OCC’s athletes making the grade

COSTA MESA - Orange Coast College’s 384 student-athletes who

competed in 23 intercollegiate athletic teams maintained a combined 2.81

grade point average or a B-minus average for the 1998-99 school year.

OCC is the only Orange County community college that publicly releases

its athletic grade point averages.

“We improved our mark from a 2.75 last year so it’s definitely a step in

the right direction,” Athletic Director Jane Hilgendorf said. “Our

short-term goal is to get into the 2.9’s, but we would really love to

have our group over a 3.0.”

The 384 student-athletes were enrolled in an average of 12.46 units each during their competitive seasons, with four of the 23 squads that had

GPAs over 3.0.

Coach Don Watson’s women’s swim team topped the OCC academic chart for

the second year in a row with a 3.28 team GPA.

OCC women’s water polo team was second on the list with a 3.08 GPA, the

men’s golf squad was third at 3.06 and the women’s volleyball team was

fourth at 3.05.

“I think it helps to publish the GPAs because it brings out the

competitiveness with the various programs,” Hilgendorf said. “We would

like to improve not only our GPA as a group, but we would like to see the

number of units taken rise as well.”

OCC in annually one of the nation’s community college leaders in

transferring students to four-year institutions.

The Pirates rank first out of Southern California’s 57 community colleges

in four-year transfers.

“It’s something we stress on over here,” Hilgendorf said. “We even offer

a Counseling 103 class designed to help student-athletes become

successful students.”