INDIANAPOLIS -- The Lewis University athletic department was honored by the NCAA, receiving the NCAA Division II Presidents' Award for Academic Excellence, awarded to Division II schools that have achieved an Academic Success Rate of 90 percent or higher. The Flyers achieved four-year ASR of 90 percent for the fourth straight year. 

The Academic Success Rate is the percentage of student-athletes who graduate within six years of initial collegiate enrollment and includes virtually all Division II student-athletes.

The Division II ASR includes transfers into a school in the calculation and removes those who transferred out of the school while academically eligible. The ASR also includes over 30,000 nonscholarship student-athletes who were enrolled in the four years covered in the most recent data.

Even when using the less-inclusive federal graduation rate, student-athletes are outperforming their peers in the general student population by six percentage points. For Division II student-athletes, the federal rate is 59 percent, while the general student body federal rate is 53 percent.