Ok, glad you have someone to advise you. Best of luck on your season and your college journey!
For football, your best bet is to focus on the coaches who have seen you at showcases and camps or games or with whom your high school coaches have a connection/relationship.
Contact those coaches often.
If they are D3 schools like Bowdoin and Carleton, you may be a good fit, but they can offer academic scholarships only (not athletic) and it may not be enough to bring you within budget. Thatâs why I threw out options like University of Puget Sound (also D3, but likely to be less expensive).
It looks like the rest of your list is D1 schools where you will not play or will maybe walk on. I certainly would include some UC or Cal state options because they will be among the most affordable options.
My child was recruited at D3 schools and her acceptances ended up being split between small liberal arts colleges where she would play and large R1 research universities where she would not. Ultimately, she decided the large school experience was what she wanted and gave up her sport. At that point, it didnât make sense to her to spend the top of the budget for a public university when there were more affordable similar options.
But because you really have TWO application processes happening (football and non-football), narrowing your list is important. Yes, you hear about players who send emails to 1,000 coaches and hear back from exactly one and then walk on and become a star. But those are outliers and people willing to play absolutely anywhere. Football trumps academics for them, period.
For exceptional students like you, the analysis is more nuanced. I am assuming you are pickier and not willing to go to a Central Washington, for example, because it does not offer the full academic opportunity you seek. In that case, I advise you to do what my kid did: (1) for your sport, focus on just a few schools â places you would be happy to attend and who have shown the most interest to date, and (2) fill out your list with strong options where you would not play (or would try to walk on or do club rugby or something). You run the risk that none on the sport list will take you, but if you spread yourself too thin looking for a football school at this stage in the game, you wonât put sufficient time into your other applications and risk being shut out of academic opportunities, too.
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Thank you for the advice!!
I am in contact with the coaches (mainly D3) that have shown interests. If it is up to me, I would go anywhere I can play, but parents donât think it is wise considering my GPA and EC.
How does D3 recruiting look like? We still need to go through the regular admission process? Would the coach press to apply for ED to show commitment?
I donât know football. In our experience, if a D3 coach was interested, the athlete was invited for a visit in the spring, summer, or early fall of application year. During the visit, there were meetings with teammates and coach and an interview with admissions.
During the process, the coach got transcripts and academic info to give to admissions for a pre-read to make sure the athlete would qualify for admission. Assuming the coach wants an athlete, the coach will encourage the athlete to apply ED and tell admissions.
Admissions will review the application like that of a regular applicant, but knowing the team wants the athlete to fill an institutional need. That is a huge advantage in getting admitted and receiving the highest merit scholarships over other similar applicants. (It is a âhookâ that makes the athlete stand out among other applicants with similar applications all vying for the same spots.)
At this date, you are very late in the process. By the time you are on a coachâs radar, the ED deadline may have already passed, so they may be fine with you applying ED2 or RD if they want you. Your best bet is finding a team who didnât get a quarterback they wanted and has a hole to fill. Maybe your high school coach has some leads.
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Agreed. This is why I suggested weekly updates. Do not sit back and wait. At high academic schools, you would want to get coach support, which typically means an ED application. ED deadlines are usually Nov 1.
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These are questions for the coaches once they are showing interest. You might miss this yearâs ED window at some schools. Some D3s each year, even the highly rejective ones, have some recruited athletes applying thru the RD round. It just depends. Football is one of the sports where itâs not uncommon for some recruits to go thru the RD process because they missed the ED window.
If a D3 coach has serious interest, they will typically do an academic pre-read with admissions, where they submit the athleteâs transcript, test scores, and resume to an AO.
If that is positive, the next step would be for the coach to make a verbal offer to the student for support thru the admissions process. Coaches typically send more athletes thru pre-reads than they have full support slots. Most D3 recruits apply ED, thatâs the quid for coach support. Many 2024 football commitments have already been made, but not all as I noted above.
Recruits nearly always have to fully complete the applicationâŠ.essays (good ones), letters of rec, as required by each school.
D1 and D2 recruiting is generally different than D3.
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I have no special knowledge about football recruiting, but I did attend a prep school that took postgrads, and that was my first thought when I read your post. You already have a strong academic record, but youâre not so far ahead on coursework that you wouldnât have classes to take in a postgrad year - youâd be a stronger candidate for top programs with calculus on your transcript, for example, and thereâs probably more econ your could take, and maybe another AP lab science, plus Spanish if you wanted. I could see you doing really well, both admissions and recruiting wise, with another year to show what you can do athletically, and get ahead of the recruiting timeline. There are terrific music opportunities at many prep schools as well.
Of course, there are good possibilities for this year too; it will just be hard to tell whether what you want athletically and what you want academically will come together in the short time available, especially within budget.
Iâm curious about how you chose Pitzer; itâs a great school, but not the most âbusiness-y,â and it would only come in under 60K if you got need-based aid. (I think the max merit is only about 5K?) In the Claremont Consortium, Claremont McKenna seems like a better academic fit for your interests. Itâs reachy but gives very strong preference to ED applicants⊠and they do have EDII if you could get coach support but needed more time. Athletically, the two schools are on different teams - Pitzer has combined teams with Pomona, and CMC with Harvey Mudd (and for womenâs teams, with Scripps). Have you had any contact with the Claremont-Mudd football coaches (or for that matter with Pomona-Pitzer)? Still tough to get down to 60K at CMC, but they do have merit scholarships of that magnitude.
Of course, most of your reaches cost well over 60K/year, and most donât give merit - are you eligible for need aid?
In terms of top business schools with D3 football, have you looked at Carnegie Mellon? WUSTL could be a good D3 reach also.
There are tons of D3 schools where youâd have merit potential. Puget Sound has already been suggested as particularly strong in business. Denison, URochester, CWRU⊠there are many good options with business majors, and even more if an econ major would work. https://www.ncsasports.org/football/division-3-colleges Many schools have ED2, if you connect with a coach but donât have time to apply ED1.
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I am not a football expert or an athletic recruiting one, so take all of this with a bucket of salt and consult with people who actually are experts. It does appear as though you need some suggestions of some schools from which you might build your lists. Thus, I have two different lists for you.
The first list is a series of schools (D1 & D3) that have fairly low admit rates but do have a varsity football team, but are not extraordinarily known for their sports teams (like Notre Dame). All of these schools also offer merit aid, though at some itâs extremely difficult to get it So, even if your family doesnât qualify for need-based aid, these schools could still meet the budgeted price.
To prevent too much visual clutter, I will post the second list in a separate post.
D1
- Bucknell (PA ): About 3700 undergrads
- Colgate (NY): About 3100 undergrads
- College of the Holy Cross (MA): About 3100 undergrads
- Davidson (NC): About 1900 undergrads
- Lafayette (PA ): About 2700 undergrads
- Lehigh (PA ): About 5600 undergrads
- Northwestern (IL): About 9k undergrads; their athletics department has been having some significant issues. As theyâre in the Big 10, this may be too far, but getting an academically strong quarterback while theyâre in turmoil could be a reasonable option. Speaking, of course, as a total layperson.
- Rice (TX): About 4500 undergrads
- U. of Richmond (VA): About 3100 undergrads
- Villanova (PA ): About 7k undergrads
- Wake Forest (NC): About 5400 undergrads, though I think they may have actually done decently well in football last year, so may be more competitive than I at first thought.
- William & Mary (VA): About 6800 undergrads
D3
- Carnegie Mellon (PA ): About 7100 undergradsâŠonly if you qualify for need-based aid
- Case Western (OH): About 6k undergrads
- Denison (OH): About 2300 undergrads
- Johns Hopkins (MD): About 6k undergrads
- Kenyon (OH): About 1900 undergrads
- Macalester (MN): About 2300 undergrads
- Trinity (TX): About 2500 undergrads
This second list is a series of schools (D1, D2, and D3) that would be likely or extremely likely admits and have records of producing solid students. They all have a varsity football team, but are not extraordinarily known for their sports teams (like U. of Alabama). All of these schools also offer merit aid sufficient merit aid that they should fall within budget. Also, all my caveats at not being an expert apply here, too.
Hereâs the second list:
D1
- Bryant (RI): About 3200 undergrads, very much focuses on business majors
- Butler (IN): About 4400 undergrads
- Christopher Newport (VA): About 4400 undergrads
- Drake (IA): About 2800 undergrads
- Elon (NC): About 6300 undergrads
- Fordham (NY): About 10k undergrads
- Furman (SC): About 2300 undergrads
- U. of Tulsa (OK): About 2600 undergradsâŠaccording to the school president, about 25% of the entering class were National Merit Finalists.
- Wofford (SC): About 1800 undergrads
D2
- Truman State (MO): About 3600 undergrads
D3
- Augustana (IL): About 2300 undergrads
- DePauw (IN): About 1800 undergrads
- Hendrix (AR): About 1100 undergrads
- John Carroll (OH): About 2400 undergrads
- Kalamazoo (MI): About 1200 undergrads
- Lake Forest (IL): About 1700 undergrads
- Luther (IA): About 1600 undergrads
- Muhlenberg (PA ): About 1900 undergrads
- Pacific Lutheran (WA): About 2300 undergrads
- Rhodes (TN): About 2k undergrads
- St. Olaf (MN): About 3k undergrads
- The College of New Jersey: About 7k undergrads
- The College of Wooster (OH): About 2k undergrads
- The University of the South (TN): About 1600 undergrads
- U. of Puget Sound (WA): About 1700 undergrads
Lastly, make sure you only select a school if youâd be happy at the school not playing your sport. You never know when an injury, your interests, or something else will come to bring an end to your varsity career.
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Just curious,
Why are you scrapping 50-60% of his reaches for more match/likely type schools?
I mentioned it in messages up top but it seems like OP is full pay but has a $60k budget.
So no reason to apply to schools where his cost will be over $60k. But I provided subs.
Like IU instead of Michigan etc. Furman instead of Wake. Denver, Miami (both actually - Florida and Ohio) instead of NU etc.
Iâm simply saying you need to build based on cost vs desire.
Thx.
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Thanks for the advice!
I am curious would the grades from prep school included in GPA and how would colleges view prep school students vs. regular HS graduates.
âPrepâ school is a college preparatory school, but now commonly refers to boarding schools. A number of boarding schools have post-grad programs for students that have graduated high school but want an additional year of high school for various reasons (athletics, test prep, academics). With your grades, classes, ECs and test scores, you are a good match for the top prep schools , but youâd have to really talk to coaches to see if youâd get playing time at QB. Most of these coaches/schools are good at marketing their athletes. I know there were a bunch of college coaches that did a tour of the boarding schools last season for scouting.
Pros: another year to be seen, good marketing, can really beef up your application with even more advanced classes, good transition to college (although you donât seem to need that).
Cons: More expensive than college, while boarding school feels like a lot of freedom to 14/15/16 year olds, at 19 you will now be dealing with a curfew, study halls, etc., not conductive to a part-time job or additional ECs outside of those offered at the school.
Additional considerations: Unless you were planning a gap year, you will be doing a concurrent application process of both boarding schools and college. The only upside of that is that it gives you an option if you donât like your college options after acceptances come out.
Chesire Academy has a good football program (our neighbor committed to Duke from there). Here is their PG (post-grad) info. Postgraduate (PG) Program - Cheshire Academy
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How was your first game ?
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We had the first three games (2W and 1L) : 586Yds and 70% completion rate.
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Great. Time for game film ?
Good luck.
sending them to the coaches! Thank you!!!
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Have you also pinned a two min max highlight clip on your Twitter feed?
When sending coach emails (send to head coach, position coach, and recruiting coordinator) make the subject line interestingâŠ2024 QB, height/40 yd dash time/bench #/completion rate(use whatever stats are your strengths), 3.98 GPA/35 ACT
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As mentioned above, you might look at University of Rochester. Solid academic school with music (noticed your EC included jazz etc) and a D3 team that probably could use some talent. They do offer merit, but unsure if it will get all the way down to $60K, but a bunch of your list donât offer merit at all so youâd be full pay if you donât qualify for need.
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