Dr. Joe Luckey

Dr. Joe Luckey, a native of Cincinnati, returned to his hometown in November 2012 to lead the University of Cincinnati athletic department's academic services unit.

He serves as the executive senior associate director of athletics for student-athlete support services and oversees all aspect of student-athlete academics and the Student-Athlete Development Academy. He is also the liaison to the department's athletic advisory committee. Luckey serves as the sports supervisor for baseball, men's golf, and men’s/women’s swimming/diving.  In addition, he serves as a member of senior staff and has a leadership role as chair of the department’s One Team Committee.

Dr. Luckey is currently serving on the board of directors for National Association of Academic and Student-Athlete Development Professionals (N4A), the national organization for athletics departments' academic services. His involvement with N4A has also included serving as president from 2011-12, chair of the strategic planning committee, division director for professional development, president elect, past president, and hosting two regional conferences.   

He was named a winner of N4A’s Distinguished Service Award in 2016 and is also a past recipient of N4A's Lan Hewlett Award which is the top honor for its active members. He has also been a faculty member for N4A's Professional Development Institute since its formation in 2005. Dr. Luckey's commitment to professional development and mentoring is evidenced by the literally dozens of institute participants and his former graduate assistants, interns and staff who are currently working in athletics academic services.

Dr. Luckey came to UC after spending 10 years at the University of Memphis where he was the director of athletic academics and oversaw the Center for Athletic Academic Services. At UM he also assisted in NCAA eligibility certification and was an academic instructor. He has also served on NCAA and campus committees. In 2005, he was the recipient of the Provost's Star Award in recognition of his contributions in achieving the mission of UM's division of academic affairs and also the University's outstanding service award. For the past five years, he served as the chair of the Conference USA academic advisors committee.

During his time at Memphis, the athletic department set new highs for 10 different academic benchmarks including student-athlete grade point averages (GPA), the number of student-athletes named to C-USA Commissioner's Honor Roll and UM Dean's List, team and department-wide GPA. Furthermore, better than 90 percent of student-athletes graduated and every sports program set its semester GPA record. There have been 17 academic All-Americans and last year every sports program topped the NCAA APR standard of 930.

Dr. Luckey's academic research has included work for Houghton-Mifflin's textbook "Becoming a Master Student-Athlete", a dissertation that examined academic statistics related to the NCAA's Proposition 48 and Proposition 16, and post-doctoral studies comparing satisfaction levels of student-athletes against non-athlete students. He has made numerous presentations before N4A national and regional gatherings and C-USA meetings. He was also a member of the NCAA Division I-A task force on student-athlete development.

He began his professional career at Austin Peay State University where he spent 10 years, progressing from an intern to an assistant athletic director. Dr. Luckey earned his bachelor's degree in mathematics from the University of Dayton, his master's in kinesiology from Indiana University and his doctorate in administration and supervision from Tennessee State University. 

He and his wife, Melissa, have three sons: Adam, Tyler and Ryan.

His Cincinnati roots run deep. He is a graduate of La Salle High School and his parents previously worked on the gameday staff for the Cincinnati Reds.