Gavin Wimsatt is officially a graduate of Owensboro High School and a student at Rutgers University. After three weeks of taking specific classes and completing the necessary steps, the Owensboro school board on Thursday granted Wimsatt’s early graduation request via the “exceptional post-secondary opportunity policy.”
Here’s what the Owensboro Times learned about the process Wimsatt had to go through at Owensboro High School to enroll at Rutgers this fall.
Note: Wimsatt did not respond to a request for an interview. OHS football head coach Jay Fallin declined to comment beyond the information below.
What is the exceptional post-secondary opportunity policy at Owensboro Public Schools?
The OPS Board of Education enacted the policy during the 2020-21 school year.
According to the policy, “Students who have been offered an exceptional post-secondary opportunity may apply for assistance with graduation requirements. In the case of exceptional post-secondary opportunity, the District may provide alternative methods for the student to complete District graduation requirements which may allow for early graduation. Methods may include, but are not limited to, regular classroom instruction, alternative classroom instruction, online courses, performance-based opportunities, college programs, consideration of waiver of District requirements that exceed state minimums (the District cannot waive state minimums), or credit recovery.”
A written request must be submitted the month preceding the student’s anticipated final month in attendance.
Requests are reviewed by the guidance staff and presented to the principal, who then makes a recommendation to the superintendent. The board then approves or rejects the request based on the superintendent’s recommendation.
Students approved through the policy are no longer permitted to participate in any school activities with the exception of graduation.
What was the timeline for Wimsatt from request to graduation?
Wimsatt submitted his request in August after it was determined Wimsatt could potentially complete his remaining credits to graduate before Rutgers Sept. 10 add/drop deadline.
Revlett said normally the board would know well in advance, but once the request was made the district started working with Wimsatt to understand all the options.
“About a month ago, he sat down with about seven folks across the district, including the principal, vice principal, guidance counselor, coach, athletic director, myself, and some others, just to kind of really break down all the different options that were going to be available,” Revlett said. “And if he wanted to move forward and be able to enroll in Rutgers this fall, what steps would be necessary to take to make that happen.
Noting the majority of Owensboro High School seniors actually have most of the credits they need to graduate — and that some of them already have them completed all together — Revlett said Wimsatt was only two credits shy of the courses needed to graduate.
Revlett said once the decision was made that Wimsatt was going to try to graduate early, he was withdrawn from all the classes that he was currently scheduled for and then enrolled only in the courses that he needed to be able to complete his graduation.
“He had to use every minute that was available to be able to get those done,” Revlett said. “They did those through a program called Edgenuity that basically was an online course that he had to complete for those two credits to be able to graduate.”
Wimsatt had everything completed at the end of last week.
“He really busted it out and worked hard,” Revlett said. “He was basically in one room all day working with a couple of teachers to make sure that he was getting those credits done in a timely fashion, and that he was getting the grace to pass and he did that he was able to have this opportunity.”
Is Wimsatt the first to take advantage of this opportunity?
No, according to Revlett.
“It’s interesting, Gavin’s actually the second student to actually be able to take advantage of this opportunity,” Revlett said. “Last year we had a female student who had a big internship that was able to leave early and met all the requirements to graduate.”
Revlett said he thinks the other student may have already completed their required credits, “but they still had to follow the same process … to make sure that they had everything that they needed as far as board policy goes to make sure that was possible.”
Revlett said it’s up to the school board to determine what an exceptional opportunity is.
The first student to use the policy had a “fantastic scholarship opportunity” at a university, but that student needed to enroll early in order to have that opportunity, which included the internship.
As for Wimsatt, Revlett said “He had the opportunity to leave early, enroll early, get started on his college career and we certainly weren’t gonna stand in his way.”
Revlett said others could take advantage of the policy going forward.
“The policy is in place for any student that has an extraordinary opportunity that’s presented to them,” he said. “That could be something from a full-ride scholarship that’s contingent on enrollment early, which was the case with the first one. It can be a number of different things. But anybody that has an extraordinary opportunity that would allow them to maybe do this early, they’re more than welcome to utilize this board policy and apply for that graduation.”
Did a potential NIL deal factor in?
There have been reports of a potential six-figure NIL (Name, Image, Likeness) deal waiting for Wimsatt, though nothing has been officially announced and Owensboro Times has been unable to confirm a deal.
Revlett said an NIL deal was never discussed in any of the meetings that OPS had with Wimsatt.
“That’s not to say that (a potential deal) maybe wasn’t a factor for him of why he wanted to go early, but no NIL numbers were ever discussed in a meeting that we had with school staff and his family,” Revlett said.
In a press conference on Sept. 4, Rutgers coach Greg Schiano said he thinks Wimsatt’s decision to graduate early came after Quinn Ewers signed a seven-figure NIL deal. According to ESPN, Quinn was originally supposed to stay at Carroll High School in Texas until January 2022. Ewers decided to skip his senior season, reclassify to the 2021 class, and enroll early at Ohio State.
In addressing how Wimsatt enrolling early at Rutgers came to be, Schiano said, “Well, the way it came to be is we know what happened at Ohio State, and I think the family saw that and they asked, really just curiously, could we do that. We said, well, we could look into it if you want to. And we did, and it was a possibility because he’s done a good job academically.”
What was the communication between OPS and Rutgers?
Revlett said the high school’s guidance counselor had conversations with the NCAA compliance staff at Rutgers to make sure that all the necessary paperwork was completed and that Wimsatt was eligible from an NCAA standpoint.
Rutgers officials said they don’t comment beyond what Schiano has already said, and that “it is also not a practice of ours to discuss the specifics of any student-athletes’ academic status.”
Did anybody here play a role in helping him make the decision?
Revlett again noted that about seven individuals sat down Wimsatt and his family to discuss the options that were available, “and that included everything from remaining in school until December — that was I believe his original plan to do — or this option to go ahead and enroll in the fall.”
“He came to us and said, ‘I’ve got the opportunity to go in September,’ and we sat down with him and said, ‘This is great. You’ve worked very hard. Here’s what the path looks like should you want to leave early, but at the same time you know if you stick around and win a state championship, then X, Y and Z could happen for you here in town, and we want to make the best decision that’s right for you and for your family and for your future.’ Ultimately the decision was up to him,” Revlett said. “He’s an adult and he talked about it with his family. All the options were presented to him and we said that we’d support him whichever way he decided to go.”
Now that he’s at Rutgers, what happens next?
Schiano said Saturday that he wanted to get Wimsatt acclimated to the college lifestyle.
“It will be a great opportunity to learn our culture, get exposed to the scheme, learn about being a college football player,” he said.
In a Monday press conference, Schiano said Wimsatt and his family arrived Sunday night. Schiano also said Wimsatt was able to practice this week, but the coach was taking things slowly.
“Just in general this is a young man who played in a high school game three nights ago. So taking it really slow,’’ he said. “People forget just because they’re a great player … they’re still a young person that’s going away from home for the first time. He’s got to move into a dorm and do all that good stuff. We’ll give him a chance to get his feet on the ground here before I worry too much about practice or that kind of stuff. I’m sure he’ll want to. That’s what football players like to do, get out there and play football. So we’ll get to that as soon as we can.’’
On Monday Schiano said he was unsure if Wimsatt was even allowed to join the team this weekend on the trip to Syracuse. According to a Tuesday post from TheKnightReport, Wimsatt will travel but he will not be dressed.
