EDITORIAL: Make top teams improve graduation rates
Mar. 25--The NCAA Men's Basketball Championship enters the Sweet 16 stage beginning tonight, and most sports fans are dusting off what's left of their brackets after an opening weekend of upsets.
But a proposal by the U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan would drastically change the look of this year's tournament.
Duncan proposed last week that teams with a graduation rate of less than 40 percent be banned from the postseason tournament.
If that restriction were in place right now, the Sweet 16 would be without Kentucky (31 percent graduation rate); Baylor (36 percent); Tennessee (30 percent); and Washington (29 percent). Eight more teams would have joined those four if the restrictions had been in place prior to the start of the tournament.
Other studies have pointed out that there is a wide disparity in graduation rates between white athletes and black athletes. The graduation rate at the University of California Northridge is so low for black athletes that they actually have a better chance of playing professional basketball in the NBA (1.2 percent) than graduating from college.
Graduation rates can be tricky to figure out. Duncan's figures were based on the number of freshman who graduated after five years. Some athletic administrators would argue that leaves a lot of room for issues. Players leave school early to play professionally. Others leave school to find a team that fits