NCAA reports overall improvement in athletes’ academic performance

A decade after the NCAA created a new measure of college athletes’ classroom success, officials announced Wednesday that the latest scores show overall academic performance edging up.

The average “academic performance rate” for Division I four-year schools rose to 976, up two points from the year before, the NCAA said. There were notable increases in the marquee sports of football, baseball and men’s and women’s basketball.

“Ten years ago, the membership designed the APR to encourage student athletes to stay in school and earn good grades,” NCAA President Mark Emmert said in a statement. “We are pleased to see that more and more student athletes are doing that every year.”

Not all schools fared well. Nevada-Las Vegas and Idaho face postseason ineligibility in football next fall because of their scores, and San Jose State will be barred from the postseason in men’s basketball.

Oklahoma State’s football team must reduce its practice time because of a substandard score.

Among local schools, USC and UCLA saw all of their teams exceed the benchmark 930 for 2012-13, the most recent year for which data is available.

The men’s basketball team at Cal State Fullerton scored 915 and will face a penalty involving less practice time.