<p>So it's this time of the year again when recruited athletes are hearing back from colleges and knowing where they will be heading to next fall. Just out of curiosity, I checked on a local private catholic school's website because I happened to know an acquaintance's son graduated from the school and is attending an Ivy League college as a recruited athlete. It turns out that among the 260+ graduates of this year, 20% were NCAA recruited athletes including about 10 to Ivy+ and another 5 to other top 20 universities. Is this "common" in either public or private schools? Since not many schools are publishing college acceptance/matriculation data for their recruited athletes (not that I'm aware of anyway), it's not clear to me just how many athletes are recruited in either elite colleges or state universities. Any experience, data or thoughts?</p>
<p><a href=“http://academic-senate.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/committees/aepe/athletic_policy_approved_2013.pdf[/url]”>http://academic-senate.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/committees/aepe/athletic_policy_approved_2013.pdf</a> has the following:</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Harvard has over 40 varsity sports and all of them recruit their athletes to some extent. Since not all recruited athletes compete for four years (injury, loss of interest, academic focus, etc.) at least one third of varsity athletes are freshmen in a typical year. In raw numbers, this means that roughly 200 slots in Harvard’s freshman class are reserved for recruited athletes.</p>
<p>^^^Yup and remember that most recruited athletes get very little athletic $. Only DI football and men’s basketball are fully funded. The other sports are partially funded. For example, a DI baseball coach may have up to 11 scholarships to divide among all the recruits. Many schools don’t fund the full allotment of scholarships. Also, DIII programs recruit a lot of athletes with 0 scholarship $ available. We have a friend who’s D is playing DI volleyball in the SEC. Her actual athletic scholarship is a joke. Her commitment to the sport is like a full time job. BUT, high schools and clubs love to list the number of committed athletes on their websites. </p>
<p>My kids attend a Catholic school with about 250 seniors. Each year about 20 are “athletic commitments”.</p>
<p>Our DS attends a Catholic H.S., Last week, two of his friends got committments from Ivys - one to Harvard, the other to Princeton. Both are recruited athletes. There are many more of his classmates who are recruited athletes that recently heard from other schools. Don’t have any stats for you, though.</p>
<p>20% of a high school graduating class being a ‘recruited athlete’ is definitely not the norm. Our public high school probably has about 5 or 6 a year who go on to play at D3 schools (out of 400) and every few years a couple who play at D1. I don’t even think
our D3 players would be considered ‘recruited’. Some for sure, but most are walk ons who try out once they get there. The percentage is definitely higher at our local private catholic schools because a lot of good athletes go there specifically because that’s where colleges recruit, the teams get noticed and are good. Of course, its a lot harder to make the teams there!</p>
<p>If this data is self-reported I would guess the number of kids being reported as recruited is overstated … especially at the D3 level. In my (small) experience families often misunderstand (or misrepresent) encouraging communications with coaches as recruiting commitments. D3 coaches do not tent to have enough recruiting slots to fill their squads in a lot of sports and actively encourage walk-ons … athletes they’d be happy to have on the team but for whom they do not have a recruiting slot.</p>
<p>@3togo: No, it’s not self-reported. It’s an official report from the school with student names and the colleges they have been recruited by. Being quite ignorant about this topic, I don’t know when they say NCAA recruited athletes, do they mean D1, D2 and D3 all included?
Interesting information. What’s the relationship between athletic scholarships and need-based financial aid? Do the athletes’ financial aid package get supplemented by athletic scholarships?</p>
<p>
The school I was checking out must be one of such catholic schools! And I forgot to mentioned it’s an all-boys school.</p>
<p>[College</a> Sports Project updates findings about Athletics and academics in NCAA Division III | Middlebury](<a href=“College Sports Project updates findings about Athletics and academics in NCAA Division III | Middlebury News and Announcements”>College Sports Project updates findings about Athletics and academics in NCAA Division III | Middlebury News and Announcements)</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>If a high school’s program produces athletes who can meet a league’s academic standards, I think 20% recruited athletes would be possible–particularly if the high school fields strong football teams.</p>
<p>The relationship between need-based aid and athletics? You’ll find that at many of more elite prestige privates, ranging from Williams to the Ivies, a very significant portion of those receiving substantial “need-based” aid are athletes. Harvard’s 10% of tuition policy for those below a certain income is at least partially designed to allow them to compete for bigger time athletes even when they can’t provide athletic scholarships.</p>
<p>(But you’ll never see them “cut the numbers” this way.)</p>
<p>The following is the NCAA definition of a recruited athlete:</p>
<p>Recruited Prospective Student-Athlete. Actions by staff members or athletics representatives that cause a prospective student-athlete to become a recruited prospective student-athlete at that institution are: </p>
<p>(a) Providing the prospective student-athlete with an official visit</p>
<p>(b) Having an arranged, in-person, off-campus encounter with the prospective student-athlete or the prospective student-athletes parents, relatives or legal guardians; </p>
<p>(c) Initiating or arranging a telephone contact with the prospective student-athlete, the prospective student athletes relatives or legal guardians on more than one occasion for the purpose of recruitment; or </p>
<p>(d) Issuing a National Letter of Intent or the institutions written offer of athletically related financial aid to the prospective student-athlete. Issuing a written offer of athletically related financial aid to a prospective student-athlete to attend a summer session prior to full-time enrollment does not cause the prospective student-athlete to become recruited.</p>
<p>Far more high school athletes are recruited athletes as defined by the NCAA then actually become NCAA varsity athletes.</p>
<p>FYI … roughly 1% of high school varsity athletes become college D1 athletes and about 10% of high school varsity athletes become college D3 athletes. These stats vary some by sport, gender, and region. So 20% is high but not outrageously high.</p>
<p>@Periwinkle: I took another close look. It looks like the strongest sport of the said school is lacrosse, with most athletes recruited and most by highly selective colleges. Football is a close second in terms of number of the recruited (but none was recruited by the Ivy+). Other sports include soccer, rowing, swimming, basketball, track/field, golf etc.
@3togo: But this is 20% of the graduating class, not 20% of the varsity athletes…</p>
<p>Actually there are great numbers of D1 fully funded scholarship opportunities for women. For instance, Womens Volleyball funds 12 players. It’s worth checking on the NCAA website for real numbers.</p>
<p>Our high school numbers seem to parallel what 3togo mentions. I’d say 1% recruited to Div I and the balance of the 20% to Div. II and Div. III. I can’t recall in ages and ages when any of the top seniors did NOT participate in athletics and our school so it makes sense that they may plan on playing (especially at Div III schools). I played my sport from HS at a Div. III school for the first couple years and continued to enjoy it. The money is in Div I,but sometimes you end up not getting much if any money depending on the sport.</p>
<p>Some high schools recruit the best athletes for their own programs, promising to develop and showcase their talent so as to maximize their chances of advancing to the next level. Probably the most legendary case here in Minnesota is Shattuck-St. Mary’s, a private boarding school in Faribault, MN that recruits elite talent for its hockey program. SSM’s alumni roster includes such hockey luminaries as Sidney Crosby, Zach Parise, and Jonathan Toews, among many others.</p>
<p>Nearly as impressive is the track record of Cretin Derham Hall, a coeducational Catholic high school in Saint Paul, which has produced baseball legends like Paul Molitor and Joe Mauer and football stars like Michael Floyd (Notre Dame WR) and Chris Weinke (Heisman Trophy-winning QB for Florida State).</p>
<p>Many state HS athletic associations prohibit or restrict recruiting at the HS level, but such restrictions are difficult to enforce, and there’s a whole shadowy world of borderline activities and alleged recruiting which may or may not cross the line into prohibited activities–but whatever it is, somehow a large percentage of the best athletes seem to end up in the top prep school athletic programs, in a pipeline to top college programs and the pros. It’s not surprising that if a school features such programs and successfully stocks them with the best athletes, a high percentage of its graduating class will be recruited to advance to the next level.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>That seems like an unfortunate naming coincidence for an athletically oriented school, considering the word’s meaning and the stereotypes around athletes.</p>
<p>The NCAA “allows” up to 12 scholarships for women’s volleyball. How many schools actually offer 12? Very few. Teams ranked outside the top twenty probably have less than 6.</p>
<p>The Ivies and NESCAR are quite competitive in the “prep” sports–field hockey, golf, water polo, squash, equestrian (some schools), lacrosse, crew,etc. Many public schools don’t offer these sports. So private schools with strong academics may be in a good position to have their players in thee sports recruited.</p>
<p>bclintock wrote:
</p>
<p>The athletes know where the best programs (facilities, resources, coaches, etc.) are in any city. There is no need for recruiting, although kids and parents talk extensively anyway. The best athletes all play year-round on teams and know where all their club teammates are headed.</p>