<p>If you have been paying attention to the threads about athletic recruiting by top colleges, you would understand the frustration.</p>
<p>The uninformed constantly make blanket statements about the undeserving-dumb-recruited-athletes who have an “automatic in” at all the top schools, and how unfair it is because they do not even need to apply and the coaches are lining up and can get them in just because they can throw a ball. As stated so succinctly by cottonmather, these people “don’t fully understand that being recruited, getting a “commitment” from the coach, and actually getting admitted are three different things.”</p>
<p>Not correcting the misperception that it is possible for a recruited athlete to actually have the “choice” to attend Harvard, Princeton, Stanford and Duke, etc. all at the same time, just fuels that fire and resentment and angst over athletic admissions. Yes, they were recruited, yes they considered those schools, but no, they were never actually admitted to all of them, thus giving them the “choice” of which to attend. </p>
<p>This has nothing to do with pity, it has to do with accuracy.</p>
<p>“These people would lead us to believe that their child was attending a very expensive private school for the same amount of money that they would have spent on the state university.”</p>
<p>Sometimes it is true, however. D1 will be graduating from a private college this May and we will have paid about the same when all is said and done as we would have at any state school. Her financial aid package has included a Stafford Loan, just as it would have at a SUNY.</p>
<p>I’ve also been assisting some students at a nearby “at-risk” small city high school with the college admissions process the past several years. Several students I’ve worked with have been accepted with great financial packages from Top 30 LACs that cost them less than what they would have paid at a SUNY. </p>
<p>So while some people do…exaggerate the largess of the private school that accepted their child don’t for a moment think that the public college option is always the least expensive. Since SUNY is dirt cheap compared to the publics in many states I think many folks might be surprised at how competitive private colleges can actually be.</p>
<p>hudsonvalley51–I agree that most students do end up paying a similar price at a private school vs state schools when all is said and done. I know in my case, it was $5000/year LESS to attend a private school than the state schools, even back in the dark ages. Our experience with our friends’ children has been the same for above average to top students. For the 3.0 student, that is not usually the case unless there is a heavy financial need. Merit aid at the private schools our kids are considering, for the most part, drop the private school cost at or slightly below the state school cost, with the exception of one school so far. That would not be the case if a student did’t have at least a 3.5 and 26-28 ish on the ACT though.</p>
<p>Yes. I know. My point was that some people led us to believe that their child had been showered with such enormous scholarships that it brought the actual cost to state school level…BUT we later found out, in the cases of THOSE kids, that the packages were mostly loans, not gift money.</p>
<p>I’m aware that it does happen, it just wasn’t happening to THESE kids.</p>
<p>My H and I always marveled that the formula for our kids always came out to be about the same cost for every college when you figured in everything. One of my Ds did go to the flagship state university, though, and it saved us tens of thousands of dollars over the four years. And she actually got a great education there and is currently employed in her field.</p>
<p>When she was a senior in high school and would tell people where she was going to attend we got all kinds of reactions…averted eyes, pitiful glances. That was in 2007. By the time my second was applying in 2010, those same parents were sending their second or third kid to State U. The economy seemed to have increased the flagship’s status and credibility considerably over three years of recession. :)</p>
<p>I had a parent tell me the other day, that his child was going to top school. I asked him if he had applied ED and he did not know. I asked him if he had already got admission and he said “No, he has just applied but this person whom we know has told me that he will definitely get in, people with lesser achievements have got in”</p>
<p>This is a very competitive institution and no, the parent did not look like belonging to the family that donated the auditorium and from what he described of his son, the son was not a star athlete though appeared to have good academics. </p>
<p>Not sure if it was wishful thinking, or that the student had some strong hooks that parent did not mention, or if the father was just naive? Or the father was trying to impress me, and did not expect I would ask some questions that showed that I knew something about the subject. I suspect it was more naivety and the father was not trying to lie, but who knows.</p>
<p>Some parents I know have no ideas of their kids’ college application process, so I guess the above example is the father’s wishful thinkings. :)</p>
<p>Oh, I think most participants in this thread would agree with that. The issue a few are raising is that recruiting is far different from admission. Inasmuch as the world of athetic recruiting and admission might be a bit more fluid than advertised, one has to admit (pun intended) that a necessary component of an admission is … an application. The same might not apply to an offer of scholarship! </p>
<p>If anecdotes are relevant, I know one case of a national team player who probably had two dozens “recruiting” contacts, a number of visits, but one application and one admission. And, if anecdotes help address the dangers of relying on log-term athletic scholarships, the athlete saw her international and college career abruptly ended by a serious injury. In insight, this was a blessing in disguise!</p>
<p>^this entire argument started when someone posted that they were not “recruited” by a college because that student was not accepted by that college. The rest of us are trying to point out that in the athletic world they are essentially the same thing until a student signs a National Letter of Intent. Like I said earlier, athletic recruiting happens WELL before any student CAN apply to a school and they aren’t accepted by ANY school during that process.</p>
<p>We have a student in our state that has been given verbal offers to play basketball from every major Basketball powerhouse in the country, and for very good reason. He hasn’t applied to any college yet because his is only a SOPHOMORE. I don’t know his plans but he just might bypass college altogether and go right into the NBA, he is THAT good. He is still being recruited by those colleges (as much as he can as a sophomore).</p>
<p>Where on this thread do you see this? It was not my impression that we were arguing about this at all.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>No, they are not the same thing when you are dealing with top colleges (which is what this thread is about). That is what we are trying to tell you. On the other hand, for colleges which have very high acceptance rates, your argument is closer to the truth.</p>
<p>Was the argument not that a student cannot claim to have turned down a school’s OFFER OF ADMISSION without having being admitted in the first place? Elevating the recruiting process to a guaranteed admission is where semantics distort the debate. It becomes very similar to the stories of people turning down a school by not … applying. </p>
<p>And to be clear, being recruited is a courting process but not a marriage proposal. You can only seek a divorce after being married. Or so they say! :)</p>