Interview: Levin

Athletic Recruits
21

<p>^ Nothing to be sorry about. It only takes that one school to make a person happy, and by some stroke of luck I found that school and then some :). Back in July though, when the circumstances were certainly more tenuous, it wasn’t a pleasant situation.</p>

<p>I did in fact get my academic stats out quite early and at multiple times (right after getting my SAT scores back, getting my junior year transcript back, etc). I do believe it was a case of “being on the radar athletically,” as I was seen by the recruiting coordinator a couple of times in early July but never the HC until their camp in late July (another lesson learned - the man in charge makes the final decision), and by then those slots were already used up. Funnily enough, despite the coach expressing his inability to offer a slot given his commitments, he still offered me an OV (which I was scarcely in a position to accept).</p>

22

<p>monstor do you think he was hoping you would be admitted on the strength of your academics and walk on? Were you offered “support in admissions?” I know you don’t have any wish to change the outcome of all this (congratulations on making a great match) but I do think for future athletes and families who seek information, your story is instructive.</p>

23

<p>"This policy IS a ploy though in the sense that I hardly feel it raises academic standards of athletes so much as it poses to raise them (while doing a disservice to athletics programs altogether). It’s there to appease the political tensions IMO, whether it really accomplishes its goals or not. "</p>

<p>^ What you say makes sense. So by reducing the number of slots for varsity athletes, who does the school make more room for? A contortionist, a champion dart thrower, a didgerido player, a drag queen, a menstrual blood artist, who? It would seem to me that with the more than 4000 undergraduates who aren’t athletes, and even among the almost 1000 non-athletes per individual class, there is already sufficient room to include a wide and interesting variety of musicians, actors, dancers, artists, writers, editors, poets, debaters, politicians, community servants, and so on.</p>

24

<p>Is there anyone on this board who doesn’t think Ivy recruiting is select enough? The pool of candidates these schools pull from is a PUDDLE compared to almost all other D1/D2/D3 schools. I know college D1 & D3 baseball recruiting pretty well. Their are 8 Ivys, 35 roster players per team. Each team recruits on avg 8-9 players a year. Half of those 8-9players will be pitchers (my son is a pitcher as well as monster and stemit jr). So that is 4.5 pitchers x 8 teams or roughly 36 Ivy pitchers per year. I personally know 10 pitchers out of that theoritical 36 (for 2014 class) just from message boards, networking, showcases, and my sons college team. It is a very small & talented group. These Ivy baseball recruiters see many, many, many thousands of baseball players every year at combines, showacases, tournaments, word of mouth, etc… When you look at the academic stats of monster, stemit jr and fenwaysouth jr (on that other CC thread) you have three “kids” who were highly recruited D1 baseball talent as well. My guess is all could have gone to state schools or private schools with significant athletic and academic scholarships. My point is why would Yale want to make recruiting even more difficult (beyond state school, private college, and other Ivys) to casually recruit someone, and show the least amount of interest in hopes of landing that recruit just because it is Yale. That recruit most likely is being recruited by at least two other Ivys because of the small talent pool. I would tell them to go pound rocks.</p>

<p>Yale has decided (through this policy) to make that puddle even smaller. They’re focusing their time and resouces on other more important things (in their minds) even though they will continue to marginally fund recruiting & athletic teams. My point is why bother if you aren’t going to do this to compete at the same level of the schools in your conference? Levin is trying to make a point, and he is trying to appease the political forces as monster points out. For the life of me, I don’t get it why an organizaton such as Yale would just “roll over” like this and make a point to be not competitive in their recruiting and eventually their athletic programs. That is doing an incredible disservice to the people who want to be (or are) student athletes. As I stated earlier, there are other college choices for student athletes. Recruiting is an imperfect process. I applaud Yale’s idealism on this topic but their implementation gets an “F” from my perspective.</p>

25

<p>The implied assumption is also that the Ivy-recruitable varsity athlete is one-dimensional, and to accept him/her means you’re rejecting every other non-athletic quality that would contribute to the richness of the Yale class. While clearly these kids spend tons of time developing their skill in their sport, they do have other talents. For example, my athlete D had her artwork displayed in a congressional exhibit, was a soloist in the high school band, and was president of an organization. At her current school, one of her team members is a world class athlete in second sport other than the one for which she was recruited, another girl is an exceptional violinist, a third a horn player who joined the college band in addition to her NCAA sport.</p>

26

<p>Here is my reaction to this story…(and in the interest of full disclosure, my child received a LL from Yale and I have another child who has already graduated from Yale, only participated in club or residential college athletic activities)</p>

<p>Using round numbers, Levin is saying out of 1200 students in a class, only 187 are recruited athletes, down from 204 prior to his tenure. He is satisfied with the athletic results based on this number of students and the actual performance of the numerous teams. When it comes to anyone’s child, one slot is all we need, so a decrease of 17 slots can be a factor, depending on allocation per team, per gender. What makes this more of an issue is when you compare 13% against 17 or 18% when larger Ivy’s are recruiting. Cornell and Penn have a significantly larger student body and so they have a significant athletic advantage when it comes to recruiting. Harvard, Brown and Columbia all have slightly larger student bodies, so they have a slight advantage. Princeton, Dartmouth and Yale have similiar numbers of students, so Princeton and Dartmouth have more recruited athletes. Allocation of slots may vary by year, may vary by team needs, may vary by team budget $$$. My own athletes thinks the teams would be more competitive if athletics were more of a priority. </p>

<p>As a parent, however, I remain impressed with Levin’s priorities and allocation of resources. I love their library system. I am not disappointed with the athletic facilities (well maybe a few bathrooms during big events!!) All of the colleges have undergone extensive renovations which were needed. I really respect what Levin has done for and with the city of New Haven. I really respect what Levin has done in broadening Yale’s international presence, especially with China. It is definitely more likely that a Yale student will consider and partake in a semester abroad now, vs four years ago. Finally, Levin has allocated significant resources to further expanding the scientific reach of the Yale community. The purchase of the Bayer campus is a long term investment in science and research that will have meaningful impact. At the end of the day, there is only so much money to go 'round. I have faith and confidence in his vision and his choices. Both of my kids have liked the broad range of kids they have shared Yale with.</p>

27

<p>I agree with maineparent 100% except for one thing.</p>

<p>Yales allocation of resources would hardly be affected by returning the number of recruits to its former number. The only big expense is the recruiting weekends, and considering the costs of the ~190 kids already coming, allowing ~20 some odd more does not cost so much that the other services of Yale would suffer</p>

28

<p>

This might be a little tough to explain, but I will give it my best shot; I’ll gladly lend any insight I’ve gathered to others. I don’t ultimately know why the HC didn’t hold out to see me first before offering slots to other kids (who took them before I ended up pitching in front of him). I know that they were aware of my academics and my athletics; I received weekly calls from the RC, who had seen me 2-3 times before the HC saw me at their camp in July. Perhaps he did not wait because he had decided, based on the RC’s description of me as a pitcher, that he would prefer his other options (and didn’t want to wait to confirm that suspicion; remember, with 6 slots every recruit becomes that much more crucial and he didn’t want to lose any. Ultimately, though I don’t think he would realize it, he made the right choice because I would not have committed). Frankly, though I did do very well at their camp, my fastball only sat 1 mph higher than it did at other camps/showcases and my location was what it mostly had been; I just can’t see how that one performance at their camp turned me into “back-up guy” to “the guy” (it was pretty clear, based on our face-to-face interaction, that I became that). </p>

<p>I do have some suspicion that maybe he bypassed me on the hope that, if I truly wanted to go to Yale anyways, that I would apply and get in on my own academic muster (and he explicitly admitted at the camp that this would involve no support from him in admissions, but also he felt that I would get in on just academics; maybe he didn’t take into account that this merely would not suffice for me with any school, or maybe it was just a calculated risk). From talking to coaches all summer, I don’t think most of them see college admissions the same way we do, and for that I do greatly appreciate my experience on CC. Perhaps in a world away from CC I would have had a misguided confidence that my academics would have gotten me in to most any school.</p>

29

<p>monstor, this is an excellent post. </p>

<p>“From talking to coaches all summer, I don’t think most of them see college admissions the same way we do”</p>

<p>I think this is the crux of the problem, and not just for Yale coaches and recruits.</p>

<p>Coaches want recruits like you (academically highly qualified but not on the LL list) to take the chance of being admitted with their support but no real commitment. I don’t think they see how risky this feels to the athlete and family. If the athlete can secure a LL from a different Ivy they’d also love to attend, waiting for the first Ivy and refusing the second LL would take an unbelievable level of courage and tolerance for gutting out this imperfect process.</p>

<p>Thanks for taking the time to post this. Your honest assessment is invaluable.</p>

30

<p>Monstor,</p>

<p>I’m pretending that I’m in your shoes, and this situation presents itself. I’m also going to pretend that Y is my #1, and I have many Ivy, D1, & D3 choices. There is no way on God’s green earth that I’m going to take on that risk even if they are my #1. I have way too many choices with so much less risk. There is just no way I can do that knowing what know about college baseball recruiting. If Y can’t see their way to wrap up a recruit with a 238 AI (using their new policy) that doesn’t really look too good for the rest of the world! Are they looking for recruits that walk on water too! All I have to say about that is…WOW!</p>

31

<p>Well, I think it depends on the sport. I know at least two athletes that didn’t make it through the pre-read at other schools who now attend Yale.</p>

32

<p>Now, That would be surprising…</p>

33

<p>Hi Everyone, I have been following this forum recently. My DS is a jr and I was wondering if there was some way to find out what the AI for the different ivies were this year. I realize that it varies year to year. Fenway South, hope you were joking about Y’s AI being 238!</p>

34

<p>^ fenwaysouth was referring to my personal example, expressing how Yale’s slot policy, intended to wrap up top academic student-athletes, ironically indirectly precluded the slotting of a kid with a 238 AI (me).</p>

35

<p>To fogfog:
maybe surprising but true unless the athletes lied, and I don’t see why they would. They sent in their transcripts for a pre-read and were not invited for an OV because admission told the coaches to stop the recruiting process. Happened for class of 2014.</p>

36

<p>The AI and its use by the Ivies in athlete admission is a mystery because few to none of the policies are written. The link below goes to a prior discussion on this board detailing an understanding of the use of the AI by a number of seasoned parents that share their and their children’s experience.</p>

<p>I got this list from a former coach at an Ivy that I can’t name. I won’t swear as to it’s accuracy, but it rings true.</p>

<p>Harvard 220+
Yale 220
Princeton 220
Dartmouth 212
Columbia Lower
Penn in
Brown order
Cornell </p>

<p>Note that football aside (it is dealt with separately in a banding system), all recruited athletes in all sports have to have an average AI as a group that is no less than one standard deviation lower than the average AI for their class in their school as a whole. So, if Penn’s entering class has an AI of 205, one standard deviation lower might be in the 195-200 range - this has to be the average of all recruited athletes. Within that pool, however, Penn can use some sports as “boosters”, requiring higher average AIs for certain teams in sports they don’t prioritize (squash, fencing, tennis - sports where the athletes also tend to have higher individual AIs) so that they can give teams that they do prioritize (Penn’s beloved men’s basketball program) lower average AI goals. And, within each team, the coach can recruit individual “boosters” with AI’s higher than the team AI goal so that he can recruit superior athletes with low AIs. This is how the occasional state champion or athletic superstar enters an Ivy with a 171 AI.</p>

<p>The coach you are speaking with may or may not be willing to share, but a key question is what his team’s average AI goal is for this class.</p>

<p>Hope this helps.</p>

<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/athletic-recruits/918333-ai-gpa.html?highlight=bballdad[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/athletic-recruits/918333-ai-gpa.html?highlight=bballdad&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

37

<p>^ Isn’t there also a caveat that prevents very low AIs from being recruited–that they have a “floor”</p>

38

<p>Monstor344, your AI is amazing and congrats on your LL. You surely deserve it.</p>

<p>Bballdad, thank you. That is the information I was looking for. The link to the weighted and unweighted gpa (bump up .3 for schools which report unweighted gpa was welcome news) cleared up another question that I had.</p>

39

<p>fogfog
My understanding the Ivy floor is 171. Individual schools may have their own, self imposed floors (note recent comments in other threads about Yale), although with the right recruited athlete, rules are made to be broken.</p>

40

<p>I’m a bit late to this thread, but I’d like to weigh in on Yale’s approach as outlined in the Levin interview.</p>

<p>I am a big fan of Yale, and I respect them for this policy. To me, it protects their academic integrity, but not without unintended consequences.</p>

<p>Monstor provides a great example; surely Yale would love another badass hurler with a through the roof AI, but they’d reached their recruiting quota. Monstor chose Princeton instead. Princeton wins, Monstor wins, Yale doesn’t lose, because they didn’t have a real shot at snagging Monstor. But…had Monstor changed his mind post Princeton LL and wanted to go to Yale instead, then both Yale and Monstor lose since Yale coach has spent his limited support tokens.</p>

<p>Now that I read this, I realize that my S probably ran into this Yale policy two years ago without knowing what was going on; his junior year we took an unofficial tour of all the elite northeast schools that offer fencing: HYP, Brown, Columbia, Penn. Monstor like stat laden resume in hand (1 of 300 rank, 35 ACT, 780, 790, 800 SATIIs, impressive national fencing rank) he was an instant hit with the coaches. It was immediately clear he could write his own ticket, except at Yale, where the coach showed no enthusiasm and was basically non-communicative. Final choice came down to P clear #1, Y and S tied for a distant #2, H #4.</p>

<p>In the final pre-commitment days in the summer before senior year he briefly debated the possibility of Y or S over P, but in truth never really gave Y the consideration it probably deserved, in part because he knew he’d have to take a more pro-active approach with the seemingly disinterested Y coach. Y coach had never followed up at all; only contact was an email from an athletic department low level functionary, saying something like “those are very impressive stats”.</p>

<p>In retrospect, this is all consistent with the Levine interview; with limited slots, the coach had little motivation to pursue a random high level applicant. What we thought at the time was casual indifference was probably more a reflection of an institutional limitation on recruiting that the coach had internalized into his approach with all prospects.</p>

<p>In the end I’m happy. S is where he chose to go and is happy there. If he would have wanted Y, he probably would have made it happen. I didn’t lose any respect for Yale in the process; if S had ended up there, I would have been equally happy with the decision. </p>

<p>I respect the policy, but I think they’d be better served by giving the coaches a greater number of slots while holding the applicants to a ultra-high threshold.</p>

<p>[/rant]</p>