Reexamining Student-Athlete GPA

• Main Authors: James E. Johnson (Author), Roger D. Wessel (Author), David Pierce (Author)
• Format: Book
• Published: University of Kansas Libraries, 2010-12-01T00:00:00Z.
• Subjects: article
• Online Access: Connect to this object online.
• Notes: 10.1123/jis.3.2.234; 1941-6342; 1941-417X
• Keywords: Recreation leadership. Administration of recreation services; GV181.35-181.6; Sports; GV557-1198.995
• Source: Journal of Intercollegiate Sport, Vol 3, Iss 2 (2010)

A sample of 674 first-year student-athletes at a midsize Midwestern university were examined each year over a five-year period (2004-2008) to determine if athletic variables were powerful enough to be used in conjunction with traditional predictors of college success to predict GPA. The four specific athletic variables unique to student-athletes (i.e., sport, coaching change, playing time, team winning percentage), were hypothesized to be as predictive as traditional variables. Pearson correlations revealed student-athletes were more likely to earn a high first-year GPA if they were female (r = .35), Caucasian (r = -.33), scored well on standardized tests (r = -.47), had a respectable high school GPA (r = .64), were ranked high in their graduating high school class (r = -.58), had a relatively large high school graduating class (r = .15) were not undecided about major (r = -.11), were not a member of a revenue sport (r = .33), and earned a considerable amount of playing time in their first year (r = -.15). Least squares linear regression demonstrated the traditional variables of gender (B = .16), race (B = -.26), standardized test scores (B = .03), high school GPA (B = .41), high school rank (B < -.01), and size of high school graduating class (B < .01) were most influential in predicting first-year student-athlete GPA.