That would be a typical uninformed response.
Many are like this recruit.
"Penn State Football: Lineman Urschel balances brains and brawn"
Read more here:
http://www.centredaily.com/2012/07/08/3255001/penn-state-football-lineman-urschel.html#storylink=cpy
Many actually played professional football, who would have guessed!
Currently there are 43 former Penn State football player playing professional football (all types not just NFL)
There have been an additional 180 who played in the NFL. CFL, Arena USFL etc are not included.
Here is a partial list of Acemenic All Americans from Penn Stte:
The following were named First Team Academic All-America by the College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA) while playing at Penn State:
Joe Bellas (1965)[17]
John Runnells (1965, 1966)[17]
Rich Buzin (1967)[17]
Dennis Onkotz (1969)[17]
Charlie Pittman (1969)[17]
Dave Joyner (1971)[17]
Bruce Bannon (1972)[17]
Mark Markovich (1973)[17]
Chuck Benjamin (1976)[17]
Keith Dorney (1978)[17]
Todd Blackledge (1982)[17]
Scott Radecic (1982)[17]
Harry Hamilton (1982, 1983)[17]
Lance Hamilton (1984, 1985)[17]
Carmen Masciantonio (1984)[17]
John Shaffer (1986)[17]
Jeff Hartings (1994, 1995)[17]
Tony Pittman (1994)[17]
Travis Forney (1999)[17]
Joe Iorio (2002)[17]
Andrew Guman (2004)[18]
Paul Posluszny (2005, 2006)[19]
Tim Shaw (2006)[19]
Gerald Cadogan (2007, 2008)[20][21]
Josh Hull (2008, 2009)[21][22]
Andrew Pitz (2008, 2009)[21][22]
Mark Rubin (2008)[21]
Stefen Wisniewski (2008, 2009, 2010)[22][23]
Chris Colasanti (2010)[23]
Pete Massaro (2010)[23]
"Nearly 400 student-athletes earn 3.0 GPA during spring semester"
http://gantdaily.com/2012/07/17/nearly-400-student-athletes-earn-3-0-gpa-during-spring-semester/