<p>Hi All,</p>
<p>I am wondering if the ivies still occasionally recruit athletes as index boosters. I know steps were taken to try to prevent it...just wondering if it still happens. Thanks!</p>
<p>So you’re asking if an Ivy coach may occasionally recruit a high AI athlete to offset a lower index recruit and keep the team AI at the required level? umm…yes, I suspect that does happen on occasion.</p>
<p>I guess my question is would they recruit someone they wouldn’t otherwise recruit solely because of a high AI i.e. a good but not outstanding athlete.</p>
<p>Don’t directly know the answer but no Ivy sport has likely letter slots that can be thrown away on athletes who will not contribute in a meaningful way to an Ivy league championship.</p>
<p>It’s hard enough to successfully project collegiate athletic success when evaluating HS talent, but to recruit an athlete who is “good but not outstanding athlete” is selling out the team. On my son’s team, every single player was an outstanding HS athlete - all-league, all-city, all-state, etc., and MOST of them are not as good as a player from the ACC, SEC, PAC 12, etc.</p>
<p>And, in some Ivy schools (Brown and Yale), the number of slots “reserved” for athletes has declined in recent years - making a coaches job to win even tougher.</p>
<p>A recruited athlete in the Ivy league is a very special breed - a rare specimen. Athletics is not a back door path into the school.</p>
<p>The cases of boosters I’ve read about didn’t involve actually recruiting the high AI student; it was more an issue of combing through the list of accepted students to try to find some phantom athletes.</p>
<p>20 years ago coaches would comb through admissions lists to put kids on their roster with the sole intent of raising the team index. Then the league decided to curtail that by imposing limits on the number pf kids that can be listed as recruits Still, allegations come up from time to time when an Ivy team has had some success that they may have taken a low AI guy and balanced him with a high AI bench player. But, it’s allowed and if a coach wants to take a risk by burning a slot, he can. But I wouldn’t count on it as an admission strategy.</p>
<p>You know, for years I had heard some kind of joke about a guy I knew in college, a hockey player who lived in my dorm, about how the coach got “in trouble for bringing him in” and it somehow involved this other hockey player who mysteriously came in on varsity but was cut to JV within a month. The joke was about how the first player barely broke 1000 on his SATs, and involved the other kid being some kind of genius, and the trouble started when the “smart kid” demoted to JV complained. It was an Ivy about twenty years ago, and this all makes sense to me now.</p>
<p>Simple answer: yes it definitely happens. who knows how (in)frequently but yes. I know of one for sure.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>At the end of the day, the coach wants competition at each position. More competition gives the Coach choices and leverage. He/she wants the best athlete that Admissions will approve. I do suspect there is some negotiation or horse trading that goes on between a Coach and the Adcomms, but I don’t think they are consciously selecting “index boosters”. I think the coach has ratings and needs, and the Adcomms have ratings, and they work to a compromise.</p>
<p>That would be very difficult to prove, and I suspect it could vary significantly by sport within the same school. Adcomm/ADs/ Coaches have many options when they look at the AI and the number of roster spots available. For example, they could pull back the number of roster spots on a particular team to satisfy an AI number that must be met. </p>
<p>I agree with stemit that these athletes are pretty darn special.</p>
<p>I’m bumping this in response to a PM.</p>
<p>The system of using academic index bands indicates that recruiting of index boosters occurs, i. e. a higher band athlete is recruited to compensate for a lower band athlete. By setting limits on the number of athletes that can be placed in each band this process is regulated and therefore limits abuse.</p>
<p>It’s the same rationale as recruiting “a few big guys” “a few skilled guys” “a few fast guys” “a few guys who can score” “a few guys who can defend” (using a soccer analogy).</p>
<p>Point being, if you can get a kid who has the highest tier AI, AND can contribute, you’re golden. But if you are short on guys who can score, and the kids you are looking at are in the lower tiers, you do need to look at whether you have to give up someone in another position with a lower AI for someone ranked lower on your list with a higher AI. The kid who is big, skilled, and can score is going to be a top recruit, even if he is in the lowest allowed AI, and a kid with a great AI and skilled but weak in other areas would get a look before a kid with an eh AI and skilled but weak in other areas.</p>
<p>Of course, everyone wants a superstar with great academics.</p>
<p>Was recently told of a hs junior athlete who was committed at one Ivy. After some period of time, the coach indicated that the athlete needed to take the SATs again to get a higher score, to help with the team average in light of another athlete who had just been added to the first recruit class.</p>