.5 7 51.0 8 12.5 UC Santa Barbara 2,892 57.7 5 40.0 UC Irvine 2,200 53.8 5 0.0 Nevada Las Vegas 612 20.8 23 17.4 1 0.0 Pacific 739 48.7 6 50.0 5 40.0 Utah State ** ** ** ** ** **

** Declined to Participate

WEST COAST CONFERENCE All Students Football Basketball School Fresh./Grad. % Recruits/Grad. % Recruits/Grad. % Gonzaga 432 48.8 3 100.0 Loyola Marymount 667 63.0 4 50.0 San Diego 758 57.0 1 0.0 San Francisco 438 57.8 * * *4 * Pepperdine ** ** ** ** ** ** Portland 425 49.4 3 0.0 St. Mary’s 438 60.0 3 66.7 Santa Clara 863 76.8 5 60.0 * No Recruits ** Declined to Participate

OTHER GRADUATION RATES

All Students Football Basketball School Fresh./Grad. % Recruits/Grad. % Recruits/Grad. % Auburn 2,927 56.2 27 14.8 6 0.0 Cal State Northridge 2,970 15.5 16 12.5 2 50.0 Colorado 3,346 56.1 27 51.9 3 33.0 Duke 1,501 92.3 26 92.3 2 100.0 Florida 4,596 47.5 27 29.6 5 20.0 Indiana 5,602 57.6 25 56.0 6 66.7 Kentucky 2,572 48.4 22 45.5 5 20.0 Miami * * * * * * Michigan 4,627 76.5 37 56.8 2 0.0 Nebraska 3,190 42.0 68 41.2 1 100.0 Notre Dame 1,796 92.7 16 81.0 4 75.0 Syracuse 2,870 62.1 22 68.2 3 33.0 Texas 6,543 52.0 25 28.0 5 0.0

* Declined to Participate

CONFERENCE GRADUATION PERCENTAGES

All All Football Men’s Bkb Conference Students Athletes Players Players Atlantic Coast 65.6 66.2 55.4 32.0 Big Eight 46.0 42.3 39.4 34.8 Big Ten 59.1 58.0 50.0 43.9 Big West 38.3 39.4 23.8 18.9 Mid-American 46.6 54.4 42.9 40.0 Pacific 10 50.1 52.9 46.6 40.6 Southeastern 46.0 36.4 32.2 14.0 Southwest 49.3 40.6 32.5 23.5 Western Athletic 34.0 40.7 43.1 17.6 Independents 51.4 59.0 51.7 33.3 Public Schools 42.8 45.8 38.9 28.2 Private Schools 70.8 78.8 76.6 63.0