D is total newbie at recruiting, her father was recruited for football but that was a long time ago and to a power 5 conference.
My D is a rising Junior and has the stats in academics and the erg. As a result she exchanged emails with several of the Ivy Rowing coaches. ( Including her first choice). What is best practice for an unofficial visit?
Is this appropriate to initiate the topic during a phone call? “ Coach, I would love an opportunity to visit campus and see the team if possible we are considering these dates. Will you or a member of the staff be available to show me the boat house and see the team?
What if she has had no email from a coach after she has submitted the profile and athletic resume and still has interest in the school?
Her father says for an unofficial. Essentially, Walk up to the coach to hand her off and say nice to meet you you have an amazing team and university and would support our daughters decision to come here in every way. Then say see you later. He remembers parents thinking it was their visit and it made everyone uncomfortable. The kid in question committed to a lesser program despite playing in the nfl for 6 years. Crazy…
On my daughter’s unofficial visits, the coaches usually had her (and me) go on a regular tour and then the coaches met with us at the end of the regular tour, sometimes just sitting at a conference table but more often touring the facilities and learning more about the team.
On one overnight visit, the coach didn’t want anything to do with me and guess what? Daughter didn’t go to that school because I didn’t know anything about it. I’d accompanied her to the college and stayed in a hotel, but I went on the general tour only because daughter called me and invited me to it. At another OV, daughter actually stayed with me in the hotel and parents were included on the school tour, in a talk the coach had (there were 5 girls there for the weekend), and given a lot of information about the school in general. On the Saturday night the girls all went off to an activity together but each family had a meeting with the coach the next day to discuss thing.
I let my daughter handle anything athletic related but I did the money (she asked me to).
I think it is very appropriate to ask the coach for a meeting. She could say she’s planning a trip to the area for the 1st week of Aug and wondered if he’d be on campus and if they could meet.
I think phone call probably is good. We did it with an email, but that was for S19 and the coaches couldn't call him back until Sept 1 under the rules at that time. So conversation was a bit not awkward for us, we had to get a coach as a middle man.
Two things here. First, if your haven't had contact back, send another email to the head coach (either an update or to ask for an unofficial visit) but cc all the assistant's. I think a couple of emails S sent fell through the cracks because they never made it to the coach in charge of recruiting. More than one program who replied did so through an assistant, who was the contact person for S, at least initially until he made his way to the top part of coaches list and the head got more involved. Also some programs take longer than others to get going. S had a coach call him to say he was a top recruit in March after ignoring all emails S sent for the past 12 months.
Second and related, some programs just won’t be interested for whatever reason. S would have started for one Ivy equivalent program as a senior in HS, but they never would reply to him, including an email saying we were going to be in their town from across the country and we wanted to meet them. He ended up at an Ivy with a much stronger program. I have many other examples, sometimes for whatever reason things just don’tn line up with a particular school.
I think for UV you want to be there. And then as a parent you have to pretend to a good little boy from 100 years ago and only speak when spoken to. Which is harder than it sounds. You also need to prep your child that they are going to have to do the majority of the speaking. Most coaches want to at least meet you to make sure you are ok with Ivy League no scholarship, that your are supportive, and that you know your place and won't be a pain for then to deal with. All of them who I didn't meet personally asked S for my phone#, and I think those 3 points were the main reason they wanted to call me. The coaches I met in person at UV's never called me, and I never initiated contact with them either.
Perhaps the one coach that never recruited your S understood there was no way to recruit your S to their school? Your guidance around the mechanics and especially preparing your child to be most of the speaking is key.