It?s NCAA Tournament time once again and the hoopla surrounding March Madness has been used in recent years by higher education policymakers to help draw attention to the unimpressive graduation rates of college men?s basketball players and the gulf between the academic successes of black and white student-athletes. The Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sports (TIDES), housed at the University of Central Florida, continued its annual drumbeat on this issue Monday by releasing ?Keeping Score When it Counts: Graduation Success and Academic Progress Rates for the 2012 NCAA Division I Men?s Basketball Tournament Teams.?
….?Having a researcher follow these trends over time has had a positive effect on the academic success of student-athletes,? says Dawn Crim, a former women?s basketball player at Virginia and a former assistant coach at UW-Madison who today serves as the School of Education?s associate dean for external relations.