KANSAS CITY, Mo. – The NAIA has released its list of Champions of Character Five-Star institutions for the 2025-26 academic year, and the University of Pikeville not only made the list but also recorded a perfect score.
 
Institutions are measured on a demonstrated commitment to Champions of Character and earn points in character training, conduct in competition, academic focus, character recognition and character promotion.

For the University of Pikeville, this marked their fifth appearance in the last six years on the list of Five-Star Gold schools. 
 
The goal of the NAIA Champions of Character program is to foster an environment in which NAIA student-athletes, coaches, officials and spectators are committed to the spirit of competition through five tenets: integrity, respect, responsibility, sportsmanship and servant leadership.
 
Institutions earned points based on exceptional student-athlete grade-point averages and by having minimal to no ejections during competition throughout the course of the academic year.
 
The University of Pikeville earned gold status, which indicates a score of 90-100. It recorded a score of 100. Only 120 members of the NAIA achieved that score.
 
In addition, the Appalachian Athletics Conference was named a five-star conference. UPike was one of 10 AAC members to be named to the gold list, all of which earned a score of 100.
 
Six other conference members were named silver schools, meaning it earned a score of 75-89.
 
The NAIA reports that across its membership, 203 schools earned one of the three levels of five-star categories, meaning they reported a score of at least 60 out of 100.