My son is relatively new to the Sport 6ft 3 175 and currently has a 6:37 Erg as a junior- Schools have started to show interest- At the end of the day he wants to Row at a school that can compete for Championships- his Erg will be below 6:30 soon- the challenge is, I don’t think he will be able to get into an IVY with his grades- of course that would be ideal- but would like to come up with a good plan B- Thinking Northeastern- Syracuse - BU- please let me know your thoughts - his GPA is a 3.3 and his ACT is a 28 - thanks
Rowers Dad – I’m new here but I do have recent direct experience with a number of kids’ Ivy rowing recruiting paths. I’m a parent. While your son’s academics are on the borderline for an Ivy – it’s not out of the question. The key point is that Ivies ( and in fact all coaches) want the fastest athletes that they can get through admissions. You will read lots of stuff online about needing 700 per section on the SAT – this is not strictly true. There are athletes who get recruited to HYP with 600 per SAT section BUT…they are very fast. For a heavyweight man – erg scores of 6.13 or less. I know rowers who have gone to non-HYP Ivies with just under 600 per SAT section. ( ACT 28 is equivalent to about 630 per SAT section).
You son’s current Academic Index is 196 – if he can raise that to 205-210, he would be in good shape….so long as his erg score is lower. I cannot emphasise this enough – even a few seconds can make a lot of difference to a school’s level of interest. If he can get to 6.19, lots of doors start opening. Coaches don’t just recruit on erg times alone, but they are by far the most influential factor.
So I would try to (a) get ACT up to 30 , (b) get erg score as low as possible , soon.
Otherwise, your plan B sounds good. You can google the USRowing collegiate polls and see who are going to be contenders.
I don’t mean to imply that it’s all easy, but equally, I don’t think you or your son should be discouraged from aiming for an Ivy at this stage.
thanks so much- really appreciate it-it’s so unclear as to where the bottom of the academics are as no one really knows but this makes it much clearer- thanks
Would your son be interested in being at the bottom of the academic group? I know my daughter did not want to go to a school where she thought everyone else was academically superior. I don’t think they would have been as she wasn’t a strong test taker and her grades were higher than average, but SHE didn’t have the confidence to swim with the academic sharks. She’s much more comfortable being with other students who aren’t as competitive, who don’t have a stroke at the thought of a B. In fact, she likes being thought of as the smart kid sometimes. I’m not judging the Ivy experience for others, and some do really want it and want the stress and competition to benefit from the high academics, but for her I knew it wasn’t right. Too much stress.
Balancing athletics and academics is hard, so if the academics is going to require extra effort just to keep up, can he do it? It may be that you think he’d be just fine academically, and if so go for it, but it is something to consider.
Could I interest you in joining our Class of 2017 Rowing Recruit thread? I’m trying to get a critical mass of parents and kids in this particular year, and so would love to discuss in more detail there . . .
fore sure!!!
Just for clarification - my post above is referring to “old” SAT scores. Because the “new” SAT section scores are different (ie. 600 per section on the new SAT is a “lower” score than 600 per section on the old SAT) , I’d recommend checking with an online score converter - just google “old new SAT converter”
@“Rowers Dad” is your son aiming for heavy or light rowing? If he’s heavy he will need to drop his 2k and raise those SAT/ACT scores. It’s certainly not impossible…
He could also ask the coaches at target schools what parts of his profile he needs to improve. They will certainly tell him.
Good luck and I agree with twoinanddone, he needs to consider where he wants to find himself. He is going to college first and rowing is just icing on the cake 
ACT is now 30- Erg is 6:28 and he is 6ft 4 -180
Sounds like he’s certainly with the heavies. I know the heavy guys on our team who got attention at ivies or other competitive D1 schools had 2ks in the 6:20 range but coaches also look to “boat feel” and “coachability” in a recruit. Congrats to your son for raising his stats.