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1. Darren | June 20, 2012 at 6:46 am

   Great work Andy. Looks like if they prep in one of the VA schools, VT usually keeps em.
2. Smithfield Hokie | June 20, 2012 at 6:52 am

   Good Luck to Drew Harris. That young man is super talented and will be a great addition to the long line of talented Hokie running backs. Can’t wait until you make it to Blacksburg Drew!
3. Trevor | June 20, 2012 at 6:54 am

   Kudos to you, Andy, for working hard to get those information. It does seem that academics are still important to Tech’s football staff, so much so, they are willing to have their stud recruits go prep and it seem from the list, a majority of them keeps their original commitment.
4. Frank | June 20, 2012 at 7:23 am

   Another good and interesting report from Andy.
5. proof reader | June 20, 2012 at 7:48 am

   It would be interesting to know of the players that did stick with VT, how many actually did graduate with a degree in hand.
6. scott whitaker | June 20, 2012 at 9:01 am

   Interesting to see VT’s Football graduation rate compares favorably to other ACC schools, notably UVa’s and GT’s.

   http://stanford.scout.com/2/1066657.html
7. Victor | June 20, 2012 at 9:36 am

   Great information Andy!

   Wonder if any of the prep players that ended up going elsewhere excelled in football?
8. hokie24 | June 20, 2012 at 9:42 am

   “It would be interesting to know of the players that did stick with VT, how many actually did graduate with a degree in hand.”

   I guess that means that it would also be interesting to see how many graduated WITHOUT a degree in hand. Wait a minute…
9. Zman | June 20, 2012 at 9:46 am

   So let’s see:

   1. We help kids prep if they need to
   2. Our graduation rate per stanford scout runs at 79% and compares very favorably to other teams
   3. We haven’t had a real scandal in years (I mean institutional based malfeasance like say – the U?)
   4. I don’t count individual player stupidity in 3, above
   5. We have (a good number) of consecutive winning seasons and bowl appearances
   6. We have a pretty boring offense which can, from time to time, frustrate Job.
   7. We lack a national title
   8. We are fairly parsimonious when it comes to recruiting dollars
   9. The football program turns a profit year in and year out
   10. We have some of the best facilities in the country

   And the reasons our own fan base sometimes turns on our program is ….

   why exactly?

   I mean when you consider all of the above Jim Weaver looks pretty good and the Coaches look pretty darn good.

   We don’t have a title and is that the only way we will respect ourselves? Seems misguided to me (and I WANT a TITLE).

   I don’t know guys but it seems to me that we are doing a whole bunch of stuff right.

   So where isd Stack today? Still licking his wounds? Do you think he figured out that FUMA is all male? Do you think he believes they routinely sneak girls in?
10. Zman | June 20, 2012 at 9:47 am

    Hokie 24. Excellent catch. I missed that. I was too busy making typos.
11. George | June 20, 2012 at 9:50 am

    Also of interest is the number of these players that never made a major impact at VT.
12. proof reader | June 20, 2012 at 9:57 am

    SW, I was only referencing the PG kids . These are the kids that are having the qualifying problems. It would be interesting to see how well prep school prepares them for that next level of education.
13. Trevor | June 20, 2012 at 10:19 am

    George, really? Brandon Flowers ring any bell? One of the best corner to played next to Macho Harris. Coaches of other team were nervous to play against the tandem of Flowers and Harris.
14. Trevor | June 20, 2012 at 10:22 am

    George, beside Flowers, I see at least 4 players who were starters and have gone on to the NFL.
15. Stack Maroon | June 20, 2012 at 10:55 am

    Zman,

    Licking my wounds from what? They don’t sneak girls in at Hargrave or FUMA, the guys sneak of the campus…

    “3. We haven’t had a real scandal in years (I mean institutional based malfeasance like say – the U?)
    4. I don’t count individual player stupidity in 3, above”

    How convenient you wouldn’t count an individual players stupidity, but doesn’t it all come back to an individual players decision? So one of vt’s best players of all time runs a huge dog fighting ring, murders dogs, gets caught and goes to prison, that’s not a real scandal, they are just glad that it never came out he fought dogs in Blacksburg. Good job Zman.
16. hokie24 | June 20, 2012 at 11:17 am

    The guys at FUMA sneak off campus for tutoring?

    The girls that they sneak off to meet call themselves tutors?

    Stack, in your words, ” doesn’t it all come back to an individual players decision?”

    That’s right. You’re exactly right. But pay attention… Zman was talking about how VIRGINIA TECH was doing a lot of things right. You are using examples of individuals who made bad choices, independant of their affiliation with VT, and trying to relate that to say that VT is making bad choices. See the difference?
17. Stack Maroon | June 20, 2012 at 11:18 am

    Proof Reader,

    The prep school doesn’t really prepare them for anything they are going to encounter in college. They are there for one of two purposes, either to get a grade to raise their GPA or to get a test score to raise their SAT/ACT score or both. The teachers know what they are there for and they just hope they can keep them from tearing the place up before they get out of there.
18. Stack Maroon | June 20, 2012 at 11:27 am

    hokie24,
    I understand completely…do you think vt is making bad choices when they have the player I mentioned above involved in dog fighting, named after a hallway in the football wing of their building? Do you think Southern Cal has OJ named after anything in their building and he was found innocent, just saying…
19. FIZ | June 20, 2012 at 11:29 am

    Tech should not be held accountable for what a player does later in life.
20. hokie24 | June 20, 2012 at 11:53 am

    Stack,
    In the case of having a hallway named after Vick, I am ok with that now. I don’t think it’s a bad decision now that Vick is actively working to fight against dog fighting. If Vick was not putting the effort that he’s putting into working against dog fighting, then I wouldn’t be ok with it. Also, it was named after him because of a donation he made.

    I think what Vick was caught doing was disgusting. I will never defend what he did. What he did will never be “ok” or made up for. But, I think that his efforts now to use his famous name, and let the Humane Society use his famous name and face to fight against dog fighting, is the best thing that he could be doing to try to make up for his past.
21. Steve | June 20, 2012 at 12:28 pm

    Vick was named after a hallway? Strange.
22. Zman | June 20, 2012 at 12:53 pm

    I don’t know Stack. Yesterday you insisted that tutors at FUMA would be female and obviously on campus for some reason other than tutoring. I wonder what you were suggesting …. but I don’t think it was a moral purpose since you called one of our contributors “naive”.

    Today you insist that prep schools including FUMA and Hargrave serve some purpose other than formal education. My interpretation is that you believe these schools some how aid in the falsefication of transcripts for eligibility purposes.

    I am pretty sure that the parents I personally know would be distressed at your view that the work FUMA did with their boys was worthless. Especially since I know that your assertions aren’t true and YOU KNOW these assertions aren’t true.

    Like I said yesterday, shut up more and talk less. If you have evidence of your assertions then go to the authorities.

    I have no interest in either Hargrave or FUMA but the fact that you knowingly assert falsehoods is nothing short of shameful.

    This is well past the acceptable degree of poking fun or being generally sarcastic.

    I also suspect you are walking very close to the civil statutes of virginia should one of these institutions take offense.

    You must be one bored fellow to derive your entertainment from getting under the skin of Hokie fans by asserting outright falsehoods as truth.

    I find it amazing that you are permitted to post considering that you are slandering institutions that are essentially innocent bystanders.

    BTW, Vick’s federal conviction for gambling came well after his time in Blacksburg. I see no way that VT can be held accountable for that anymore than UVA can be held accountable for Tiki Barber’s less than steller behavior at ESPN or Auburn can be held accountable for Sir Charles’ seeking a hooker while drunk in AZ.

    It appears to me that Vick did learn something while at Levenworth, even if it was just that he’ll do anything to avoid a return engagement. His behavior since is pretty good. I can’t speak for Barber or Sir Charles.
23. scott whitaker | June 20, 2012 at 12:54 pm

    Stack. OJ and MV, really? I spent many years working in the criminal justice system and I, as well as most people, know a finding of not guilty does not mean the individual was not guilty. There is no question in my mind Simpson committed those murders. So where is OJ right now? And where is MV? I say one guy learned his lesson and the other didn’t.

    Let’s see if I understand the game your playing. Pick the player with the most off field problems, even though the problems occurred after he left the school, then make broad generalizations based on that one player about the whole school, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. And then to add fuel to the fire, to prove the football team is no good ignore the past 20 years and concentrate on the won-loss record of that time before you were born. Then, despite being encouraged to do so, never divulge your team’s identity as no doubt they continually lose to the team you are bashing. Not only do you come across as pathetically desperate but your intentions and methodology are weak and incredibly transparent. Quick, type fast now before your parents get home…
24. Stack Maroon | June 20, 2012 at 1:03 pm

    Zman,

    I was saying that the tutors would be all females at vt, not FUMA or Hargrave.

    I’m not talking about the general student body of FUMA or Hargrave, so no need to take offense, I’m sure they did a great job with the sons of the parents you personally know.

    The PG program is there to help guys get eligible. I’m not saying anything is illegal there, I’m just stating that is what it’s for, no more no less.

    By the way, you are seeing fewer and fewer guys go the prep school route because the NCAA is tighening the loop hole on it. They already have done it with the number of credits you can make up in the classroom and by limiting the opponents they can play on the field.

    I’m not condoning Charles Barkley or Tiki Barber, but that is like comparing apples and alligators with the Vick situation, at least in my opinion…
25. Stack Maroon | June 20, 2012 at 1:06 pm

    scott whitaker,

    You are way off base, not a uva fan or unc fan or any acc/sec fan for that matter. Just giving a different perspective.
26. Peter777 | June 20, 2012 at 1:32 pm

    Great job, Andy- I had wondered about retention, and you nailed it. Looks like a real shift in philosophy in recent years to seeking higher qualified.
27. Trevor | June 20, 2012 at 1:58 pm

    Wow, Stack would have won the “Wrong End of a Massive Pwnage” award on a forum I used to be a member of.

    Anyway, getting back on topic, I am curious to know if there are other schools in the FBS that employ the practice of sending prized recruits to a prep school to encourage the improvement of their grades.
28. Stack Maroon | June 20, 2012 at 2:17 pm

    Trevor,

    Not sure what the first part meant, but to answer your second question, yes, most of FBS schools use prep schools as a way to get recruits eligible. The traditional way was to have them go to junior colleges (JUCOs) to get eligible, but they would lose 2 years of eligibility. If they go to a prep school, they don’t lose any eligibility.
29. Mike | June 20, 2012 at 9:09 pm

    As a FUMA graduate who went on to play Division I football, I would like to provide add some actual facts to the baseless comments about Fork Union which were posted by Stack Maroon yesterday and today.

    Based on his wildly inaccurate claims and constantly shifting explanations, it’s clear Stack has little to no understanding of Fork Union, what life is like in the barracks, the academic program, or how tightly the rules are enforced by cadets and faculty. Even if Stack had bothered to invest in a modicum of research, he would have known that FUMA is an all male institution with no female tutors under the age of 35. He could have even found the NFL Films special on the Academy which helps to dispel his assumptions which he purported as facts. Unfortunately, Stack decided to vomit out a few claims he hoped would stick without attempting to understand the school or the PG system in even a rudimentary way.

    While many on this blog have successfully refuted several of Stack’s assertions, even forcing him to adjust his story to fit the facts, I would like to walk through some of his more foolhardy claims and discuss them by the ones:

    - Stack said, “Fork Union probably costs between $25-27K…”

    Since Stack is unsure of the cost, hoping to approximate, it seems wise to discount his claims about how those costs are defrayed.

    - Stack went on to claim, “Shuman will free up about $10k in scholarship dollars, which means Harris or someone will have to come up with the rest.”

    Stack gives no basis for this statement, hoping the reader might dismiss his ignorance of the baseline cost and believe his baseless estimate of what Coach Shuman might or might not provide for Harris. As someone who has lived through the FUMA experience, I can say that I never observed what Stack claims the financial arrangement will be. Unless he was part of the conversation between Coach Shuman, ADM Burhoe, and the Harris family, it’s clear Stack was just making it up.

    - Stack went on to provide unintentional comedy, saying “This also means, that Harris will not graduate from his high school and will fail so he doesn’t have enough credits to graduate so when he enrolls at Fork Union he can take the easy classes and get good grades so he can increase his GPA that correlates to his SAT score, which must not be very good, because the NCAA Clearinghouse uses a sliding scale.”

    It’s interesting to me that Stack went on and on later about the Postgraduate (PG) program at FUMA but completely forgot about his claim that Harris won’t graduate. It could be that Stack doesn’t understand what the word *post*graduate means. It seems more likely that he just has no understanding of how the process works.

    As for taking “the easy classes” at Fork Union, I wish Stack would elaborate. Which classes are easy? Who teaches them? I went through Coach Shuman’s algebra class as a freshman, and it was anything but easy.

    At FUMA we also learned about the use of irony, which could include questioning someone else’s academic performance by using a run-on sentence.

    - Stack went on to mock the academic performance of Harris and the Academy, saying “He should fit in well, some female tudor [sic] is going to have their hands full”

    At the time, Stack appeared to have no idea FUMA is an all male institution with an almost exclusively male faculty. After some great comments by other posters, he later changed his story to claim the students would sneak off campus for their lessons. He’s clearly never been to Fork Union, VA or Fluvanna County. There’s simply no place to go even after leaving campus on foot.

    It’s also clear Stack never had the opportunity to attend the “easy classes” at FUMA. In those classes we learned that “Tudor” refers to the former royal family of England (e.g. Henry VIII) and a “tutor” is someone who provides supplemental academic assistance.

    - Stack further demonstrated his ignorance of FUMA’s history with VT by stating, “Obviously, FUMA is pro vt, one of Shuman’s sons is a GA there”

    Long before Coach Shuman’s sons (both of whom are current or former Tech athletes) were born, FUMA provided a pipeline of players to VT. Chris Kinzer and over a dozen future Hokies were classmates of mine at the Academy. Will Furrer was our QB my senior year. The participation of Coach Shuman’s sons in the Tech football program is a product of, not a reason for, the relationship between the two schools. If Stack had even a basic understanding of the program at FUMA, he’d have known this.

    - Stack went on to repeat, “They have 11-13 scholarships for 60 players, so do the math.”

    Maybe Stack hopes that by repeating an inaccuracy several times, it might somehow become true. Of course, Stack provides no source for his claim and isn’t even quite sure of the number of scholarships.

    - After getting caught in his claim about female tutors, Stack demonstrated the elasticity of his story, saying “You think that they are going to assign a male tutor to him or any other student-athlete? I would say that there aren’t many males at all in that department.”

    Only someone completely ignorant of all things FUMA would believe that the Academy has a corps of female tutors (or “tudors” for those who took the easy classes) at the ready for athletes like Harris. To be fair to Stack, he essentially admits pulling his claims from an orifice by prefacing a supposedly factual statement with “I would say that…”

    - By yesterday afternoon, Stack’s purported knowledge of Harris and FUMA fell apart when it became clear he did not even know what year Harris is scheduled to graduate. Stack admitted, “My bad, I thought he was a 2013 recruit who they knew wasn’t going to get eligible…yes, his recruiting has opened up again and he will have to sign a NLI again.”

    - Finally, after everything for Stack broke down, he claimed, “The prep school doesn’t really prepare them for anything they are going to encounter in college…The teachers know what they are there for and they just hope they can keep them from tearing the place up before they get out of there.”

    Stack has obviously never been in a FUMA classroom or learned from a teacher at Fork Union. PGs are part of the corps of cadets, march tours if they get in trouble, and are subject to dismissal just like any other cadet. One of the greatest athletes who attended the school *was* dismissed for disciplinary reasons. The faculty at FUMA puts up with far, far less nonsense than any public school, and teachers there have no problem enforcing discipline. Even Don Majkowski (FUMA ’83) pointed out in the NFL Films video that football players are required to follow the rules, just like everyone else.

    I apologize for the length of this post, and I would like to thank anyone who read the whole thing. There are certainly areas of opportunity for Fork Union as an institution, but it’s particularly irksome when someone who is clearly ignorant of basic facts about the school spews forth several false (and nonsensical) claims. FUMA means a great deal to my classmates and me, and I hope this post serves to dispel the myths Stack posted about our school.
30. scott whitaker | June 20, 2012 at 10:43 pm

    #25 Another perspective? Ahh, so you are trying to enhance Andy’s work, kind of enlighten us, is that it? So your goodwill is what brings you here? And I’m sure you’re on other teams boards doing likewise? How nice of you. And just think I had you erroneously pegged as a cowardly little twit with no friends and no life…
31. Trevor | June 21, 2012 at 10:02 am

    #29, excellent post, sir.
32. Dan | June 23, 2012 at 1:53 pm

    @#29 Thank you Mike. You get my vote for post of the year. Just one editing note Andy, I believe that 2007′s “Quillie Oden” should be “Quillie Odom”. Great job though, and excellent research as usual.