Achieving Academic Excellence
By Tom Symonds
HurricaneSports.com
For Director of Athletics Blake James, student-athlete academic achievement is one of the key measures of departmental success at the University of Miami.
To ensure academic success at the highest level, James entrusts Senior Associate Athletic DIrector David Wyman and his eight-person full-time staff to lead a seemingly never-ending quest to ensure that Hurricane student-athletes are exceeding the challenging academic requirements at Miami.
So far, mission accomplished.
For the past seven semesters, Wyman his staff have seen Hurricane student-athletes post a cumulative grade point average of over 3.0.
“We have a commitment to the student-athletes to help them succeed at the highest level possible,” Wyman said. “We want them to achieve their own personal highest level. A national honor society student’s achievement level may be higher than the guy next to him. Our goal is to foster higher learning through that achievement. In doing that, our method is to engage with every student-athlete that comes in and commit our resources to help them achieve their personal and ultimately their professional goals.”
Most recently, Hurricane student-athletes continued their strong work in the classroom by posting a Graduation Success Rate (GSR) of 91 percent, as announced on Nov. 8 by the NCAA.
Heading into his 23rd year at Miami, Wyman still remains as committed as ever to helping Hurricane student-athletes reach their academic goals.
“I’m passionate about watching people grow up and develop into whatever they want to develop,” Wyman said. “I want to help you navigate your resources to help you accomplish your goals. We realize that a lot of students come here to be national champions, Olympic athletes and world champions.
“In addition to that, we want to remind them of their obligation to themselves to further their education and enrich themselves socially – to get the full experience. My goal is to make them get the most out of their experience here at the University of Miami.”
Helping student-athletes achieve their academic dreams is certainly no small task and an average day for anyone in academic services is rarely just an average day.
“It’s very fluid,” Wyman said.
With dozens of coaches and support staff members working with the academic staff, Wyman readily admits that a day in academic services can change at a moments notice.
“This is not a typical 9 to 5 job,” Wyman said. “This job is seven days a week, could be up to 70 hours a week. In academic services you need to be passionate about helping people and you need to care about people and their development.”
Armed with eight full-time academic employees, tutors and mentors, Wyman and his staff are fully equipped to deal with the high and ever-changing academic standards.
“We have been blessed to add some staff in the past two years and I’m very grateful to Blake (James) and the administration,” Wyman said. “We’re here for the students because student achievement is why we’re here. I enjoy watching my colleagues that I supervise learn the tactics and the tips of the trade of working with and motivating students.”
Wyman believes that student-athletes are products of their environment and the environment Miami student-athletes are apart of is one of the best academic facilities in the country in the form of the Theodore G. Schwartz and Todd G. Schwartz Center for Athletic Excellence.
“Our old environment, the study area, didn’t have the foster a good academic feeling,” Wyman said. “This new facility is strictly for academic success. We have auditoriums, quad study rooms, whiteboards and brand new computers that are strictly set up for academia. It was an incredible enhancement in us continuing what we do in helping students be successful.”
Wyman and his staff constantly push Miami student-athletes to reach for the highest achievement.
“You have to constantly promote achievement among the students you bring in,” Wyman said. “You have to plant that seed and cultivate its development for them to be able to obtain their degree.
“It only gets harder. You go from freshman level requirements, four-page papers, to upper level courses with twelve page papers. We want to make sure we have our daily and weekly objectives so that we get them done on a monthly basis.”
Despite the long hours and high demands of the educational standards at Miami, Wyman and his staff gain the most satisfaction from student-athletes’ academic success.
“I have assembled an incredible staff of the most talented educators in the country and together we improve the lives of our students through higher education. It’s wonderful.”
