So here is my situation, a d3 swim coach and I have been emailing each other for almost a year now and even had a call with the assistant coach. Today I sent him a final update on my athletics and he replied “Thanks for all the information. Good luck with the application and have a great summer!”. How do I know if this coach will support my ED application? He also told me to apply ED since that was the best bet. Should i ask him if he will support my application? When should I ask him? I am applying this November through ED.
Unless the school is a D3 school that does not conduct pre-reads (which are only a handful) based on your post, it does not sound like you have coach support. Typically, athletes that are being recruited submit their applications in July for a pre-read. If the pre-read comes back positive, the coach will tell the recruit whether or not he will support the application with admissions.
Before you submit your ED application, you definitely need to ask the coach if he will support your application. If the coach tells you he will support your application, you will then want to ask him what percentage of supported recruits typically are admitted each year. You only have one ED choice, and you want to make sure to use it wisely. Good luck!
he wanted to do pre pread but he just said work harder. Should i ask him now whether he will support my application?
If he wanted to do a pre-read, why didn’t you submit your transcript? I don’t understand what was meant by “work harder”. Has the coach asked you about your academics - i.e test scores, gpa, courses taken? You definitely don’t want to submit an ED application without determining whether or not you have the coach’s support.
Have you sent the coach your transcripts and any of the standardized test scores for the pre-reads? If you have not, I would do so and then ask about his feedbacks. If the feedback is positive, then ask him about possible OV. Have you contacted any other schools’ coaches?
i sent him the transcript and he said he recieved it. he just said work harder. but then few weeks later, he kept sending me updates about the school e.g. new coaches and stuff
that is the thing im not sure whether he will support my application. we even had a phone call after i sent him the transcript. I also told him i was going to apply ed
Did you ask him the results of the pre-read? The coach’s comment to “work harder” suggests to me that admissions did not give your application the green light - i.e. your academics right now are not at an acceptable level to get your application through admissions.
You should clarify with the coach what he means by “work harder”. Do you need to raise your test scores? Is your gpa within the required range? At this point, you really can’t do much to raise your gpa, but there is still time to raise your test scores.
Those updates are mass emails. Are your GPAs/test scores compatible with the school? The coach tells you to work harder in swimming or academically? He would tell you if the preread is positive or not. It looks like not positive if he didn’t state it to you clearly.
yes he was just cheering me up like saying keep up my work. but he also said to me that I should apply ED and I heard that d3 recruits apply ED…should i just ask him right now?
You need to ask the coach specific questions:
Was my pre-read positive with admissions?
Where am I ranked on your swim list that you submit to admissions?
Will you support my application if I apply ED?
Is it possible for you to issue me a likely letter once I submit my application?
What percentage of your supported recruits are accepted?
never mind i just asked him and he said he will support my application. Had few minutes of hard attack but thanks for the advice @shuttlebus
@mrdiaz. You should ask some more follow-up questions before you apply ED. You need to determine how much pull the coach has with admissions. Is he guaranteeing that you will be accepted if you apply ED?
Listen to @shuttlebus. You must have both coach support and a positive preread, otherwise you are wasting your ED application. Coach support is just a form that gets included in an applicant’s admissions file. Admissions makes the admissions decision, and if Admissions hasn’t given the green light through a positive preread, then the coach support is meaningless. Similarly, if Admissions says that you are good to go, that too may be meaningless if the coach doesn’t provide a coach support letter for your admissions file.
Umm. You can get accepted to schools, ED, EA, RD without the coach supporting your application. At many schools, coaches hope what happens if they have limits to their recruits list and have some truly borderline admissions, is to use the admissions cards to the athletes most wanted and least able to get accepted without s boost.
Yes, ask the coach where you stand in admissions. Ask if the coach is giving you an admissions boost and what that does to your chances of acceptance. Let him know that there are other schools on your list and you’d like an athletic commitment if you are going to use your single ED card to apply there. Do you know any of the athletes at the school or thosecwho have dealt with this school and coach before?
You need to ask if this is just a “soft support” letter or whether or not he is giving you a true “slot” (his allocated number of almost guaranteed recruits). With a true slot comes a real academic pre-read from the AO. There is a huge difference between just a support letter and full recruit status.
@cptofthehouse, it goes without saying that you can get admitted ED or EA without coach support, otherwise entire colleges would be made up of only athletic recruits. This is why I said that if “Admissions says that you are good to go, that too MAY be meaningless . . .” (emphasis added). The point here is that if the coach has 2 slots and 3 tips, and the recruit is the 5th of 5 recruits, if a D1 player drops into the coach’s lap and the recruit is pushed off the coach’s list, the recruit could pass the preread, lose coach support and get declined.
Doesn’t it also depend on whether this student is an academic match, especially if it’s a NESCAC or other difficult admit? @MrDiaz, a few suggested questions you should ask yourself before you even get down to the really hard questions with the coach:
- Are your stats well within the 25/75% range? Preferably close to the 75%.
- Do your focus event(s) place you in the top 1-3 swimmers?
- Are some of those students juniors and will be graduating as you arrive?
- Did you run the NPC for this school?
There’s a thread on the Bowdoin forum regarding questionable support from a coach in another sport so you need some comfortable level of certainly before pulling the ED trigger.
Just got an email from d3 coach saying that i should apply ED so he can give me the support on my application and that it will help a lot with the application…it seems positive enough…
@mrdiaz You want to make sure you are using your ED wisely since you can only use it at one school. Based on what you have written in this thread, you haven’t asked the coach the direct questions needed to ensure that you are not wasting your ED on this school. The coach simply saying applying ED will help a lot with the application is not positive enough. You need to know where you stand on his recruiting list and what type of guarantee of admissions he can give you.
When my kid went through the process, there was no question at all where he stood. He knew that he had the coach’s full support and that in years past 100% of the coach’s recruits who had his full support were admitted.