The job of a college president is multi-faceted, but one of the most fulfilling things I am able to do as the president of College of the Redwoods is talk about the many achievements of our students, faculty, and staff. I want to take the opportunity with this article to recognize the academic achievements of our student-athletes.

In our May 19 Education Matters article, we wrote about the satisfaction that comes at commencement when we honor our graduates for seeing their academic goals come to fruition.  At our recent graduation ceremony, I had the additional joy of giving college diplomas to 35 of our student-athletes. These students are now on to their next adventure, and I truly believe their time here has made them better prepared for whatever that may be.

But graduating is only one of the things to celebrate. All of our student-athletes accomplished a lot this year. Of the 204 students who participated in at least one athletic contest in the 22-23 academic year, 121 of them attained a 3.0 or above grade point average (GPA). This represents 59.3 percent of all of our student-athletes. Even more impressive, 60 of them ended the year with a 3.5 GPA or higher.

My granddaughters would be happy to hear that our female student-athletes outperformed their male counterparts—but not by much! The overall GPA for our women student-athletes (70 participants in seven sports) was 3.233 while our men (133 participants from six teams) realized a 3.134 GPA.

Our highest performing athletic teams (it was a virtual tie) were Men’s Basketball and Women’s Cross County with 3.348 GPAs. Following these two teams were Women’s Track, Women’s Basketball, Men’s Cross Country, Softball, Volleyball, Baseball, Men’s Track, Football, Women’s Soccer, Women’s’ Tennis, and finally Men’s Soccer with 2.768.  We anticipate sending 74 participants (41 men and 33 women) from various teams forward for All-State Academic recognition (3.5 cumulative GPA or higher).

I believe that you would agree that the academic achievement of the 204 students is quite remarkable given that they accomplished the academic milestone while transitioning to the post-COVID learning environment. I want to commend our athletes for their dedication to their sport and to their academics and our faculty and staff who supported those students. It is a testament to the fact that academics is a priority for our college.

College of the Redwoods’ student-athletes push themselves to an exemplary performance and inspire all of us to do the same in our work. We are all very proud that they continue to excel in the classroom and I am grateful to be able to celebrate their accomplishments.