<p>Please provide an executive summary. Don't expect lazy people like me to actually read the NYT! :D</p>
<p>Kids are taking up winter sports (skiing, ice hockey, skating, etc.), and going to academies (high schools) that specialize in fostering these sports in order to get thier children into top colleges that field teams in these sports.</p>
<p>I am quite familiar with these academies as one of the well known ones is in my town and I know numerous local kids who have or currently attend, as well as kids from all over who have attended as boarding students. I have even interviewed many for admissions to my alma mater as an alum interviewer. My kids' friends have attended. My kids did not choose to attend and went to public school. My kids were involved for years since age 6 in the affiliated weekend training program, however. In fact, I just read the article and one girl who is interviewed, Sasha D. who attended a different ski academy for HS (one that just does a winter term not a full school year) used to be in my D2's ski group on weekends when younger. </p>
<p>Anyway, at our local ski academy, where the graduating class numbers about 20, this past year, two went to Harvard, one to Stanford, one to Brown, and one to Dartmouth. In the past, several have gone to Dartmouth and Middlebury. Some are recruited for skiing and some do not plan to ski at all in college. The one who went to Stanford actually was recruited for sailing. We have no other private schools in the area. My kids went to public school. Contrasted to the tiny ski academy in town, there were no students who went to Ivy League schools from the last 2 years' classes and only one (my D) who did in 2004, from our public HS. </p>
<p>My D1 is a ski racer (my younger D used to be but gave it up in MS) and races for Brown. She was not a recruited athlete, however. Her team at Brown mostly consists of racers who attended such ski academies, including two racers from our local ski academy though neither girl is local whatsoever (one is from NYC and one is from Australia).</p>
<p>By the way, my kids didn't learn to ski to get into college, LOL. Both were on skis literally at age one as we live in a ski town and skiing is a major part of our family's life.</p>
<p>Kids taking up winter sports is nothing new - has been going on for years and years - and the college piece of that article is not really expounding on anything new at all. Just more of the same ole stuff to make people think that another new 'trick' will get their kids into great schools. With the exception of snowboarding as a winter sport - the winter sports are not a ''new'' hook - and there are only sooo many pre-college schools what will be able to accomodate the winter sports craze.</p>
<p>Being in the girls hockey world, I'll give you some more insight on NAHA (one of the hockey schools featured in the article). I have a friend whose daughter (not in the article) plays there.</p>
<p>I think the article doesn't grossly misrepresent NAHA from a what they are doing perspective. They literally provide a turoring service for their students while giving them more practice ice time and game experience than they could get at any of the traditional New England prep schools. However, they are not really a school as I understand it. They students actually stay enrolled in their home schools, do the work for those classes remotely (being tutored at NAHA) and get their diplomas from their home city High Schools. Not a good or bad thing. They may eventually go into the full time school business, but it is still a fairly new operation.</p>
<p>As described, they don't have a lot of the trappings of a prep school as resources are focused on hockey and tutoring.</p>
<p>As for the hockey part of NAHA, they have 2 teams, the top of which (if USA Hockey gets around to certifying them) would be considered a top 3 contender for the 19U National Championship. They are 29-3-1 this season ( and this is still November they do play a lot of games, don't they?) . Their second team is not a slouch either and is better than most club or prep teams in New England as well.</p>
<p>Their success is due not to having the best skaters in the country, (although they do have many of the top prospects), but is more due to having depth in quality players that the traditional club and prep school teams cannot pull together.</p>
<p>The people who send their daughters there are very serious about maximizing the hockey skill development necessary to play Division 1 College hockey. I guess they are very serious to spend $35K per year (plus other expenses - they do not have financial aid) for up to 4 years to get their kid a 4-year college scholarship worth about that much and perhaps admission to a school they might not otherwise get into.</p>
<p>We don't have that kind of money for hockey school, as my 9th grade daughter goaltends at a New England prep school (not one of the better known ones) with an incredibly generous need-based FA package. She is using this opportunity to get a better HS educational experience (even the best public schools here are not that good) with the hopes that she can get an academic scholarship someplace where she can play the game she loves. BTW, she is absolutely loving the experience and is doing well. </p>
<p>Like the young lady quoted at the beginning of the article, some of our motivation for placing my daughter in prep school has to do with college scouting. There aren't enough Division 1 prospect senior girl hockey players south of the Mason-Dixon line to field a team, so coaches don't come here. Heck, there aren't even enough talented male hockey players here either. Just to give you an idea of the lack of talented players, my daughter's other local option this year was to play up an age level in boys travel hockey. Now my daughter is good, but no place else in the country will you find girls playing up a level in boys hockey. To get exposure, girls from our area have to find a way of playing up north, either through club hockey (as we had been doing as well as boys hockey) or through prep hockey.</p>
<p>The few talented girl players in this region, almost always end up at a prep or a place like NAHA if they can find the financing as the club hockey thing is very iffy.</p>
<p>In our particular situation, the costs of playing travel hockey at a competitive level here in the south made prep school (with FA) a wash financially. And there is the endless travel. I drove 20K miles last season just going to games.</p>
<p>Several of the players at NAHA come from similar situations, so I can identify with their plight.</p>
<p>So as much as the article tries to paint this as a shortcut to Ivy League admissions, there is sooo much more involved in young girls going thousands of miles away from home to play hockey.</p>
<p>The best college women's and men's hockey teams were at Wisconsin last year. Each has about 18 full scholarships.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.news.wisc.edu/12376.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.news.wisc.edu/12376.html</a></p>
<p><a href="http://www.news.wisc.edu/12463.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.news.wisc.edu/12463.html</a></p>