STONY BROOK, N.Y. – Stony Brook's student-athletes continue to distinguish themselves in the classroom, with six sports graduating at rates above the national average, according to information released Wednesday by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA).
 
The annual report, issued by the NCAA, revealed that six of Stony Brook's sports registered a Graduation Success Rate (GSR) higher than the NCAA Division I institutions national average, including men's and women's cross country/track and field and men's basketball, who each compiled a perfect 100 percent graduation success rate.
 
The Seawolves men's cross country/track and field programs placed an impressive 20 points higher than the national average, while the women's cross country/track and field came in 12 points higher and men's basketball's 100 percent rating was 24 points higher.
 
The Stony Brook baseball program's rate of 83 percent came in three points higher than the national average of 74 percent, while the women's basketball program's rate of 88 percent is a point higher than the national average. The Seawolves football team's rate of 79 percent is six points higher than the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) national average.
 
The GSR measures those student-athletes who enrolled in 2009 and graduated within six years. Overall, the GSR for the 2009 cohort at Stony Brook was at 84 percent, three points up from the 2008 cohort, and the highest rate in the school's history since the NCAA began collecting official GSR data.
 
The GSR was established to more accurately gauge academic progress among student-athletes as compared to traditional federal graduation rates. Traditional federal graduation rates, which do not account for incoming transfers or student-athletes who leave an institution in good academic standing, were also released on Wednesday. That rate, based on student-athletes who enrolled full-time in fall 2009 at Stony Brook, was 64 percent, also the highest in school history.
 
GSR begins with the federal cohort, and adds transfer students, midyear enrollees, and nonscholarship students (in specified cases) to the sample. Student-athletes who leave an institution while in good academic standing before exhausting athletics eligibility are removed from the cohort of their initial institution (essentially passed to another squad's GSR cohort if they transfer). This rate provides a more complete and accurate look at actual student-athlete success by taking into account the full variety of participants in Division I athletics and tracking their academic outcomes.