The College Bound Athlete (share, ask, boast)

[dchogs]

1 hour ago, PeterMP said:

 

1.  Some kids can do college sports and keep everything else together.  If you have one of those kids, that's great, but that's rare (which I've already stated)

i'm with kilmer here. 

 

2.  There are kids out there that playing sports are going to open opportunities for them in terms of going to a college that they otherwise wouldn't have been able to do.  In those cases, it makes sense (which I've already stated).

 

and i'm with you here.  i work at a school, and it drives me crazy when student-athletes could realistically be accepted into highly/most selective liberal arts colleges or universities but choose to go to quantifiably lesser schools just so that they could play "Division I" sports.   the cost factor is usually a non-issue, as most of those really good colleges have need-blind and 100% of need financial aid policies that would rival (or likely beat) athletic scholarships potentially earned.

 

 

my daughter is going to attend the best college (for her) that she can get into (that we can afford).  if she can play sports there, great.  if she can use sports to get into that college, great.  if not, no big deal. 

[HOF44]

My biggest problem with it is there seems to have been a cottage industry pop up to "help" get you a scholarship.  Kind of reminds me of those "modeling" agencies for little kids that end up charging a fortune and not doing much.  I mean if you use a service and your kid gets a scholarship you assume it was because of that help, but you have no way of knowing.  Might just be that your kid was damn good.  They prey on a parent wanting to spare no expense or effort for their kids to excel.  Let em play, the cream usually rises to the top. 

[AsburySkinsFan]

17 minutes ago, HOF44 said:

My biggest problem with it is there seems to have been a cottage industry pop up to "help" get you a scholarship.  Kind of reminds me of those "modeling" agencies for little kids that end up charging a fortune and not doing much.  I mean if you use a service and your kid gets a scholarship you assume it was because of that help, but you have no way of knowing.  Might just be that your kid was damn good.  They prey on a parent wanting to spare no expense or effort for their kids to excel.  Let em play, the cream usually rises to the top. 

I've spoken with college coaches, they do not go to high school games anymore. Those days are long gone. Team budgets are tight and so they focus their attention on the concentration of high quality players: i.e. Showcase tournaments, showcase camps, and club play. Not participating in those concentrated events will get a player passed over. That is the state of current college athletic preparation. People have mentioned private coaching, but I'm not convinced that alone will be enough since it doesn't provide a "real world" look at the player, how do they handle adversity, losing, mistakes, winning. Do they crumple under pressure or do they rise to the occasion? That can't be seen in a lab setting. So if the colleges aren't going to high schools then where is the cream supposed to rise to? I sit on the front lines of this thing and I watch players passed over because they don't participate, and I see 1/3 of our varsity grads go play collegiate ball because they got the necessary exposure. What's more is that these showcase camps/tournaments are put on, sponsored by, or held with the specific intent of being a place for talent evaluators to come see a lot of players in one place. And they do come.

 

Now, if a player plays only HS ball and no camps etc can they get a scholarship? Sure, they might get picked up by a local DIII or DII school that happens to have an opening, but they aren't going to be seen by longer distance colleges thus their odds further reduced.

[HOF44]

Then how do so many inner-city kids that have no resources at all manage to make it to Division I

[TMK9973]

10 minutes ago, HOF44 said:

Then how do so many inner-city kids that have no resources at all manage to make it to Division I

Depends on sport and how good.

Football and basketball are different then Baseball, soccer, etc....

Football -Yes -Scouts go to HS games. 

Basketball -yes -To a lesser degree. But there are also all sorts of showcase for HS players - many give out scholarships.  

 

I can only speak to baseball -But ASF is 100% correct. In fact we have a kid at a local HS -Top prospect.  He is committed to GA Tech for baseball.  His Coach in the local paper was talking about how he now has Pro Scouts at every game - but still never sees college scouts.  

 

Pro teams have bigger budgets -But colleges -They are going to showcases.  And yes -It does suck for kids with less money because most of these showcases have to charge every kid the same amount of $$.  

The work around? For great kids without means? Team showcases tournaments. The Tournament has to charge all the teams the same, but the teams can charge whatever they want to whatever kids they want.  

 

 

[HOF44]

So other than football and basketball means have become as big a factor as ability. Interesting. Sports have started mirroring the real world.  Sad.  

[dchogs]

Our boys basketball team has roughly 75-100 coaches through our gym every year looking at our guys, and our school isn't one of the nationally ranked (or even top-top tier DMV ranked) school.  our guys definitely do the AAU circuit, but the HS stuff does still matter.  Coaching connections matter-- our head coach has a TON of connections and works those for the guys.

 

Not totally disagreeing... just adding a shade of grey to the convo.

[PeterMP]

2 hours ago, dchogs said:

i'm with kilmer here. 

 

That isn't my experience and I suspect that my experience is more significant than yours and Kilmer's (as I interact with many non-student athletes and several student athletes a semester), and so I went and looked.  The research on the topic indicates (for D1 athletes (I can't find anything that has looked at non-D1 athletes)), there is generally a relationship between being prepared for a career and playing a sport and even the amount of time spent on the sport.

 

http://ac.els-cdn.com/S0001879199916913/1-s2.0-S0001879199916913-main.pdf?_tid=176b5ed6-2ac1-11e7-91e3-00000aacb35e&acdnat=1493239626_5710ee3a9371f8fab6d96fc9b60c46a1

 

(Though further reading indicates that at least some universities are trying to do something about and are starting career related workshops and activities to target their student athlete population.

 

Just one thing that I see is that it isn't uncommon to have sport that have conference championships right at the end of the semester/finals week, especially spring semester.  If you are looking for a job, trying to do the work for the end of a semester/finals, and prepare for a conference championship, that's a hard combination to put together.)

[Elessar78]

Forgot this tip...

 

follow schools, coaches, assistants, ADs etc on FB or twitter. Can give you a good feel for who they are or where their values are.

 

and expect them to follow you... don't post stupid **** in your feed.

[AsburySkinsFan]

57 minutes ago, HOF44 said:

Then how do so many inner-city kids that have no resources at all manage to make it to Division I

Prepschools and AAU

[TMK9973]

9 minutes ago, dchogs said:

Our boys basketball team has roughly 75-100 coaches through our gym every year looking at our guys, and our school isn't one of the nationally ranked (or even top-top tier DMV ranked) school.  our guys definitely do the AAU circuit, but the HS stuff does still matter.  Coaching connections matter-- our head coach has a TON of connections and works those for the guys.

 

Not totally disagreeing... just adding a shade of grey to the convo.

 

Again -Basketball and football are different.  College coaches show up to those.

Baseball -HS matters - But Tournments and showcases is where college coaches go. And then normally to see kids they have contact with already.

Soccer -To show you how much HS soccer doesnt matter compared to tournaments and showcases -HS teams around NOVA CHANGE THEIR SCHEDULE based on Showcase and tournament schedule.

 

[HOF44]

13 minutes ago, AsburySkinsFan said:

Prepschools and AAU

If those are free why don't more people do that than go to high cost events?

[AsburySkinsFan]

22 minutes ago, dchogs said:

Our boys basketball team has roughly 75-100 coaches through our gym every year looking at our guys, and our school isn't one of the nationally ranked (or even top-top tier DMV ranked) school.  our guys definitely do the AAU circuit, but the HS stuff does still matter.  Coaching connections matter-- our head coach has a TON of connections and works those for the guys.

 

Not totally disagreeing... just adding a shade of grey to the convo.

I wonder how much of that is a concentration of population issue? Not sure where everyone is at geographically but out here in Kentucky we have to go to where the attention is. I agree that with football high school does matter, mostly because there isn't a strong developmental system other than Pop Warner.

[dchogs]

22 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

 

That isn't my experience and I suspect that my experience is more significant than yours and Kilmer's (as I interact with many non-student athletes and several student athletes a semester), and so I went and looked.  The research on the topic indicates (for D1 athletes (I can't find anything that has looked at non-D1 athletes)), there is generally a relationship between being prepared for a career and playing a sport and even the amount of time spent on the sport.

 

i can only see the abstract so i don't know much about the study.

 

any controls for background?  for entering criteria?  sure, you have a stud athlete from the inner city system that gets pulled into X university for 1-4 years-- even with mandatory study halls, etc, that kid ain't going to be career ready at graduation (if they graduate).  an argument against having sports "pull kids up" the selectivity ladder is that kids with lower GPAs, test scores, and general prep get into schools that they're not ready for.  if you control for that factor, what happens?

 

you have a middle class, white girl with college+ educated parents that is attending a rigorous college prep boarding school (with a 3.9 GPA playing 3 HS sports AND club sports) that wants to play sports in college... how's she going to do?  frankly and selfishly, that's all i care about. 

 

http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~banaji/research/publications/articles/2004_Aries_RHE.pdf

 

harvard says: " Student-athletes were studied over 4 years at a highly selective liberal arts college and an Ivy League university. Students spending 10 or more hours per week in athletic activities had lower entering academic credentials and academic self-assessments than non-athletes, but the academic performance of athletes was not below what would be expected based on their entering profiles. Athletes surpassed non-athletes on sociability/extraversion and self-reported well-being in each annual wave of the study."

 

 

at this point, i think this side discussion on "should kids even play sports in college" should be a separate thread. 

 

 

[dchogs]

16 minutes ago, HOF44 said:

If those are free why don't more people do that than go to high cost events?

AAU isn't free, but i suspect that the top, top kids are pretty heavily subsidized by the team... they just pay less than folks like me.

 

prep schools offer need based financial aid and are more generous for higher impact students (academics, arts, athletics, etc... not just sports).

 

honestly, there is an education issue on this-- at least with the prep school aspect.  families just don't know what they don't know, so prep schools aren't considered.  different schools have different academic levels, so there are really schools out there for every kid (theoretically). 

19 minutes ago, AsburySkinsFan said:

I wonder how much of that is a concentration of population issue? Not sure where everyone is at geographically but out here in Kentucky we have to go to where the attention is. I agree that with football high school does matter, mostly because there isn't a strong developmental system other than Pop Warner.

true... we're in hagerstown/western maryland, so not super populated/concentrated.  we are close to and play our away games in DMV though, so there's added exposure.  basically good private HS coaches attract good players which attract college coaches.  a specialized situation that can't necessarily be transferred from school to school (or sport to sport) universally. 

[AsburySkinsFan]

24 minutes ago, HOF44 said:

If those are free why don't more people do that than go to high cost events?

Prep-schools have scholarships and AAU teams do as well for select players.

10 minutes ago, dchogs said:

at this point, i think this side discussion on "should kids even play sports in college" should be a separate thread. 

FACT!!

[PeterMP]

16 minutes ago, dchogs said:

http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~banaji/research/publications/articles/2004_Aries_RHE.pdf

 

harvard says: " Student-athletes were studied over 4 years at a highly selective liberal arts college and an Ivy League university. Students spending 10 or more hours per week in athletic activities had lower entering academic credentials and academic self-assessments than non-athletes, but the academic performance of athletes was not below what would be expected based on their entering profiles. Athletes surpassed non-athletes on sociability/extraversion and self-reported well-being in each annual wave of the study."

 

 

at this point, i think this side discussion on "should kids even play sports in college" should be a separate thread. 

 

Again, I'm not saying kids shouldn't play college sports. In fact, I said in some cases it makes sense.

 

They are talking about an Ivy league school and a highly selective liberal arts school.  You are already talking about elite and rare students for the most part.

 

Those kids by definition of getting into those schools are the rare student, but the fact of the matter is that most of won't have kids that get into Ivy league schools.

[HOF44]

So at least in the big sports the level,of subsidation you get pretty much tells you where you stand.  

[dchogs]

3 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

Those kids by definition of getting into those schools are the rare student, but the fact of the matter is that most of won't have kids that get into Ivy league schools.

absolutely... for students that are not athletes or legacies, who can be decidedly above average (academically) and still get in. 

 

but it does say that athletes have lower entering metrics, and that they fair worse than the average student at those schools.  BUT, if you account for the entering disadvantage, they perform at the same level as the average student.  that aspect can totally translate to differing selectivity levels of colleges. 

 

also, selfishly, that's what i care about.  my daughter isn't going to play for FIU, even if she get's recruited (she's not).  uchicago has been emailing/mailing, and while we are still in the very top end of that funnel and have no realistic hopes of that panning out, that is a scenario i'd be willing to consider.

3 minutes ago, HOF44 said:

So at least in the big sports the level,of subsidation you get pretty much tells you where you stand.  

kinda.  the priority and needs of the school play a role, but generally yes.  a top 10 PG may not flash for a school with a top 5 PG, but there's a school that will pony up.

[AsburySkinsFan]

12 hours ago, dchogs said:

 

kinda.  the priority and needs of the school play a role, but generally yes.  a top 10 PG may not flash for a school with a top 5 PG, but there's a school that will pony up.

This is a crazy vital aspect that can't be over-looked, especially in key skill positions. It's one of the big factors we have to deal with because as a GK there's obviously only one spot per game, and most schools only carry three. A mid-fielder in HS can be slid back into a defensive back position, but a GK is pretty much stuck. So even if school X is the most favorable spot for my son, if they don't have a need for a GK in 2020 then it'll be off the table, which is why for is it's key to get on their radars now.

[PeterMP]

2 hours ago, AsburySkinsFan said:

This is a crazy vital aspect that can't be over-looked, especially in key skill positions. It's one of the big factors we have to deal with because as a GK there's obviously only one spot per game, and most schools only carry three. A mid-fielder in HS can be slid back into a defensive back position, but a GK is pretty much stuck. So even if school X is the most favorable spot for my son, if they don't have a need for a GK in 2020 then it'll be off the table, which is why for is it's key to get on their radars now.

 

And this is where my nephews ran into issues and ended up going to schools that weren't probably the best fit from a long term perspective and certainly not an academic perspective.

 

I had one nephew that in the region (the area where he was competing) for his age at his position was one of the top two kids.  Nationally, there were about 8 regions for the sport, which you'd think put him the top 16, but the sport wasn't as popular in the area where he lived as in other areas so if he would have competed in a different region instead of being 1 or 2, he would have been 4 or 5.

 

So over the whole nation, he's now like 25th.  But he's 25th his year.  There were 24 kids better than him the year before, and the year before that, etc.

 

Right off the bat, he's got to eliminate a lot of schools because they are going to get a kid better than him that year.  From there, his top 2 or 3 choices had given out scholarships to kids the year or 2 before him.  A coach told him, they would take him as a walk on and if he could beat out the kid they had, he'd get the scholarship the next year.  The coach told him that he'd like more competition at the position and was looking to take on a kid, but it wasn't worth giving another scholarship (to the 25th ranked kid his year) and if my nephew didn't take the walk on offer, he'd get some kid at the position in the top 30 to take the walk on opportunity (so my nephew had to make up his mind quickly because the coach was going to move down the line to the 26th ranked kid and the first kid that took the offer was going to get it).

 

And you go from a kid that academically was a strong student in high school, has 2 college educated parents and got into some really good schools independent of the sport going to a much less quality school because it is where he can get a scholarship and has a real chance to play his sport.

 

And let's be honest if a coach has a kid that is a good fit at a position the year before your kid that is going to take the scholarship that is about as good as your kid, they aren't going to not give out the scholarship because they think have a good chance to get your kid the next year.

 

This is where there is a difference between it being the dream and part of the package.

 

15 hours ago, dchogs said:

also, selfishly, that's what i care about.  my daughter isn't going to play for FIU, even if she get's recruited (she's not).  uchicago has been emailing/mailing, and while we are still in the very top end of that funnel and have no realistic hopes of that panning out, that is a scenario i'd be willing to consider.

kinda.  the priority and needs of the school play a role, but generally yes.  a top 10 PG may not flash for a school with a top 5 PG, but there's a school that will pony up.

 

And that's where I suspect there is a difference between the Ivy kids and kids that end up at other schools where I'd be dubious that if what is true at an Ivy school trickles down.

 

I suspect with the Ivy and similar students at similar schools that playing the sport in college wasn't the dream, they were more involved in other extra-circulars and came in as more diversified people.

 

Right, you're seeing talk about a single sport being a kids only extra circular activity as early as their early teens, but for Ivy like students the dream was something else and playing the sport was just a piece.

 

I also suspect the Ivy's do a good job of supporting their athletes.  I talked before about how some schools were doing things to support their student-athletes in terms of looking for a career and career training.  What interview training does the school make available to the students (and where I work they do a lot of this in terms of interviewing and resume writing) and is there an effort to do it at times that are conducive to student-athletes schedules (I know where they work they do a lot of it on weekends, which doesn't seem so conducive to a student athlete)?

 

I know different schools offer different types of support.  I get a letter each semester slightly before mid-term for every athlete I have in my classes with a series questions they want me to answer.  I know other D1 schools that don't do that.

 

If the dream is to play college sports and you have limited options (which is the case for the vast majority of students), then those questions and issues become less important.

 

I'd be curious (as a parent with my own kid that sees this road coming).  Have you talked to your daughter?  Does she know she's going to the best school she can get into even if she can't play her sport there?  Is she really okay with that and does she understand what that means?  Does she have other extra-circulars?  If so, did you force them on her (did you tell her she has to do something other than play the sport) or did she do them on her own?

 

[AsburySkinsFan]

41 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

 

And this is where my nephews ran into issues and ended up going to schools that weren't probably the best fit from a long term perspective and certainly not an academic perspective.

 

I had one nephew that in the region (the area where he was competing) for his age at his position was one of the top two kids.  Nationally, there were about 8 regions for the sport, which you'd think put him the top 16, but the sport wasn't as popular in the area where he lived as in other areas so if he would have competed in a different region instead of being 1 or 2, he would have been 4 or 5.

 

So over the whole nation, he's now like 25th.  But he's 25th his year.  There were 24 kids better than him the year before, and the year before that, etc.

 

Right off the bat, he's got to eliminate a lot of schools because they are going to get a kid better than him that year.  From there, his top 2 or 3 choices had given out scholarships to kids the year or 2 before him.  A coach told him, they would take him as a walk on and if he could beat out the kid they had, he'd get the scholarship the next year.  The coach told him that he'd like more competition at the position and was looking to take on a kid, but it wasn't worth giving another scholarship (to the 25th ranked kid his year) and if my nephew didn't take the walk on offer, he'd get some kid at the position in the top 30 to take the walk on opportunity (so my nephew had to make up his mind quickly because the coach was going to move down the line to the 26th ranked kid and the first kid that took the offer was going to get it).

 

And you go from a kid that academically was a strong student in high school, has 2 college educated parents and got into some really good schools independent of the sport going to a much less quality school because it is where he can get a scholarship and has a real chance to play his sport.

 

And let's be honest if a coach has a kid that is a good fit at a position the year before your kid that is going to take the scholarship that is about as good as your kid, they aren't going to not give out the scholarship because they think have a good chance to get your kid the next year.

 

This is where there is a difference between it being the dream and part of the package.

Yeah, that's the reality dynamic at play. It's one of the things that we discuss regularly. We do the "What If" scenarios, "What if D1 school but you have to wait to play versus a DII school full scholarship and a good business program?" The walk-on scenarios doesn't seem to be one that he's too interested in even at a DI school, there are other options out there rather than fighting for a spot that may not even be available or where he's brought on to be a pace horse in order to give the thoroughbred a push.

[PeterMP]

3 hours ago, AsburySkinsFan said:

Yeah, that's the reality dynamic at play. It's one of the things that we discuss regularly. We do the "What If" scenarios, "What if D1 school but you have to wait to play versus a DII school full scholarship and a good business program?" The walk-on scenarios doesn't seem to be one that he's too interested in even at a DI school, there are other options out there rather than fighting for a spot that may not even be available or where he's brought on to be a pace horse in order to give the thoroughbred a push.

 

And this is where it gets hard for many sports about where do you really rank nationally?  I know the one nephew his dad thought he really would be recruited as a top 15 kid at his position and maybe even top 10.  But when you looked at who got scholarships at the top schools, the college coaches clearly didn't see him that way.  He was somewhere around 25.

 

My niece swam and in something like swimming that issue goes away.  It doesn't matter as a high school junior if you are the best in Delaware in your field.  If there are 10 kids swimming faster times in CA and another 10 in TX (and today it is all online so you can check), then you're clearly behind them and she had eliminated the hopes of competing at a really high level pretty long ago.  She picked a college based on that's where she wanted to go for things other than swimming, and then afterwards compared her times to the swim teams there and saw that she could compete and so she swam (D3) in college.

 

Swimming in college wasn't the dream.  She did it because she could, but if she'd picked a school where the swim team was too good for her to make, it wouldn't have mattered and she did much better in college and has done much better post-college than her older brother.

[dchogs]

2 hours ago, PeterMP said:

I'd be curious (as a parent with my own kid that sees this road coming).  Have you talked to your daughter?  Does she know she's going to the best school she can get into even if she can't play her sport there?  Is she really okay with that and does she understand what that means?  Does she have other extra-circulars?  If so, did you force them on her (did you tell her she has to do something other than play the sport) or did she do them on her own?

 

we've talked pretty much constantly as we see other kids at the school having signing days, etc.  it was easier using other kids as the example rather than talking directly about her, but the frequency and constancy of it has had the issue sink in for her.  she knows that it's the best school she can get into, and if basketball/soccer help her get in, great.  if she can't play at the level of her best choice, so be it.  she gets it and is A-okay with it.  she loves playing but knows that it isn't her long term future.

 

other extra curriculars... she does community service for the underprivileged.  that interest started on a trip to africa and then to nicaragua, but she's carried it back here locally.  she's also setting up shadowing opportunities over the summer to see what people are doing in the field she thinks she wants to go into (medical services... anything from athletic training to doctor). 

 

being well rounded is important, but at the same time, a lot of the really selective schools are looking for kids that are super passionate about something.  from my experience with my son, it's great to be involved in 10 different things, but there better be one thing that you're really diving into. 

[dchogs]

1 hour ago, AsburySkinsFan said:

Yeah, that's the reality dynamic at play. It's one of the things that we discuss regularly. We do the "What If" scenarios, "What if D1 school but you have to wait to play versus a DII school full scholarship and a good business program?" The walk-on scenarios doesn't seem to be one that he's too interested in even at a DI school, there are other options out there rather than fighting for a spot that may not even be available or where he's brought on to be a pace horse in order to give the thoroughbred a push.

 

playing such a specialized position that is so limited on a team is tough, and you'll have to be very careful that he doesn't sacrifice in other areas or "settle" so that he can play specifically at D1.  you just have to find that sweet spot where a college meets all of his needs, and then if there are several schools in that sweet spot, the D1 aspect or food or housing or whatever can act as the tie breaker. 

 

we had a student at my school that turned down an ivy league school to go play baseball at a big south school.  our college counselor almost lost his mind.  i have no idea what the finances of the decision were like, but that's the only excuse i could see for that decision. 

 

something else to be careful of is that there are very few "full rides" available for non-revenue-generating sports at college... especially for male athletes.  a lot of kids (i see it most with our lax players) think they're going to get full rides at whichever D1 school is talking to them, but they just don't exist unless you're top 10 in the country or something crazy (and maybe not even then).