News and Observer
Published Sat, Aug 18, 2012 06:49 AM
Transcript
shows low hurdles for UNC athletes to stay eligible
CHAPEL
HILL -- When a transcript bearing Julius Peppers’ name came into public view
earlier this week, some wondered how an athlete with such poor grades could
have remained eligible to play football and basketball at the University of
North Carolina.
Peppers,
though, did enough to pass through a system that didn’t require even academic
mediocrity.
The
transcript, once publicly accessible on UNC’s website, showed that Peppers
received D’s or F’s in 11 classes, began his college career with a 1.08 GPA in
his first semester, never raised it above 1.95 and yet was never academically
ineligible.
He came
close, though. Peppers ended his spring semester in 2001 with a 1.82 GPA, according
to the transcript. According to UNC’s minimum academic eligibility standards
for athletes then, Peppers would have needed a GPA of at least a 1.9 to play
football in the fall of 2001.
Peppers’
transcript doesn’t list any grades after the 2001 spring semester, but what UNC
had identified as a “test transcript” – which mirrors Peppers’ transcript
almost exactly – offers clues about how he kept his eligibility.
According
to the test transcript, Peppers in the spring of 2001 appears to have received
a B-plus in one course – Black Nationalism – in which he originally received an
incomplete. He also appears to have received an A in the summer of 2001 in an
African and Afro-American Studies seminar.
Those two
grades – the B-plus and the A – would have improved Peppers’ GPA enough for him
to be eligible to play football in 2001, his final season before entering the
NFL.
Jay
Smith, a UNC history professor who has taken a leadership role among faculty
members who have grown disgusted by continued academic problems related to
athletics, studied Peppers’ transcript with interest.
“Assuming
it’s a legitimate transcript – and I guess everything suggests that it is – I
was struck by the very poor showing in the student’s very first semester,”
Smith said. “And (by) the pattern that quickly developed of the student doing a
kind of high-wire act – barely staying eligible, or even falling under the
eligibility bar in the course of the academic year and then getting back over
the bar with courses over the summer.”
A 1.5 for sophomores
Peppers
remained eligible thanks to courses from the AFAM department, which has
recently come under scrutiny after an internal UNC investigation uncovered 54
suspect AFAM courses between 2007 and 2011. The problems in those courses
ranged from no-show professors to unauthorized grade changes.
In AFAM
courses, Peppers carried a 2.16 GPA. In non-AFAM courses, he received a 1.41
GPA. A similar disparity existed between the work Peppers did during the
regular academic year and in the summer.
Peppers
produced a 1.65 GPA – below a C-minus average – in his first six fall and
spring semesters, but he recorded a 2.93 GPA in the four summer classes for
which letter grades are listed on his transcript. UNC officials won’t confirm
that the transcript is Peppers’, but they have said Peppers was academically
eligible to compete.
Carl
Carey Jr., who is Peppers’ agent and former academic counselor at UNC, declined
Friday to discuss specifics of Peppers’ transcript. But Carey said it wasn’t
uncommon during his years at UNC for athletes to find themselves tip-toeing a
line – eligibility on one side and ineligibility on the other.
“There
are always a significant number of student-athletes that need to make certain
grades to have their eligibility before their season begins,” Carey said. “That
is not uncommon at all. You see close calls from time to time in every sport.”
Carey,
who worked as a UNC athletic department academic counselor from 1998 to 2002,
also said it was “irresponsible” to suggest that Peppers was given fraudulent
grades so he could remain eligible.
“I cannot
think of one case – not one – during the time that I was at North Carolina
where a faculty member knew what a student needed in order to be eligible,”
Carey said. “Not one single case where a faculty member was told what grade a
student-athlete needed to earn.”
To remain
eligible during Peppers’ years at UNC – he played on the football team from
1999-2001 – the university required athletes to have at least a 1.5 GPA
entering their third semester, a 1.75 entering their fifth semester and a 1.9
entering their seventh semester.
It wasn’t
until athletes entered their ninth semester – their fifth year of eligibility –
that they would have needed a 2.0 GPA to be academically eligible.
“In
retrospect, it’s kind of amazing that the floor was ever that low,” Smith said.
A change in standards
In the
fall of 2006, UNC adopted stricter academic eligibility requirements. Athletes
must maintain at least a 2.0 GPA after their freshman year. Any athlete who
falls below 2.0 is placed on academic probation and allowed to compete as long
as the athlete meets the NCAA’s minimum eligibility standard, which requires a
1.8 GPA entering the third semester, a 1.9 entering the fifth semester and a
2.0 after that.
UNC said
it would be unlikely for an athlete to be granted probation more than once.
Smith
praised UNC’s improved eligibility standard but questioned what it really
means.
“I guess
that’s one thing that has changed for the positive in the last few years,” he
said. “Although, I doubt that the stricter GPA guidelines have done much to
change the nature of the overall game that is played. The game is still, it
seems to me at most big-time sports universities, to find course schedules that
will keep players eligible.”
Carey,
meanwhile, reiterated how common it is for athletes at major universities,
particularly in football and men’s basketball, to be on the verge of academic
ineligibility. The problem, he said, begins in high school when college-bound
athletes might barely receive qualifying test scores.
From
there, academic struggles intensify, he said.
“Pull any
roster in college basketball and football,” Carey said, “and count the number
who are very close to the edge.”
Carter: 919-829-8944
·
Transcript
shows low hurdles for UNC athletes to stay eligible
A
transcript bearing Julius Peppers' name showed that at no point during his
career at UNC did he have a GPA above 1.95. Yet he was never ineligible to play
sports because the school didn't require a 2.0 until an athlete was entering
his ninth semester. UNC since has raised those minimum requirements.
·
UNC
chancellor asks ex-governor, auditors to look into academic fraud
UNC-Chapel
Hill Chancellor Holden Thorp said he's bringing in a former governor and a
national management consulting firm to audit "any additional academic
irregularities that may have occurred."
·
Tudor:
Tar Heels now face yet another awkward, uncertain season
Moving on? UNC would like to,
but instead will operate with a dark cloud hanging over the program for a third
consecutive season.
·
Peppers'
agent: Many UNC athletes unprepared for academics
During
his years as an academic counselor in the athletic department at the University
of North Carolina, Carl Carey worked with some of the most physically imposing
members of the student body. Yet some of them, Carey says now, were
"scared to death" of walking into a college classroom.
·
Peppers'
transcript might point to broader academic issues at UNC
An
academic record bearing the name of Julius Peppers, the former UNC All-America
football star and current Chicago Bear, inexplicably surfaces. The transcript
could be a link to the ongoing scandal in Chapel Hill.
·
UNC
reluctant to dig deeper on scandal
The university has shown little interest in digging into two
separate matters brought to its attention that could show that the scandal
involving no-show classes goes back several years beyond what the university
has confirmed.
·
Judge
allows access to business-related calls on Butch Davis' cellphone
A state Superior Court judge issued a decision Thursday that
appears to pave the way for university-related calls that former UNC-Chapel
Hill football Coach Butch Davis made on his personal cellphone to be accessible
to lawyers representing the media in a public records lawsuit.
·
Report:
UNC-Chapel Hill athletic advisers steered players to dubious classes
A
faculty report released Thursday suggests the support program strayed from its
original mission. The report spoke of "potential confusion" in the
role of academic counselors at the new $70 million Loudermilk Center, a
150,000-square-foot building for athletics at Kenan Stadium.
·
UNC-CH’s
academic fraud case puts new scrutiny on professors
The
scandal involving UNC-Chapel Hill’s African and Afro-American Studies
Department prompts questions about the oversight of tenured faculty.