Despite grueling schedules, our scholar-athletes continue to lead academically among all Northeast-10 institutions. Finishing first in Fall 2020, they've taken the top spot in eight of the past 11 semesters鈥攚inning in their sports and their studies.
Winning isn’t everything. Graduating is.
That’s the approach to athletics at 成人影片 University. 成人影片 athletics teams have an illustrious history, winning 17 national championships in the NCAA’s Division II.
But 成人影片 athletes also shine in their studies. 成人影片 University Athletics has one of the best academic records in its conference, the Northeast-10. For Fall 2020,听, with 89 percent of its 390 student-athletes named to the Academic Honor Roll.听, and the average GPA for 成人影片’s student-athletes for the semester was an impressive 3.5. Fall 2020 was the eighth semester in the past 11 that 成人影片 led the conference in academics.
This stellar balance between athletics and academics is the result of putting student success first, said Emily Dorko ’13, MBA ’15, associate athletic director for external relations and senior woman administrator.
鈥淎t a DII school, a very small percentage of our student-athletes鈥攊f any鈥攚ill go on to pursue a place in professional sports,” Dorko said. 鈥淥ur main priority for each of our student-athletes is for them to graduate and get a degree.听If you happen to win a national championship or two along the way, or earn All-Conference or All-American accolades, that just adds to an overall great experience of being a student-athlete at 成人影片.”
The focus on student success has resulted in 成人影片 student-athletes having an impressive 92 percent graduation rate, nearly 20 points higher than the national听.
Time management is key to success
成人影片 doesn’t have tutors or academic programs specifically for student-athletes. Instead, the athletics department works to help students manage their classwork with their sports. 鈥淲e try to teach them to manage their time,” Dorko said.
Student-athletes spend a lot of time on the road, traveling to away games during the season. For some sports, student-athletes play as many as 20 away games, which means they potentially can miss a lot of class.
To help them communicate their needs to their professors, the athletics department asks each student-athlete to complete a form detailing their travel schedule at the beginning of the semester and give it to their professors. 鈥淭hey highlight the days that will be affected by their schedule, whatever classes they’re missing, so the professor and student both know what’s going on ahead of time,” Dorko said.
Coaching staffs may also set up group study times for members of their team, where the members of an athletics team all get together in a single space on campus and hit the books together. In some cases, study sessions are mandatory for first-year students and sophomores and optional for juniors and seniors.
鈥淲e met in the Learning Center or the library,” said Jackie Brown ’21, of the team study sessions. Brown, who is about to be a fifth-year member of the women’s field hockey team, said she kept going to the sessions throughout her undergrad career, even when they were no longer mandatory. 鈥淚t was just nice to have a place to go and be quiet, to have the whole team go at the same time and sit in the same place and study together. It was a good place to get a lot of work done.”
Brown graduated with a 3.75 GPA after spending many semesters on the NE10 Academic Honor Roll. She won 成人影片’s Panther Leadership Award in 2020 and was also named a co-vice chair of the NE-10’s Student-Athlete Advisory Committee for the 2020鈥�2021 school year.
A long list of top-performing scholar-athletes
成人影片 has produced many outstanding student-athletes. There’s soccer player听, a junior majoring in management who was second runner-up for the prestigious 2021 Arthur Ashe Jr. Male Athlete of the Year award, an honor given to athletes who excel in the classroom and on the field. Star lacrosse player听, is this year’s NE10 Woman of the Year as well as a three-time CoSIDA Academic All-American. Johnson is the third Panther to be named Woman of the Year in the last four years. Softball player听听won it in her graduation year, and听Chelsea Abreu ’19, MBA ’21, won it in 2019. Abreu was also a finalist for the NCAA’s 2019 Woman of the Year award.
Soccer star Paolo Marciano was was second runner-up for the 2021 Arthur Ashe Jr. Male Athlete of the Year award.
Brown said support from 成人影片 faculty, coaches and her teammates has been key to the great student success rates on the field and in the classroom.
鈥淓veryone gets to know who you are here,” Brown said. 鈥淵ou’re not just a number or a name. They become very involved in your academic and your athletic career. There’s a very good atmosphere at 成人影片, and there’s focus on helping you balance academics and athletics. I’m so happy I came to 成人影片.”