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http://www2.ncaa.org/portal/academics_and_athletes/education_and_research/academic_reform/penalties_per_school.pdf

Does anyone know how many academic advisors UCA has to do work with the men's and women's athletic programs? Academics are goingtoh ave to take on a greater importance now since wea re moving up or we could get slapped with a loss of scholarships in different sports if the players and athletic staff don't take this serious. We need to move in a Division 1 aspect all the way around, athletic competition and academic progression as well.

You couldn't be more right... the D2 approach won't work with the higher eligibility requirements and the penalties are serious for noncompliance.
I'm not 100 percent certain, but I believe we have just one advisor for ALL athletes at this point, and that's not going to be enough. I don't expect us to have eight just for football like they have on the Hill, but I do feel some upgrading in this area is going to be necessary. This is a serious issue which I hope is being addressed by the Athletic Department.

And stuff like this had better change...
http://echo.uca.edu/NEWS/S3.html

I guess I'm getting old, but what is an RSO?

Registered Student Organizations I do believe..

A Registered Student Organization...mainly different clubs and groups around campus can apply to be an RSO with the proper forms and numbers...there are a lot of RSO's on campus if I am not mistaken and they do NOT need advanced registration like sports do. I don't know why they were included! For example, for a couple of years I was the president of the Student Affiliates of the American Chemical Society, we had about 12 members and didn't really meet on a regular basis and did absolutely nothing with the university, we did nothing at all really! However, with a couple of forms and some names of officers and a "regular meeting time" we were an RSO! Now things like choir and band are not RSOs, I understand correctly becuase they are actually classes at the university. I was in the UCA Concert Choir for 4 years and each year it is a class that I have to register for and I get a grade for, and sometimes fitting my schedule around it was difficult but I made it work and so advanced registration for those type of CLASSES may be useful, but not neccessary by any means!
I think there should be some type of application that various students can fill out to get advanced registration due to various things such as children, job(if absolutely need to pay for your schooling), and other very important things. That way those students will be happy and the sports guys and gals and benefit from it too!

Is the Athletic dept. an RSO?

And I agree with your application suggestion.

No. The Athletic Department is just that a Department of the university. Things like The Bear Den are an RSO because it was formed by students for students.

UCA Recognized Student Organization (RSO) Handbook
Disclaimer RSO HANDBOOK

If you have found this document, you are either considering forming a group of UCA students who share your interests or you are striving to improve an existing recognized student organization.

From UCA Student Services

I read the article again and I think I understand now. But, I'm not sure what my opinion is yet.

It's hard for us old dummy's to understand everything on the first reading.

Bottom Line: We need more than one academic advisor for thr entire athletic contingent at UCA. If we don't fix this, we will be paying some serious prices down the line in the form of lost scholarships. And the central issue is that our athletes aren't normal students... they sacrifice up to five hours a day, even in the offseason in football, and produce revenue which benefits the rest of the student population. Most of them don't take classes after 1 p.m. They do deserve at least the benefit of not ending up with the bottom feeders from the teaching pool. It's not asking much.

Great post!

You need something just like this D1-AA program has . . . including priority registration!

http://daytonflyers.collegesports.com/athleteservices/dayt-athleteservices.html

SHSU has one full-time academic advisor and I believe, a graduate assistant...yet in the spring 2005 semester, we led the SLC in All-Academic selections and were one of the few SLC schools that did not have any scholarship problems. So, it's not about how many, it's about quality. Our Univ President goes around touting our Academic AD. You just need a commitment from the AD, support from the Univ Pres and a good academic support staff in place and you can "move mountains"...

Nicholls St, SFA and Texas St-San Marcos all felt a blow from the NCAA as it relates to scholarships. I do not believe any others were impacted. The SLC has made a huge commitment to academics and is trying to do what it can to publicize the good things these student-athletes do.

Div II has different standards and that's why some Div II schools have expressed an interest to move up (I know Presbyterian in SC did this to get it in their professor's head), to be with schools that more similar standards to that of their own. We'll see how UCA does, but never forget, it's all about being a student-athlete. You couldn't be an athlete at a college without the student...

Once again, Texas Terror has seen fit to enlighten us with his vast and superior knowledge of all situations, yet I really do not see how his correlation of Sam Houston State and their one extra special advisor and one graduate assistant relates to our situation at UCA. We are in transition and some of the problems we will be facing will be new and unique to us and it's obvious to me we will need several experienced people to help move this along smoothly. If TT really wants our transition to be smooth and for us to get where his beloved Kats are academically, then maybe he can see if SHS will lend us their advisor for a few semesters.