DETROIT (11/4/2015) -- University of Detroit Mercy student-athletes are still performing at a high academic level as evident by the national averages for Graduation Success Rate (GSR) and Federal Graduation Rate (FGR), which were released by the NCAA on Wednesday.
 
For the 11th-straight year, Detroit ranks among the top-five in the state with a GSR of 80 percent, while the Titans had three teams with a perfect 100 percent score, as well as seven programs who exceeded the national average.
 
From 2005-2008, UDM student-athletes in men's tennis, women's golf and women's lacrosse achieved perfect graduation success rates, while the rates for men's cross country and indoor and outdoor track and field (92 percent) and women's basketball (87 percent) were above the national average. 
 
For the Federal Graduation Rate, Detroit ranked fourth in the state at 64 percent, while men's cross country and indoor and outdoor track and field (75 percent), men's fencing (67 percent), women's soccer (74 percent), softball (72 percent) and women's tennis (75 percent) were all above the national standard.
 
Overall, the national GSR average score was 86 percent and the FGR was 67 percent, which indicates that Division I student-athletes continue to perform well in the classroom and more of them are graduating. 
 
The GSR for the last four graduating classes of all NCAA Division I student-athletes (2005-2008) jumped two percentage points from last year to 86 percent, which is an all-time high for the NCAA. Nationally, student-athletes in the entering class of 2008 at Division I institutions achieved their highest rate in history at 67 percent, which is 2 percentage points higher than the general student body at Division I institutions.

"We are moving in the right direction," said Ohio University President Roderick McDavis, chairman of the Division I committee on academics. "Ultimately, the real significance of this is that more student-athletes are graduating from college, and that's good news."

The GSR and federal rate calculations measure graduation over six years from first-time college enrollment.
 
The federal graduation rate, while less inclusive than the GSR, provides the only measure of historic academic comparison between student-athletes and the general student body. By this standard, student-athletes consistently outperform nearly all of their peers in the student body.