<p>My S is a middle of the road student from a middle of the road high school. Forunately for him, so far, several coaches from some of the top 10-20 LACs are interested in him. Given that he does not know what he wants to do, does not show much passion in any specific area and is equipped with only mediocre studying skills and work ethics, I'm wondering if it would be too stifling for him to be put in an environment where amost every one else is in the 10% of their class? Or will it be more condusive for his devlopment if he goes to a second tier LAC (top 50-100) where he may have more breathing room and be more confident?</p>
<p>I wonder how hard it is for some one like my S to get a B average in the tier 1 LACs? I'm hoping that at some point he'll pick up his intesity, but there's no guarantee that it will happen. </p>
<p>Obviously the name recognition of these schools are very tempting and it is hard to pass them up. </p>
<p>Please let me know the pros and cons for either choices.</p>
<p>"Given that he does not know what he wants to do, does not show much passion in any specific area and is equipped with only mediocre studying skills and work ethics,"</p>
<p>Hmm. As the mom of two sons who had mediocre studying skills and work ethics, I think there's a good chance that your S is not yet ready for college. I don't think that a college exists that can ignite a passion for studying and can build responsibility in a student who isn't interested and probably isn't mature enough yet to handle the responsibilities of college.</p>
<p>Consequently, my thoughts are that it would be a great idea to consider a gap year. Surely there's something productive your S can do such as work fulltime at a community recreation center while also keep up his athletic skills while he matures and learns the value of a college education. (Some students understand the value of a college ed when they have to pay rent and pay for their clothing and entertainment expenses while working a minimum wage job.)</p>
<p>Anyway, my older S went off to a very nice state U that was thrilled to have him. He promptly got into partying and flunked out. He only got to that school because I did the hard work of organizing him as he applied to college.</p>
<p>I learned my lesson: Exposed younger S to colleges, made sure he took the right tests, etc., but did not stand over him to make sure he got those applications in.Consequently, he got none in, and now is taking a gap year with Americorps -- a position he literally had created for himself due to his excellent volunteer experience. He's loving this experience and is handling it with organizational skills that he'd never demonstrated before.</p>
<p>After he didn't apply to college, my husband and I also had told him that he would be welcome to live at home after h.s. graduation, but would have to pay rent. He also was welcome to move out after graduation. I showed him the classifieds with apartment info and job info. Since he didn't want the usual kinds of jobs that h.s. graduates qualify for, he showed amazing creativity in getting a position created for him that he would love doing.</p>
<p>My thoughts are that if your S shows little interest in doing whatever is required to check out colleges and to get those applications in and if you also have to sit on him to make sure that he has decent grades, that's a big sign that he isn't really interested or ready for college. Look, then, for other alternatives that will allow him to mature and give him a good dose of 5h3 reality of surviving without a college degree.</p>
<p>Not knowing what he wants to do, no passion for one specific area - no problem, imo. Some kids are focused, many are not, many think they are and change their minds. College is a fine time to sort this out.</p>
<p>Mediocre study skills and work ethic - this could work out a number of ways. Being around kids who are academically motivated could rub off on him. Human beings do have some tendency to regress (in his case, progress) toward the norm. Alternatively, he could find and join the slacker/party group and do poorly. Or he could make it through as an athlete with whatever support/slack the school offers him due to his athletic skills. He could be a "late bloomer," but the question is when he will bloom.</p>
<p>Trying to predict which of those alternatives will be his future is tricky, I am sure. But I think that would be your mission in helping him.</p>
<p>I'm hesitant to automatically prescribe the gap year that others have done. But it surely can work wonders. My own step-grandson fell into a gap year because he and all around him were out to lunch during the college admissions season of his senior year. His gap year was nothing planned, he worked in a grocery store. He is now performing extremely well in Engineering in a near-top 100 University. Your S might be interested in an athletic gap year - it is something that accomplished high school athletes do around here (eg, junior hockey...). I suggest that as just one option. There are ample threads discussing a variety of gap year options here on cc.</p>
<p>If he will sit still for it, a real heart-to-heart about what he wants out of school, how he will feel at a place where most kids are top 10% hs kids might help guide you.</p>
<p>Side question: why have you narrowed it to LACs? Is he not interested in small/medium/large U's? Are you not? Are they not calling him re the athletics?</p>
<p>Is he just now entering junior or senior year in high school? Is there good Guidance Counseling at his school? What have the Guidance Counselors had to say about good fit schools for him?</p>
<p>We need data points. Mediocre in intelligence? Mediocre in standardized testing? Mediocre in grades? My advice could be different in all three areas. Can we assume that he is a recruited D3 athlete but is not being recruited by D1's, at least not so far?</p>
<p>Mediocre to some might be a 1200 SAT kid with a 3.5, although that would really be substantially above the norm. CC stats are some seriously skewed stats and what seems mediocre here is actually quite good.</p>
<p>tennisdad: I have to quibble with your labeling your son "mediocre". From your other posts I see he has a 3.6 gpa and 1810 1st time SAT scores - far from mediocre! He may be more comfortable at a less intense school, but he needs to make that decision, IMHO.
Its time for him to visit the schools, talk to coaches, kids, hit with the team, etc.</p>
<p>"From your other posts I see he has a 3.6 gpa and 1810 1st time SAT scores "</p>
<p>I wouldn't call that mediocre, either. My sons with "mediocre" grades had gpas that were below 3.0 unweighted. Now, that's mediocre!</p>
<p>I take back everything that I suggested about a gap year's being appropriate for your S. To the poster who asked for the OP's S's stats -- great call!</p>
<p>What a tough question! As I understand it, the problem with Northstarmom's sensitive advice is that your son's athletic skills give him some advantages that he might lose with a gap year, and that might be inconsistent with deferring admission to a particular college. (I haven't heard much about "athletic gap years", although that's an intriguing concept.)</p>
<p>Another complicating factor is that it's more or less an open secret that the more difficult an institution is to get into, the harder it is to flunk out. Top 10 LACs simply do not "lose" many kids, unlike state universities where significant attrition is just part of the landscape.</p>
<p>Your dilemma is that most, but not all, horses will drink if you lead them to water. Unmotivated 17-year-olds placed in social contexts that are achievement-oriented often become motivated, successful 20-year-olds. But not always, and especially not if they spend a lot of time feeling alienated and inadequate. And on the other hand, letting your son put himself into a context where his social cues would be not to challenge himself and not to achieve outside athletics could be a horrible waste of money and opportunities.</p>
<p>I don't think there's a one-size-fits-all answer to your question. And, while I would love to say "your son should decide for himself," I don't think it's that simple. He can certainly defeat any choice you impose on him, so don't do that, but he is probably also capable of making a bad, immature choice on his own. Parenting is tough.</p>
<p>My anecdotal experience, for what it's worth: The two most unhappy people I knew at my elite college were a recruited quarterback and the grandson of a member of the board of trustees, both of whom stuggled constantly to keep their heads above water academically, in a social context where that was not respected. Neither flunked out, but both would have been far happier and learned more somewhere else. But they were not at all representative of the recruited athletes or the trustafarian legacies of my cohort -- most of them did fine, had a jolly good time, and got a lot out of the whole experience. Among my chidren's peers, the single worst college horror story I know is a kid who went to a party-school LAC to play tennis, and not only failed to finish, but spent some time in jail and a lot of time in 12-step programs (something that will -- I hope -- be a lifelong thing for him).</p>
<p>For the benefit of other readers , I'll repost what I posted on a previous thread of the OP's:</p>
<p>" It appears from what you are saying that you are more concerned with academic maturity than brain power . D3 sports could be seen as an enforced structure that could greatly benefit a student like that. Many programs are quite pro-active about making team members take advantage of all the helpful modalities the campus has in place-writing centers, tutors, office hours, academic advising specifically geared to athletes etc. And those early morning practices tend to keep the late night carousing to an acceptable level." </p>
<hr>
<p>I think it will come down to judging this particular student's maturity level. If the maturity is there to make good academic choices when in the environment at a top school, I think history says that recruited athletes a deviation or two down from the mean can do very well at top colleges. (Some studies have been cited about Ivy league and Nescac schools previously on the board. I have no cites myself.) </p>
<p>Throw a little laziness and "Party-Hearty, Brah" into it and he'll be home to stay by Christmas.</p>
<p>Time to get real with the kiddo, and let him check out the environment at schools of differing difficulty.</p>
<p>tennisdad, I wouldn't choose a school because it is a top ten or top 20 school. However, if one of those schools was your son's favorite then why not go for it? If he goes to a top ten school and it doesn't work out, so what? He'll do something else. Failure is OK. </p>
<p>"I wonder how hard it is for some one like my S to get a B average in the tier 1 LACs?"</p>
<p>The median average at top 20 LACs is about a 3.3 (a smidgeon higher or lower dependeng on which school.) A B average would likely put him in the bottom third or so of the class.</p>
<p>No top 20 Div. 3 LAC is going to accept a student whom they believe can't do the work. The reason for that is simple: they want him for his athletic eligibility. At many schools (including my alma mater Williams), a recruited athlete with lower SAT scores and GPA has a better chance of admission than one with higher ones, for the simple reason that coaches are less likely to use their limited athletic "tips" on students who are more likely to get admitted anyway.</p>
<p>How well he does - anywhere - will be totally up to him.</p>
<p>There is a risk to a gap year -- namely, the risk that the kid will never complete college.</p>
<p>I know a young man with little academic enthusiasm who started college, hated it, and came home after a semester with the intent of completing his first 60 credits at the local community college and then attempting to transfer to a different university. While attending community college, he got a job in a retail store. A couple of years later, he is working at that store full time, and the community college no longer comes up in conversation. There is no sign of him ever transfering to the university or completing a degree. He's a working man now.</p>
<p>It is clear to me that this young man likes his job and the money it brings in and does not fully appreciate that years from now (when he may have a wife, kids, and mortgage) he will find his career opportunities limited because he has no degree. I think this may be a fairly common occurrence among kids with limited academic motivation who take time off from college or decide to attend part-time. They may tend to drift away from formal education -- possibly forever.</p>
<p>
[quote]
It is clear to me that this young man likes his job and the money it brings in and does not fully appreciate that years from now ... he will find his career opportunities limited because he has no degree. I think this may be a fairly common occurrence among kids ... who take time off from college or decide to attend part-time. They may tend to drift away from formal education -- possibly forever.
[/quote]
I know of no data on this phenomenon, but I can tell you that this worry weighed heavily on DH's mind regarding his grandson (see post #3, above).</p>
<p>It didn't work out that way at all, in his case. Some day, I will ask for his perspective on why. It may be the good fortune that he lived during this gap year a stone's throw from his in-state flagship where almost all of his close friends attended. He saw their daily lives and social lives in comparison to his; he saw where they were headed in comparison to the relative dead-endedness of his prospects. It was a supreme motivator and he jumped at the chance to have our guidance in applying to and attending college.</p>
<p>Tennisdad- You may want to start a new thread and re-direct this question to parents of "Recruited Athletes". I think you may be in a unique type of situation where your kid is a pretty average type student who may have the athletic ability to make it into a top school. And being a caring and practical parent, you are wondering if that is the right type of academic environment for your kid.
I share a bit in common with you- My d is also the "average" type kid. Does well enough in school, conscientious but really isn't too interested in academics. My d could take a GAP DECADE off, and I don't think it would make much of a difference. She'll do what she needs to do, but I do not think she will ever get the academic spark and love of learning.<br>
She's also a very solid athlete- 3 season sports--starter on basketball and soccer team. Good solid athlete-but not recruitable. She'll be majoring in Sports Management and will probably do intramural or club sports only. </p>
<p>I did wonder at some point, that if my d was good enough to be recruited-- what would be the right academic environment for her, as that was most important and the reality that she was pretty much an average type student. Even if she was good enough to be recruited, I could not see her at a school like Williams, Amherst etc. cause it would not have been a good academic fit. I think d would have felt way out of her league in the classroom.
As I am from NY- there are some pretty solid schools like Ithaca College, Siena and Hofstra where alot of recruited athletes go. If you want to bump it up a notch or two academically, you may want to check out LAC's that fall into the top 25-50 like Trinity in Conn. or Union in NY. That may have an academic atmosphere more in line with his needs.<br>
I do suggest you get input from the parents of Recruited Athletes as they may be more knowledgable as to the type of academic support that is really being offered to college athletes. You may also need to consider if a LAC environment is really right for your son. If he has no clue what his interests are, he may need a school that offers a broader choice of majors.
As he is into sports, a lot of these kids do gravitate into Sports management, athletic training, physical therapy etc. Alot of LAC's will not have programs in those fields. You may need to consider a Big U setting too. Good luck.
Just re-reading his stats- he really is a bit more than an average student and would probably do just fine in most school environments. But he may not thrive in an extremely competitive academic environment.</p>
<p>marny1 : you speak my mind much clearer than I did in my original post. Thanks!</p>
<p>Currently, my S is recruited by some LACs (DIII) near the top 10 (no Swarthmore, Amherst), and one DI school. The coaches claim he is their top recruits. My S feels more comfortable with a small school and I agree with him. That's why we are focusing on small schools in the North East.</p>
<p>My S and I also went to a college showcase for the athletes and his grades and SAT score do fall into their range. But seeing the stats of many CC'ers who are interested in these same schools, it's intimidating to think of putting my S in the same class as them. </p>
<p>It's comforting to hear mini's comment that the schools do care for the academic well being of the recruited athletes. We should discuss this with each individual coach to see what kind of help their program offers.</p>
<p>Talk to the coaches. Any experienced recruiter will have heard these questions a thousand times, and be prepared to discuss</p>
<p>how many of their athletes graduate</p>
<p>GPA of the team</p>
<p>entrance academic qualifications of the team members (is your son mid range for the tennis team? near the top? near the bottom?), this will tell you how well the overall team stats would apply to him</p>
<p>academic support to the athletes provided by the athletic department or the college</p>
<p>If he goes D3, then essentially none of these athletes expects to be a professional tennis player, so they all need to worry about how they do in school. Any decent coach will know this and should be able to give you a much better feel of what he would be getting into. </p>
<p>From his stats if you eliminate places at the Amherst Swarthmore level he should be fine. Even at Amherst and Williams he would be very unlikely to flunk out (almost no one does), but if he is not energized by his studies he may not enjoy struggling to keep up with stuff he does not care about.</p>
<p>His search should be much like anyone else's: find a place where he feels comfortable, where he fits, and, for an athlete, where he likes the program.</p>
<p>Tennisdad, there are some schools and subjects your son should avoid if he is not in a revved up mode about college and could go either way. Coaches, even in D-3, if they are recruiting are demanding. The top D-3 schools in a particular sport may be more challenging and have more talented athletes than a number of D-1 schools. You will have to look at the composition of the team, their majors, their grades and scores. A school with "tech" in its name should be approached with caution. In many ways, being an athlete at college is an advantage because it does give structure to the kids, and being on a team gives a student an immediate crowd to join. Just make sure it is the right crowd.</p>