For the first time under fourth-year coach Dirk Koetter, at least one-third of the ASU football team posted a 3.0 GPA for the fall semester.
The team has improved its academic performance in each of the past three years, athletic department officials said.
Only 15 players on the 2001 team earned a 3.0 GPA for that year's fall semester. By comparison, 34 players posted a 3.0 GPA last semester.
Jean Boyd, assistant athletic director for student-athlete development, said improved academic performance could explain the team's recent success.
"My philosophy is that your character dictates who you are in everything you do," Boyd said. "If you strive to be successful in every area of your life, it can't help but cross over onto the football field."
Athletic department officials said roughly half of ASU's student-athletes had cumulative GPAs higher than 3.0 for the fall semester.
Boyd said the steady improvement student-athletes have shown in the classroom could be linked to the department's continued emphasis on learning.
"The athletic department has been in a deficit situation for the past few years," Boyd said. "But [Athletic Director] Gene Smith made sure that he preserved the integrity of what we were trying to do."
Boyd said not cutting academic budgets and personnel has led to increased stability. He said the department has been more proactive in recent years to help student-athletes make a smoother adjustment to college.
"We know who the student-athletes are academically before they even get here," Boyd said. "The people at the top who were getting 4.0s in high school are going to come here and pretty much do the same thing. If we can help the people who struggled improve their skill set and motivation toward performing, they help your GPA increase as an athletic department."
Senior Associate Athletic Director Sandy Hatfield-Clubb likened the department's approach toward struggling student-athletes to establishing an offensive strategy.
"We call our academic staff coaches," Hatfield Clubb said. "Their job is to coach our student-athletes to be the best they can be in the classroom."
Boyd said the department strives for 3.0 GPAs for each team. Last semester, 13 of ASU's 22 teams had a cumulative GPA of 3.0 or higher.
The athletic department has improved its efforts to educate faculty members, Boyd said.
"We have gone out of our way to visit with faculty members," he said. "We solicit their support in helping empower student-athletes to be self-sufficient and to set high aspirations for themselves in the classrooms."
Boyd dispelled the notion that student-athletes receive special treatment from faculty members.
"The student-athlete in general has some extra burdens to bear that other students don't," he said. "The NCAA has very specific and stringent criteria that they require student-athletes to abide by."
In addition to meeting GPA requirements and taking a specified number of courses, student-athletes sometimes miss class for road games and out-of-state tournaments.
"It's helpful for the faculty to understand that the reason an individual is missing class is not because they are blowing it off," Boyd said.
Reach the reporter at mark.saxon@asu.edu.
