Ole Miss posts highest APR in school history

Published 7:35 pm Wednesday, May 10, 2017

Ole Miss athletics’ latest Academic Progress Rate score is the best it’s ever been.

The NCAA recently released its APR figures for the 2015-16 academic year with Ole Miss’ overall score of 985 being the highest in program history. Football, men’s basketball, baseball, soccer, men’s golf and men’s and women’s tennis each tied or set their highest multi-year scores with men’s basketball, men’s cross country, men’s golf, softball, men’s tennis, men’s track, women’s golf and women’s tennis achieving perfect single-year scores of 1,000.

Football’s single-year score of 991 is second only to Vanderbilt in the Southeastern Conference while its multi-year score of 971 ranks eighth. Multi-year APRs are based on the scores from the last four academic years.

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All of the school’s athletic programs scored higher than 930 for the 2015-16 year. Teams that do not reach that benchmark are subject to penalties, including postseason bans and loss of scholarships. The football team has already self-imposed a postseason ban next season in response to the recent NCAA investigation into the program.

The NCAA, according to its website, created the APR in 2003 in order to hold athletic departments accountable for the academic progress of its student-athletes using a team-based metric that takes into account the eligibility and retention of athletes each academic term.

Each student-athlete receiving financial aid earns one point for staying in school and one point for staying academically eligible. A team’s point total is divided by the number of possible points and then multiplied by 1,000 to get the team’s APR.

The data is calculated annually with results announced each spring.