ASU earns top academic honor
By Joey Warren, athletics media relations director, contributing writer
Augusta State University’s Department of Intercollegiate Athletics has been named the recipient of the 2012 Peach Belt Conference Presidents’ Academic Award.
The award—the first-ever for Augusta State—recognizes excellence in academics concerning all of an institution’s student-athletes. The 2011-12 academic year marked the seventh year the award has been presented by the PBC.
“In my 24 years as an AD, this might be my single proudest moment,” said ASU Director of Athletics Clint Bryant. “We had a terrific year in so many areas on and off the fields and courts and courses. My hat is off to the exceptional efforts of so many of our student-athletes.”
This spring, the Peach Belt Conference asked each of the league’s 13 members to submit an average GPA for the undergraduate student body and a GPA for all student-athletes. These two numbers were then used to create a ratio identifying which school’s athletes were performing ahead of the curve in comparison to the student body.
Institutions were not measured against one another, just their student-athletes against their total student body. Augusta State had the highest ratio at 1.100, but at 10 of the 13 PBC member institutions the student-athletes had, on average, a better GPA than the general student population.
The Presidents’ Academic Award is part of a larger conference program to highlight the accomplishments of PBC student-athletes in the classroom as well as on the field.
