<p>Let’s hear from some coaches. Surely there are some scouts or coaches who read this stuff. Tell us what you look at and how you decide to pick one 6’ 4 athlete over another. What are the little things that you look for?</p>
<p>@loosingitmom…STAY AWAY from NCSA, especially in the senior year!!! All they care about is collecting your fees ($2000 when my son was a sr in 2008). They did not fulfill their service offering. Since I signed up for 4 installments to my credit card, I cancelled on the last two payments. No one from NCSA would address my issue (needed a later time appointment for the initial appointment) and the salesperson was no where to be found after the sale. They pursued collections on me, and even recently posted a lien on me 3 years after the fact. I feel they prey on the anxiety and emotions of parents and athletes and once you take advantage of that too good to be true offer that has to be signed within days of the first call, you are sucked into a contract which they will hold over your head regardless of whether they have performed the services. Looks like I’ll have to pursue them in small claims court!</p>
<p>So being a newbie on this topic, my question is this: do/did you all feel that this was needed in addition to the input and guidance of your kids’ team coaches? Did the coaches not provide much support for college recruiting? Or is there so much more out there for one person to wrap their heads around in addition to their day jobs?</p>
<p>sweetbandit has good advice on NCSA but it’s not all bad. Surely signing up your senior year was not a good decision. It’s too late. NCSA has a promotion system that best works it you sign up your freshman year. As you attend combines and college camps the athlete’s “qualified” numbers/stats/vitals are added to the profile. Info from school events also are included. Over the next 3 years as numbers improve --which they should–the athlete will get elevated to a higher level on guidance and promotion by NCSA staff. True it’s expensive but by starting early and attending every camp and combine you can afford you will see action. Can one do this on their own? Yes. But it takes time and much effort. That’s why you pay a service. Of course if you’re in MaxPreps top 100 you won’t need to spend a dime.</p>
<p>re: 2girlzmum. Will coaches promote you if asked? Yes. But when being recruited I found it surprising how few college coaches actually called my high school coach. Most want to talk directly to you and if interested you will have numerous conversations. It’s their way of accessing your character, motivation, and dedication.</p>
<p>2girlzmum: I think it really depends on the coach. If your coach has been involved with numerous high level recruited athletes or was a high level recruited athlete him/herself they are more likely to have the kind of credibility that makes them great advocates for your kid. If they don’t have that kind of credibility then even if they are a great coach, the college coaches don’t seem as interested in hearing from them. At least that’s been our experience.</p>
<p>… that I haven’t seen here is the breadth of schools that you’re willing to send your kid to. (And this has to be measured against the relative level of your kid’s interest in playing varsity sports in college.) If your kid is a ‘B’ student and has the skill and interest level that playing sports is a ‘must’, there will likely be hundreds of potential colleges to choose from and it may be worthwhile to cast your net widely and use a recruiting service.</p>
<p>By contrast, if for some reason (a) your child’s net is limited to a certain number of colleges because of geography, finances, academics, etc., and/or (b) there are other opportunities to reach those schools, a recruiting service may be a waste.</p>
<p>My HS Senior baseball-playing son fortunately has the sort of grades what will get him into a top University of California school (we’re in California) or a top LAC, if not an Ivy (where he does not have the skills to play). So, we know which schools he’d be willing to go to, and he’s willing to simply play club ball of he gets into a D1 or Ivy school. Also, baseball offers showcases (like the Headfirst Honorroll showcases) that bring all those high-academic schools together.</p>
<p>Also, if your kid is incredibly talented, he or she may not need a service to reach schools. By contrast, if his or her skills are weak or are not capable of being appreciated on video or by statistics, a recruiting service may be of little aid, and the kid may need to attend a camp or showcase hosted by the school(s) of particular interest.</p>
<p>Thanks for the advice everyone! My D is a freshman who played varsity Field Hockey this year as a starter. Her coach has been saying that she has a lot of potential (does he say that to all the kids?) and right now, she’s interested in playing in college. I do understand that a lot can happen in the next three years but I want to have my eyes open. This coach is a bit new to the sport and to coaching (8 years?) but he’s starting to have players play in college. His wife has coached much longer for one of the private schools in the area and I hear that she’s sent dozens of girls to play in college so he can glean some strategies from her. The local FH club also has seminars on college recruitment, which we’ll have opportunities to attend. D’s coach says she ideally should start looking ahead to college recruitment readiness in her Sophomore year. Yikes!
D has just this week caught the eye of one of the local FH coaches who invited her to try out for their local club indoor team that will play in a regional tournament, which might start to raise her profile. I’m not sure I’m ready for this!</p>
<p>Get familiar with NCAA recruiting rules and regulations. You don’t want to eliminate options by violating a rule. It’s happened.</p>
<p>berecruited.com is a great start.</p>
<p>See what happens, but make sure her grades are strong. So many more options and $$ (if not Div 3), with a solid student/athlete.</p>
<p>Daughter was recruited Div1 for two sports and S2 now for D3. Vastly different.</p>
<p>2girlzmum: I think at this stage your role as a parent is just to guide your daughter and keep her options open. It’s still early in the process – so you can slowly learn about the recruiting process for FH. Lots of great information on the web and via forums like this. If you know any parents of recruited FH players, talk to them. FH recruiting is changing ( we went through it a few years back) and a lot of recruits are committing in Junior year now - as is already common in other sports. I also do not see the benefit of these recruiting services unless, like someone previously posted, you are casting a wide net to get coaches interested as opposed to you targeting specific schools that you and your D feel are a match. </p>
<p>At this point – great academics are more important – they will help her whether she decides to play or not, at any level (D1/D3 … club)
Feel free to PM me if you like.</p>
<p>I have signed up for berecruited and I need some advice to try to get my parents to pay for the service they think its a scam and indeed real people’s experiences with this website.</p>
<p>Created a berecruited profile for my D who runs XC and track when she was a freshman. We did the Deluxe so that we could see who sees her profile and bookmarks her. As of today she has had several D1, 2 and 3 coaches look at her profile, and she’s been bookmarked as well as have received emails from various D3 coaches. She’s sent out letters to several schools that would be a match for her stats and grades as well as she has started calling coaches of schools that she’s interested in. And I’m talking great schools all over the country. We cast our net wide. I think it has been a great investment and tool and am confident that it will pay off for her. Have started college visits, mostly to D3 schools that are showing great interest in her. I keep her stats updated, and she follows up with the interested coaches. It’s really a good way to see just what kind of interest you can generate and what’s out there. Have never heard of some of the schools, but they are looking for people just like her to fill their rosters with scholarships to give. Have a profile on NCSA and CaptainU also, both free, but berecruited is the main one that seems to be paying off. Hope this helps:)</p>
<p>Laxbro- My son also used BeRecruited- when we signed up for it originally, it was a one-time fee for unlimited time (Under $100). Since then, they have changed so that in order to see which coaches are looking at you, you have to pay a monthly fee. While I don’t think it is a scam, I don’t think it had a lot to do with where my son ended up (D2-soccer). He got a LOT of activity on BeRecruited (and CaptainU); a lot of coaches looking at his profile, a lot of coaches e-mailing him, bookmarking him, etc. The problem for him was that very few of the schools that contacted him were schools he would even consider attending. He had better luck just aggressively contacting the coaches at schools he was interested in. He first came up with a list of schools that met his academic and sports needs, as well as were in areas he liked, and were of a good size for him (large). He then went to each website and got all of the coaching information for each as well as finding out about each team and school. He emailed each coach and followed up with phone calls. He kept at it until he came up with a list of schools that seemed interested and from which coaches came to see him. We did our own highlight video and posted it on YouTube so that each coach could see him play. In the end, he got a lot more response from his own legwork than from any recruiting site. We also noted that the coach information on BeRecruited and CaptainU was not always up to date. Coaches at schools change often, so he always checked school websites before sending any e-mails. The recruiting website often listed old coaches. So in the end, while I don’t think the recruiting sites are scams, I question their usefulness. My son used the “college search” tool on this site, where you can enter search criteria including sports, and generate a list of schools that fit your criteria. It was a great way to start a list.</p>
<p>Berecruited doesn’t really advertise it, but after a couple of months of paying whatever the monthly fee was, I saw something about the lifetime membership and contacted them to find out what it was. Once you pay that, you don’t have to pay anymore. Wasn’t that expensive. And after a few times of noticing that the coach that was listed wasn’t the current coach, we check the school’s website now before sending any letters. And the schools that have looked at her stats and/or bookmarked her are schools that she is interested in, U of Miami being one of her top choices and Birmingham-Southern and a lot of the D3’s like Brown, Lehigh, Wesleyan, Wake Forest. I would think that most people would say that those are pretty good schools. But it’s just a good starting point. You have to do the legwork and reach out and follow-up as the above post said.</p>
<p>Don’t do it</p>
<p>I haven’t had to pay one extra dime since we signed up for the lifetime ($100), and we still are able to see who looks at her profile and who bookmarks her.</p>
<p>In my opinion, plunking down a few thousand bucks for some sort of recruiting consultation service is nuts.</p>
<p>As a parent of of a former NCAA athlete I would advise against using these services. In today’s day and age you can find all of the contact info for any coach or school online. If your willing to make a lot of phone calls and send out of a lot of emails you will be doing more than any service can do for you.</p>
<p>Many services offer an online database which is filled with athletes who have no chance which is a waste of the coaches time. The majority of NCAA coaches are not well paid and therefore will be easily manipulated into endorsing these services because often times these companies pay coaches to attend camps and seminars.</p>
<p>None of these services will magically get your child a scholarship, either your child is deserving or they are not. </p>
<p>-Target schools of interest
-Prepare a professional academic/athletic resume which includes videos
-Send it to every coach you can find
-Follow up with coaches every couple weeks with new results/scores/statistics</p>
<p>In today’s online world there should be no barriers to doing this on your own.</p>
<p>We went through this process 15 years ago with old fashioned mail, phone calls, and a coaching directory. The whole process cost $200-$300 which included the coaching directory book, postage, and long distance phone bills.</p>
<p>I asked a recruiter who was recruiting my son this very question. He said most coaches (DII)would prefer an e-mail directly from the parent to him. I identified schools that would be the best fit for my son and sent an e-mail and his hudl account video to the prospective coaches. Most coaches responded back that they were impressed and wanted more information on him. </p>
<p>He said most recruiting service just send him lots of films so they can show the athlete that they are doing something for them. He said most of them are just a waste of time and he finds himself deleting the e-mails from his account.</p>
<p>Just my experience. My son ended up getting 3 DII offers, 1 D1AA offer, and support from an Ivy by doing this.</p>
<p>I feel ambivalent including this, but we also signed up for one of these services when I did not know Any different. My older dd was not an athlete. My son was, and they got us at a camp, it was a camp that sounds like eff bee you. And they heavily sold a recruiting service that sounds like enn see ess ay. Anyway we signed up for what we could afford.</p>
<p>It was not anyway close to the big fee, but in truth, For us they really did nothing. Maybe we were better educated about recruiting, but I will never forget when a dad who had a boy at D1 football literally laughed at us, like “well, there goes another sucker.”</p>
<p>We did all our own recruiting in the end.</p>
<p>Now that my son is into college this recruiting service has been trying all our numbers trying to find out where he is committed. My son accidentally responded one day and they then papered us with requests to put his commitment on their website. I am really pretty offended.</p>
<p>They had nothing at all to do with it.</p>
<p>I can only speak to D3, some Ivy League schools and a few lower D1’s in regard to swimming which is based purely on times, these recruit services are not necessary. We did it all on our own and even though it was a lot of work over a two year span (began in February of his sophomore year) my son ended up at a great school.We spent our money on traveling to the schools and meeting the coaches (we live in California and most of the schools he was interested in were back East) The past two summers after Sectionals we headed out and visited schools and met with coaches. Even though he was offered many recruit trips, because he had seen so many schools and met a lot of coaches, the end decision was so much easier. So unless you are a solid D1 athlete and know your recruit trips will be paid for, send out the emails on your own and go visit the coaches and schools you are interested in. I cannot speak to other sports, but in swimming there is NO need for film…your times speak for themselves and that is all the coaches need to know about you.</p>