Our HS had its DI/II signing ceremony yesterday, and I attended. One of the athletes was a kid i tutor, and the other was my son’s best friend. The third was also a friend of my son’s.
I have to say I was surprised at the tone of the ceremony. Having never gone to one before, I didn’t know what to expect. But it was solemn and very serious. The AD knew a great deal about these three kids (one headed to an Ivy - my sons best friend, one to a very highly ranked university (no doubt because of my tutoring, ?, and one to a large sports powerhouse), and spoke about who they are as people and how proud he was of how well they represented our HS, always. The three students seemed struck by all of the students and teachers who came to support them, and their expressions of gratitude for all who helped them was heartfelt. I have known 2 of these 3 kids for years, and I suddenly saw them as adults. They are entering a new world where they are expected to perform athletically AND academically, and the hugeness of this was not lost on them at all.
This was not a Woo-hoo!!! event, at all. It was clear these kids had sacrificed a great deal to get where they are, and now they feel the weight of the responsibility to deliver, and the gratitude for the chance to try.
My hat is off to all the recruited athletes out there. Knowing these two kids as well as I do, I appreciate what you’ve agreed to take on. Bravo.
Not to take away from these students, who sound really great – but why is it that this sort of thing doesn’t seem to be done for students in general? What is it about athletics that warrants more celebration than other qualities, I wonder? Just curious. Maybe it’s just the area where we are, but it doesn’t seem as if other things are celebrated the way athletics seem to be celebrated. (Full disclosure, both my kids are involved in hs athletics, so I have no bias against athletics per se.)
A friend posted her daughter’s senior commitment night on FB. I think it was an alternative high school as there weren’t that many students and they were mostly attending the regional colleges, but it was still nice with about 30 kids giving speeches to thank their parents and teachers and many received a Bag-o-Swag from their colleges. Some of the colleges sent admissions reps to present the swag.
It is up to the school. If they want to recognize athletes, they do, and my DDs school’s athletic director organized the signing ceremony and the parents of the signers bought all the food and balloons. If schools want to recognize academics, they do. We had a senior awards night and it wasn’t nearly as fun as the athletic signing and only the seniors and parents getting the awards were invited. The teachers didn’t even show up. It was very boring and there were no cupcakes. My older daughter’s theater group had an awards night where they gave awards. One year they announced where they were all heading to college and of course the year my daughter was a senior they didn’t. That was up to her theater teacher.
I think many school clubs and sports have end of the year banquets where scholarships and awards are given out. I know our school had them for sports, for band, for theater, for debate, etc. Any group could arrange a ‘signing ceremony’ type event if they wanted to.
@amsunshine I see your point (and all of my kids were/are athletes, too). But I think my point was that this ceremony wasn’t at all a ‘look how special these kids are!!!’ but more of a ‘now the really tough part begins’ thing. It didn’t glorify them, at all. I sort-of expected it to, but it didn’t.
And, at least in my HS, they make a BIG deal about the high academic achievers. Not to mention most of those kids get WAY better financial deals for college than the athletes do.
Playing D1 sports AND being a student at these not-at-all-easy universities will be challenging. And these kids know it. No college was anxious to recruit me, as a . 5’ 4” basketball player, but going to college was pretty intimidating to me, academically. Expected to be an impact player on a team, too? Pfffft…I was not strong enough of a person to do that when I was 17. These kids were sobered by what is to come, for sure. But they are going for it. Impressive.
Oh, I think it’s impressive too! And again, I have kids who are athletes, so I think it’s great when athletic achievements are recognized.
I think it must be regional? We don’t see any big deal made of high academic achievers around our area – at all. In fact, it almost seems to be downplayed. Kind of an attitude like, “oh, we don’t want to embarrass or discourage other kids that are less academically inclined” sort of thing.
My view has changed slightly having reading this thread. I understand the OP’s point of view but I do agree with the regional thing. Our school in my opinion did something rather embarrassing. They had a signing day ceremony and posted pictures on the school website of recruits pictured with their parents generally more than a couple pictures of both. To me that was already overkill but most of these kids were either going to nearby community colleges or schools you never heard of. I believe 1 or 2 out of 25 was Division 1.
I’m going to be a stickler here and say that the kid headed to Ivy probs should not have been included in the mix at this point.
While s/he may have a likely letter in hand, the prevailing wisdom is to keep it under wraps until the official acceptance letter arrives (in Dec.) Kid is not signing an NLI like the two others, as Ivies do not award athletic aid…so what were they “signing” at the ceremony?
As to why they have signing days for athletes (vs. non-recruits), it’s because, as I noted above, for DI/DII recruits, they are literally signing a National Letter of Intent — a binding commitment to play for a school/accept athletic aid in return. Signing the NLI takes a recruit off the market. It’s obviously more of a big deal if a kid is a national-level recruit and people are interested in where s/he is going to play in college.
At our signing ceremony, most signed a blank piece of paper. My daughter had signed her NLI months earlier, many were going to Div 3, one to an Ivy, one to Navy some to NAIA or jr college. I know there was at least one male rower (no NLI). Who cares? They are going to college. Who cares if the school posted pictures of kids going to community college? Why is that embarrassing? Many people hadn’t heard of the school my daughter attended and it was 2 hours away from her high school. She had looked at Smith and someone asked me where that was.
The TV stations here do stories on some of the signing ceremonies and many of those students haven’t been accepted to the schools yet even if they’ve applied ED. At least a few of those kids are going to Ivies and service academies and those aren’t sure things yet, but history shows that those commits do attend those schools. Why not celebrate?
@amsunshine Hmmm…I don’t know if it a regional thing or what, but I would say our HS touts academic achievements as much as sports ones. The academic achievement things tend to be winning state or national competitions (Latin, and things like that) and everyone knows who the NM winners are, at every level. Every athlete who has a high GPA gets noticed. At the end of the year, each sports team gives a ‘scholar-athlete’ award to the kid with the highest GPA.
Our school does not rank, oddly enough, and I none of my kids have noted that it is a ‘cut-throat’ place (although not sure the older two would have noticed). But we are NOT a sports power house kind of school. Much MUCH bigger emphasis on music. All kids are require to start an instrument in fifth grade. Music classes are mandatory through HS, daily. So our band system is HUGE.
Too bad your school’s culture doesn’t tout the academic achievers. Really, that is kind of a shame. Academic success is far more likely to help any kid than any sport, in the long run. This is kind of hard for me to imagine. There is a private catholic school in my community where a lot of the kids with college sports aspirations go. I wonder if the culture there is different. Will have to check!
@SevenDad You are not being a stickler. I had the same thought about the Ivy kid. I know his parents well, and they both went to the same Ivy and are not jump-the-gun types. In fact, despite his being my sons best friend I had no clue he was a recruit. He kept it very quiet. But I did have visions of his getting rejected…I guess we very anxiously await his decision-day?
Re: the Ivy athletes I think either approach is fine. I do understand the rationale for waiting, and that’s probably how the admissions folks would like it to happen. But there is enormous pressure on these athletes from many directions so if a mutual decision has been made it’s often easier to share it. They would have told other coaches shortly after committing anyway, and in most cases the HS coaches, teachers, teammates know by now. The likely letter has the same effect as a formal letter of admission so there’s little to no risk that an athlete with a LL in hand will not be admitted formally (barring some event that would also nullify a formal admission).
What the OP describes is similar to the commitment ceremonies Ive attended. None have been ego driven or Lebron to Miami type affairs the way some might expect.
@cypresspat: FWIW, I didn’t even think of the possibility (albeit slim, if he had a pre-read and did not have any discipline/academic issues in the meantime) of rejection.
I was thinking more of what politeperson mentions in post #10…that I’m sure the admissions folks would prefer that it is kept under wraps until the non-athlete ED notification day.