Success in sports can be measured in many ways. Wins and losses, standings, improvement, and a wide range of various statistics help us. At Rider University, the successful 2006-2007 academic year is being measured by grade point average.

During the spring of 2007, the semester grade point average for all Rider student-athletes was a best-ever 3.04, compared to the 2.96 grade point average for Rider’s non-student-athlete population. 55 percent of Rider’s student-athletes received a 3.0 or better grade point average and 14 of the 20 squads had a team grade point average at 3.00 or above. “We are extremely proud of the academic performance of our teams,” said Don Harnum, Rider Director of Athletics. “It is a credit to our coaches for recruiting quality student-athletes, to the efforts of the students, and a testament to the dedication of everyone involved in the area of academic support at Rider.”

Rider’s male athletes compiled their best semester GPA ever last spring with a 2.91. Not to be outdone, 66 percent of Rider’s female athletes compiled a 3.0 or better, giving the women a 3.17 GPA as a group, the second best semester ever at Rider.

The women’s swimming & diving team compiled its best semester grade point average ever (3.32) after placing second of 10 teams at the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference Championships and third of 16 teams at the Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) Championships.

“One of the goals we set each year is to be recognized by the College Swimming Coaches Association of America for academics,” said Rider Head Swimming & Diving Coach Steve Fletcher, “and our women really responded to that challenge.” The Rider women earned the highest of the three levels of the Academic All-America team award presented by the CSCAA.

In all, 87 Rider student-athletes earned MAAC All-Academic Team honors (3.2 or better, no freshmen) for the 2006-07 academic school year. Outside of the MAAC, 11 members of the field hockey team were named to the 2006 National Field Hockey Coaches Association Division I National Academic Squad, and as a team the Broncs were one of 48 teams honored for having a 3.0 or better grade point average. Junior wrestler T. J. Morrison, a three-time national qualifier, was honored by the National Wrestling Coaches Association for his high grade point average, as one of 57 wrestlers nationally to be named to the NWCA All-Academic team.

“We are proud of T.J. for his efforts in the classroom,” said Associate Head Coach John Hangey. “T.J. is the true definition of a student-athlete and is the type of young man any team could build a program around. Being named an Academic All American, T.J. proves that you can be a great student and one of the best wrestlers in the entire nation at your weight at the same time.”

Rider’s Student Transitional Education Program (STEP) provides individual and group tutoring, as well as study tables, coordinates progress reports and monitors the student-athlete’s academic progress, while providing workshops on such topics as library skills, test taking and note taking. It appears to be working.

“For both the men and women, there was a dramatic decline in the percentage of student-athletes with a semester GPA below 2.0,” said Dr. Jonathan Husch, Rider’s Faculty Athletics Representative. “I believe this is strong evidence to the ongoing efforts of all Department of Athletics academic support personnel in assisting our academically at-risk student-athletes. They include Associate Athletic Director Greg Busch, Academic Support Coordinator Sonya Hurt, Director of Rider Learning Center Kendall Friedman, the coaches, and the entire staff of the University’s Education Enhancement Program.”

“Our student-athletes work really hard on and off the field and it shows,” said Hurt. “The success of our student-athletes in the classroom speaks volumes about the homework our coaches do when recruiting the best students for Rider University. I applaud our student-athletes and coaches for a job well done.”

“This is a story not often heard about Division I athletics and we should all be extremely proud,” said Husch. “It is academic results like this that allow us to say with all honesty, ‘We do Division I right’.”

At Rider, student-athletes are winning on the court, on the field, in the pool, on the track, and most importantly, in the classroom.

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