<p>I’ve been helping a parent of a potential recruit through PMs, and thought I’d put her latest question out for general discussion: </p>
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Can you tell me what you think the GPA range is for getting recruited for Brown, Stanford, Columbia, Johns Hopkins, and Duke?</p>
<p>My son who had straight A's last year, has a sprinkling of B's this year, and I'm wondering what that will mean for him.
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<p>Here’s how I responded:</p>
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I think the basic approach should be that the applicant's academic profile should be in line with that of a typical admitted student. So, if a typical admit might have a 2200-2300 SAT and a 3.9 GPA, then an athlete in that range will attract the coach's attention as an admittable prospect. Sure, they'll bend the academic standards a little, but I think it's better to shoot for the general standards for the school.</p>
<p>In short, a few "B"s are probably OK, but try to keep them to a minimum.
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<p>I think my advice is perhaps a bit over-cautious, as we all know that recuits aren't held to quite the same standards as the general applicant pool.</p>
<p>My d is a recruited athlete and will attend Brown in the fall. Pay attention to the AI score. You can google information about the Ivy league Academic index score. It is key for being admitted to the Ivy’s as an athlete.</p>
<p>Well, as usual, it depends on the sport, caliber of athlete, school’s reputation, and if the athlete has another “hook”, of course. I would say that for non-helmet, unless you have a “niche” sport, nearly straight As are a must and certainly an upward trend if there are many Bs. These schools don’t want to have students who can’t succeed.</p>
<p>Just my opinion, of course. Honestly, I think the test scores are more important than the grades, unless the grades point to laziness or academic dysfunction. My S had more than a 4.0 in IB, top 5 in a class of 400ish and they focused on his test scores. Prolly because so many kids of his sort have straight As.But if you’re the BEST considerable allowances are made.</p>
<p>As for the ivy league, The sports teams in general must remain within one standard deviation of the AI for the school. This means that the AI, and correspondingly in part the grades necessary, will vary by school and will be somewhat lower than school average for athletes. In any case! With good sAT scores, a 3.6 would be good enough for most ivies, at least for the more significant non helmet sports. My guess that lower might even be acceptable at cornell.</p>
<p>Depends so much on the sport–track and field and xc generally have top 3.9 and over GPAs, yet one or two top nationally ranked members may have a bit lower.</p>
<p>Thanks for the replies so far. My PM friend has asked a followup question:
I think that ultimately they look at the entire transcript, to see grades, course selection, and overall rigor, and when Ivy schools do the AI calculation they use unweighted GPA.</p>
<p>In GENERAL I think you’re spot on, and that applies to just about every University. However, there is a curve ball coming. Some colleges within the University can be different and much more difficult. For example, engineering or pre-med may have a 7-8% acceptance rate versus the entire university which may be 15%. These are elite schools and that is still a low acceptance rate, but one has to know what one is getting into in these cases.</p>
<p>The AI, class rigor, and life balance were clearly stated as the primary factors for admission to my son’s Ivy. Each Ivy or elite school is different, so I think someone has to clearly understand what it is they are looking for before filling in an application or writing that killer essay. The GPA is somewhat important, but I think it is awfully hard to compare GPAs across a country…this is why they have standardized tests. Let’s face it a bad GPA can knock you out. At best a GPA will keep you in the running.</p>
<p>I think OldBatesieDoc is the closest … I’d suggest searching for recruiting bands, or IVY leageu recruiting, or NESCAC recruiting. The IVYies and NESCAC use bands for athletic recruiting … where a band, in very rough terms, is equivalent of a standard deviation …most recruits need to be within one band of the average admt from the overall pool or better (BTW - this is true for about 67% of the overall frosh so this basically means be a pretty typical admit) … some can be within 2 bands … and then a very few can be 3 bands away. So a few (a handful or two) per year get fairly big breaks … while most are in hunt with the normal admit. So who gets the big breaks … the schools and sports can decide for themselves … given a limited number of these slots they tend to go to the very top recruits in the highest profile sports (star RB or QB maybe) while they typically will not be used for the back-up goalie on the field hockey team.</p>
<p>Bottom line this answer could be very specific for a particular student-athlete at particular schools … so direct conversations with coaches is the best/only way to know IMO.</p>
<p>I think that the basic need for a strong GPA and test scores is just a given at this level of elite colleges. I know that test scores in particular, can make a significant difference in catching the eye of a coach. However, I agree with 3togo above: It really does come down to the individual athlete, the particular sport, how much that means to the particular school, and the role of the coach. How much does the coach want you? How much play do they have with their admissions rep? How quickly can they produce that LL? The more they want you, the better of an athlete you are, the more room there is for discrepancies - such as having a few Bs, not having 11 APs, not having outstanding test scores, etc.
I believe that once the basic academic criteria is met, it is all up to the individual coach, school, and admissions liason - and that is something that is a mixture of chemistry, the need for you on their team, the relationship that has been built, etc. - intangibles that are not necessarily in the athlete’s control, and elements that can change as the wind blows, so to speak.</p>
<p>Looks like our collective wisdom has it covered.-I have to say that for Midd, a C+ in AP physics was enough for one student-athlete to be told that ED wasn’t going to work out, and he’s better get a B and apply ED2-all other grades As according to the poster, and there also have been threats from Midd of rescinding an ED admit for an athlete over a 79 in Calc BC that was an 81 when the athlete was accepted. No other grades went down.</p>
<p>Again, I’d be willing to commit that these are not helmet sport athletes, and above average types, not nationally ranked.</p>
<p>Coaches, as we all know, may or may not be truthful. Insist on a “walk-thru” or “pre-read” before committing, especially at D3 no LL schools. You never know when that left-handed pitcher being recruited by Princeton decides he’d rather go to Amherst, and gets your “slot”.</p>
<p>A “B” on your record is a way another athlete may look better to the coach and the admissions committee when so many intangibles are being compared, with so few slots for so many-44 for the entire Amherst athletic department per one coach…</p>
<p>I’d also like to add that it depends on the high school you’re coming from. If it is known as a ‘tough’ school and the applicant has excellent SAT/ACT and AP scores, the GPA can be quite a bit lower than some of the numbers that have been mentioned here.</p>
<p>i always thought the “weighted” gpa thing was only a California UC system thing. Do other schools do it? I don’t think the ivy’s and the privates that I know (stanford, duke, etc) weight.</p>
<p>All competitive schools look at a “weighted” GPA. Whether they reweight according to their own scale depends on the school. Even if they just look at unweighted GPA, they are looking at course rigor, so one kid’s uw 3.75 will be different from another kid’s 3.75</p>
<p>the university that my daughter ultimately signed with required her to take 3 AP’s her senior year…so that was their version of weighting! And get A’s in those AP’s as well. they dictated that part of her senior curriculum when she was a junior in the recruiting pipeline.</p>
<p>never a discussion of weighted or unweighted, but what’s the dif if dictating classes.</p>
<p>My kids’ school didn’t allow them to take more than two AP classes/semester, nor did their school weight. As someone said above, at the elite college level, it’s assumed that you are taking challenging classes. If the OP is in an IB program, I would think that classes are rigorous, especially since there will be a track record of how well the students enrolled in the IB program are doing on the IB exams.</p>
<p>I don’t mean to sound harsh, merely realistic, but being recruited and receiving a Likely Letter are not the same thing. Very few athletes with stats like these make it on the rosters, unless they are exceptional athletes, ie. Olympic level. Best of luck to your sister!</p>