<p>I would be very surprised if a coach at CalTech can give a likely letter without the application being looked at by the admissions committee. I have not heard of likely letters to begin with.</p>
<p>The very fact that he has asked you to visit soon after the EA deadline is very indicative. He wants to check you out and put in a good word before the committee starts looking seriously at the candidates. Please remember there are students who review applications and also faculty members. Coaches cannot short circuit the process.If a student is admitted purely for academic abilities, I am sure there will be an uproar.</p>
<p>If your stats are not in line with what CalTech expects, you will not make it. Remember, it does not matter what your major is, you have to take 5 very tough classes in math, physics, plus two in chemistry and one in biology. You are going to be with some of the academically best performing students in the world. If you are not going to be able handle the workload, then it serves no purpose in getting admitted. Go ahead apply, EA and do the visit but be realistic on your chances. You know the CalTech criteria, you should by now have a good idea if you are in the ball park or not.</p>
<p>I meant “if a student is admitted purely for *athletic *abilities, I am sure there will be an uproar.” not academic abilities. Academic abilities in science and math is is in fact a key criteria.</p>
<p>Ok. I think that I stand a chance of getting in normally without this, and i was already going to apply. I was just sorta worried that I would not get in and was wondering how much this would help.</p>
<p>As I have said, it will not get you to the starting gate, but if you get their on your own (as you have said you could), it could give the final push that gets you into the selected list. Visiting and meeting with the coach will not hurt.</p>
<p>My son was recruited by the coach for his niche sport. His test scores/GPA/courses were competitive for Caltech. The things I know happened include:</p>
<ol>
<li>Coach told admissions that he definitely wanted my son </li>
<li>When son was deferred from EA to RD, Coach went to admissions and had a word with them.</li>
<li>Admissions sent the coach an update on his ‘list’ and what they thought was lacking from son’s application (in his case, demonstration of math/science interest as in contests, related ECs which we mostly don’t have in our town) </li>
<li>Son was rejected RD. Coach did not know until we let him know.</li>
</ol>
<p>So sorry, no go on the admission help front. BTW, Caltech most definitely does not do Likely Letters. That is purely an Ivy League thing.</p>
<p>gongmiester…what mazewanderer said was really right. The problem is not getting admitted to Caltech, but how to survive it. In other words, even if you get admitted, don’t go there unless you are absolutely sure whether you can handle the rigorous courseload. May be you are qualified, but good luck to anyone who tries to go there on athletic accomplishments. If one is a very good athlete, then he/she really should not try to go to Caltech, as the school does not excel in that department. Try something “ivy” if you really like athletics. On the other hand, if you really like epsilon-delta proofs in calculus, like abstract type of mathematics, like physics/chemistry a lot, then Caltech might be the place for you.</p>
<p>My son is a math (qualified AIME a few times, math league, and some other math awards) and science (top three awards on state science olympiad ) boy and computer company internship in summers, he is a rising senior, his does sport too, not very fast, but I checked caltech roster’s time, he will be in the top three on the team if he is accepted.
his ACT is 35, but he does have a few B’s, do you guys think he have a shot or not, should we contact the coach?</p>
<p>These other posts are from 4 years ago. Seems that the recruiting really would only help to show that student is really interested. The school cobbles together sports teams based on who gets in. True student-athletes compared to most universities.</p>
<p>You never know what will get you in to such a small class. S1 is NMS and has only had 2 B’s ever in HS and he did not get in. </p>
To the undergraduate athletes at Caltech: how do you juggle practice/competitions with psets? is it really possible at Caltech to be a good student and also to put in enough time for competitive athletics?
Regarding being a competitive athlete - I think it depends a lot on what you define as being successful in both. My experiences and my friends experiences in Caltech athletics was that it was very difficult to really crush both (both it also depends on your skill level in academics/athletics too). Generally what I’ve found is that players in individual sports (track, swimming, cross country, etc) generally do a better job of being able to hit PRs while excelling academically. I’m not sure if its causal or not but it could make sense too in that there’s really only so much conditioning, stretching, and so on that you can accomplish in a day without injuring yourself whereas if you’re playing baseball or basketball, you can always be working more on the skill side. I have friends that probably put in 7 hours a day to team sports in season which could easily be half the school year and their grades definitely reflected those contributions. Basically, the main thing to recognize is that unlike high school for a techer, very few techers can be perfect at both sports and academics here.