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Skid:
First of all, OSU is on a quarterly system, not semesters. It is common practice at many schools for athletes to take a light course load during their sports season. For OSU basketball, this is Winter Quarter. OSU now requires it's basketball players to take classes during Summer Quarter, in part to make up for the light load during the season. That said, Oden did hurt OSU by dropping out last Spring Quarter after the cutoff date. As a result, he left OSU as being academically ineligible. Mike Conley and Daequan Cook were stand-up guys and completed their academic responsibilities, but now Kosta Koufos has pulled the same crap as Oden. As a result, OSU basketball will have an uphill battle to get back up to 925...but no sanctions for now due to OSU requiring their players to attend Summer Quarter.
Also, the APR system requires students to make prescribed levels of progress toward earning a degree as they progress through their years of eligibility. Can the system be scammed? No doubt, but it is still a step in the right direction. When the APR system was first implemented, OSU football was well below the 925 benchmark. Since then, Tressel has recruited a few classes under OSU's recently raised admissions standards. Not only has he been recruiting great athletes, he has also been getting good students. Every year, Tressel takes a pass on some of Ohio's best talent because they don't meet the academic standards (Mario Manningham is a great example...no doubt the Wolverines are proud of the 6 he scored on the Wonderlic). The result...OSU football has an APR of 984, has a team GPA above 3.0, and has led the Big Ten in academic all-conference players for the 4th consecutive season. Clearly, it is possible to do things right.
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