For those who like to bash the academic standards and accomplishments of the current team.
Team GPA
- Thread starter LB99
- Start date
21 valedictorians on the football team.
Oddly that is the average Star rating of 2027 recruiting class 
You might be amused if you saw what went into computing that number.
Honestly, probably closer to a 2.5 - if you account for both grade inflation (which has been CRAZY for a while, throughout most of the country - and then went absolutely bonkers since "COVID"), and the choices of curriculums.
Not that it is either good, bad, or indifferent - its just what it is.
But, no harm no foul - it is cute when the kids still believe in Santa Claus (and John Urschel
)I have always heard rumors they put kids on the team that a very good academically but will most likely never see any playing time. I mean that is a good number I guess and congrats to the team but I would like to see the data behind that number. Did all the players with low GPAs enter the portal and xfer already? Or is this just the spring semester? Did they count the Iowa State GPAs transferring in?
Back in the day, it was common to have really good students as most of the walk ons (and, back far enough, a lot of very good students among the scholarship kids too).
Now, with no walk-ons to speak of, it is pretty much all recruited scholarship kids (with a few who earned scholarships after walking on a few years back). But the really big difference is the cloistering of kids into a handful of academic programs (stunningly so, if one takes the time to dig up the data) - those that are almost assured of leading to high GPAs (for several reasons). Aside from rare instances, there really are not kids with "low GPAs" anymore. When was the last time you heard of a football player becoming "academically ineligible"? Years? It used to be a regular occurrence (at PSU and other reasonably reputable schools) - not because the kids were dumb or not trying - but because it was much more challenging. It is what it is.
But, yes Virginia, there is a Santa Claus!
Parks & Rec and Kinesiology have always been the home to a lot/most football players since I came here in 1990.
The NCAA APR has been a joke for a long time. There was a basketball player under either DeChellis or Chambers that failed two of his four fall classes yet was still academically eligible for the Spring. I would love to see how close these players that are on their third or fourth school are to actually completing a degree.
1. Replaced by Communications and Criminology. FWIW, Myron Rolle was a kinesiology major at FSU.
2. Not many. Someone bouncing around 3-4 schools is probably nowhere close to meeting the residency requirements of any of them in order to receive a degree. Possible exception is someone who stayed at his first school long enough (minimum of two years) to accumulate enough credits to be close to graduating from that school.
I don't even know what that means these days. I keep reading about how high school graduation rates have risen from 75% to 90% while also reading that the bottom grade at some schools is 50% even if you didn't do the work. NAEP reports that 65% of seniors scored below proficiency in reading and 78% didn't meet math proficiency. These kids are just being passed along and I can't help but to believe it's also happening with athletes in college. Especially after reading that Penn State was last in the BiG in Academic Progress Rate.
Penn State football ranks last in Big Ten APR
Do you think that the bot that compiled that knows what it signifies?
College athletics is way ahead of the game when it comes to kicking the academic can down the road.
Hmmmm, I wonder how the upcoming demographic cliff is going to effect this?
The “demographic cliff” is upon us. The number of teenagers graduating from American high schools peaked last year. It will begin declining this spring and keep falling steadily through at least 2041. The trend is more of a downward slope than an abrupt falloff, but the gradient is steep and represents a crisis to colleges dependent on filling classroom seats and dorm beds. The United States currently has about 4,000 colleges. According to a recent study from the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, about 60 are closing on average each year; that number could double in any given year if the bottom falls out of enrollment.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/04/college-enrollment-demographic-cliff/686750/
The “demographic cliff” is upon us. The number of teenagers graduating from American high schools peaked last year. It will begin declining this spring and keep falling steadily through at least 2041. The trend is more of a downward slope than an abrupt falloff, but the gradient is steep and represents a crisis to colleges dependent on filling classroom seats and dorm beds. The United States currently has about 4,000 colleges. According to a recent study from the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, about 60 are closing on average each year; that number could double in any given year if the bottom falls out of enrollment.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/04/college-enrollment-demographic-cliff/686750/
So...yeah...I mean, I find that really tough to believe but there must have been a lot of kids not seeing playing time pulling in 4.0s
How about this as a recruiting pitch for the class of 2030? We can guarantee you one of our 100 Valedictorian slots upon graduation.21 valedictorians on the football team.
And many of those who do graduate aren't particularly smart:
The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) found that in 2024, only about 35% of 12th graders read at or above proficiency, while 32% scored below “basic” reading levels abcnews.com. In math, just 22% of 12th graders met or exceeded proficiency, with the rest scoring below basic