I had an interesting conversation with IM Matyas Marek, the Lyndonville Institute senior who played and won the Danville Open last weekend. He’s planning to apply to colleges/universities here in the US that offer chess scholarships. I asked him which schools he was considering—UT Dallas and Texas Tech. He has considered Webster University, ex-US Chess member Susan Polgar giving WU visibility, but said that academically WU is not up to the academic standards of other universities like TTU and UTD. I mentioned U Maryland Baltimore and he aggree that was another for him to consider.
One has to think that big time college chess may have moved closer to other college sports when the well known coach attracts the student players, but the academics of the university a) may be lower and b) the easier academics make the sports program a bigger draw for some student players. I’d be curious to see the retention/graduation rates for all colleges giving full chess scholarships.
According to Google, Webster’s graduation rate is 61.3%, UT Dallas is 66.9%, Texas Tech is 59.1% and Maryland-Baltimore is 63.3%. By comparison, Harvard’s is 97.5%, but private schools are often much more selective about who they admit and many have better programs to help students succeed in college, while public schools may try to eliminate a third or more of each incoming Freshman class.
I don’t know if Shimer College still offers a chess scholarship, but their graduation rate is 37.8%. (Shimer used to be in Mount Carroll, IL, near where I grew up, but the college has apparently moved twice since then.)
I was referring not to overall graduation rates, but the rates for students on full sports scholarships. If you look at college rankings, Webster is much lower rated than any of the other chess schools academically.
That opens a somewhat different can of worms. The NCAA publishes data on that (at least for Division 1), but the way the NCAA computes graduation rates may differ from the rates schools give in their promotional literature.
As I recall, for most public universities the graduation rate for student-athletes is a bit higher than the graduation rate for the general student body. However, that may not apply to specific sports, men’s basketball being one of them. (This is mostly due to small numbers, when you only have 14 or so students on scholarship in a sport, one star athlete leaving early for the NBA can cause a huge dip in the graduation rate.)
I know at some elite private schools (I went to Northwestern), the graduation rate for student-athletes is fairly similar to the graduation rate for non-athletes.
Shimer recently merged with North Central College, located in Naperville, IL. It is now The Shimer Great Books School at North Central College. As of 8/2015 Shimer’s graduation rate was 68%. Of course, Shimer was so small that a small change in numbers could result in a large change in percentage.
In point of fact the original post talked about graduation rates at schools that offer chess scholarships but did not confine the question to rates among the chess scholars. That was clarified later. So Kevin may be technically correct but the total thread shows Brian’s actual intent for the thread.
I’ve removed several posts arguing about whether ChessSpawn misspoke in his initial post. Please keep any further discussion focused on the subject of College Chess Scholarships and Recruiting.
[b]Rule 6
Colleges and universities offering chess-related scholarships shall maintain records about the individuals awarded such scholarships, their time of attendance, the degrees received if any, and the grade point average attained…
The following are suggestions offered for guidance:
…Non-compliance:
Winning teams should file a report to document compliance with these regulations with the USCF.
Any team’s standing may be challenged for non-compliance by a competing team through a written complaint sent within 30 days to the Executive Director or the Scholastic Director of the U.S. Chess Federation. That official shall gather the relevant documentation of the complaint, make a recommendation as to disposition, and send it to the USCF Executive Board for resolution.[/b]
The records, at least at a public university, should be available to the public and/or taxpayers. It may also be, for public and private institutions, available from US Chess.
Participant eligibility for the Pan AM Intercollegiate and subsequent Final Four is determined by the college chess committee and the records are provided to that committee directly by participating schools. They do scrutinize those records and deal with eligibility questions each year. Those records are not maintained by the office, and do not deal with subsequent graduation rates. Graduation rates have no bearing on eligibility for events by then current students in a particular year.