CEDAR CITY, Utah - Each year the NCAA releases a report on the Academic Progress Rate of its member institutions. All Southern Utah Athletic teams met the standard APR for the 2021-22 season.

Each academic year, Division I sports teams calculate their APR using a standard formula. Scholarship student-athletes can earn points for remaining eligible, staying in school, or graduating each academic term. 

The minimum standard APR for each team is 930. Typically, teams that scored below the benchmark would have to face penalties that encourage an emphasis and prioritization on academics. These penalties have been on hiatus since Covid and will resume beginning with the Spring 2024 reporting period. There has been a slight dip in APR nationwide since the Covid 19 pandemic but many universities are starting to return to pre-pandemic performance in the classroom.

Five programs at SUU increased their APR over the last year. The best increase came from both Men's Cross Country and Men's Golf who improved significantly in this reporting term. With the changes in the landscape of college athletics, an increase in APR is a good sign that the department is striving to set a high standard for academic performance. 

The Southern Utah Gymnastics team had an immaculate 1000 APR for the first time since 2016. The Flippin' Birds posted an overall team GPA of 3.784 in the 2021-22 season which earned them a spot among the top 5 teams in the nation in last year's WCGA Academic Awards coming in at #4. Southern Utah returned to the top 5 for the first time since 2017 when the Thunderbirds were the top academic team in the country. The last program to achieve the perfect 1000 APR score for SUU was the 2017-18 Women's Cross Country team. 

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