<p>CNP 55: You do have a strong booster org. Ours is helpful but not like that. Each team gets one night at the "weenie hut" during football games and we do make a lot of $ off those hot dogs!
Stickershock:
I just dropped my daughter off at Haverford for a prospective athlete's recruiting event and there were many girls there. Do they drop out after they get to school or are the stats different for DIII?</p>
<p>Patient notes,"I just don't accept the premise that all colleges make different demands because of the scholarship"</p>
<p>Response: Now, I know that you are kidding. With athletic scholarship kids, they MUST attend priactice and attend all games. With the non-scholarship kids, both games and practices are optional! Thus, if you need to do more work for a class, you have the option of being able to do this for a non-scholarship kid. To me, this is a tremedous difference.</p>
<p>Also, based on what I have seen in various schools, the scholarhships kids generally put in much more time than those without scholarships. Again, this does vary by school and by sport.</p>
<p>Recruited kid decided not to play Div III sport because the upper class team mates made them go drinking the night before the first day of classes. Kid decided that it was not the way to go.... not like high school sport .... which was more serious. Kid said that it was just a social/drinking group. We are very surprised and unhappy. Anyone else have this story?</p>
<p>Taxguy:
[quote]
Response: Now, I know that you are kidding. With athletic scholarship kids, they MUST attend priactice and attend all games. With the non-scholarship kids, both games and practices are optional! Thus, if you need to do more work for a class, you have the option of being able to do this for a non-scholarship kid. To me, this is a tremedous difference.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>You are so wrong it is not funny. Whether the athlete is on scholarship or not makes zero difference. They are kicked off the team if they do not show exactly the same commitment as the scholarship kids. At least, that is the case at Stanford. </p>
<p>On another note: there are little D1 perks that might be mentioned, and this is scholarship or no. Ones that I can think of in a moment:
*totally cool gear. Several different uniforms (home/away), uniform laundry done for them. Travel gear, jackets, logo polo shirts, cleats/running shoes/mitts, all equipment. Travel duffel bags, equipment bags. Boy do those kids look awesome.
*access to private clubhouse with state of the art training equipment, large screen TV, superb locker rooms.
*free travel to cities/athletic facilities around the country. Meal allowance.
*feel-good moments: little kids clustering around the clubhouse, pen and foul ball in hand, waiting for autographs.<br>
*meeting professional athletes who come back to campus when they are in town and hang out
*access to top trainers, conditioning knowledge and equipment
*free admission to all athletic events
*Sears Cup presentation if your school is so lucky.
*Coaches checking in with you at the start of each quarter, making sure things are going well academically.
*Tutors if needed.</p>
<p>For some schools (cough<em>Rice</em>cough), football is a BIG money-loser. It is insane for a school the size of Rice (2800 undergrads), to field a D-1 team. They looked into changing divisions two years ago, but decided not to make the change.... They really ought to!</p>
<p>I am not very knowlegeable about college athletics, but I would think one of the main differences between non-scholarship and scholarship athletes at D-1would be that if a non-scholarship athlete decides stop participating, for whatever reason, his or her financial status remains unchanged, but I would assume someone on an athletic scholarship would lose his or her scholarship if they just decided they did not want to play anymore (because it took too much time or something).</p>
<p>MotherofTwo--yes that is true (and hello, haven't talked for a while!). I am not clear about this, but I believe that there may be some provision for helping kids who get injured, maintain some scholarship protection of some kind--maybe they shift to need-based aid or something?</p>
<p>Although you can quit the team in DIII, all the kids I have talked to, do not miss practices or games for any reason. They even run their own off season practices that the coaches cannot oversee, by NCAA rules The team members do it voluntarily. Even my high school daughter would never consider missing a game or practice, and as of the last couple of years, wants to stay active in her sport through a good portion of the year.
I imagine it could affect the player's status as a starter if she shows up for pre-season out of shape.</p>
<p>Hi Patient! I wasn't referring to students who get injured and can't play (since they don't have a choice) but students who just decide, for whatever reason, that they don't want to do their sport anymore. It would be a problem for someone on athletic scholarship who does not qualify for need-based aid - if a person in that situation decided he or she did not want to do sports anymore, they would lose their scholarship and would have to pay. So when someone accepts an athletic scholarship, it is with the understanding that they are committing to play their sport.</p>
<p>Other anecdotal evidence that education and athletics can blend: I just heard that two former Stanford baseball players, now playing professional baseball, are back on campus this fall working for their masters' degrees during the off-season. (Two others, now finished with their professional careers, have also been back to complete their degrees while still others drafted this summer are back on campus this fall as seniors to pick up their final degree requirements in the off-season) Stanford is special, I tell you....</p>
<p>The conversation seems to have drifted a bit to Title IX, but I'll comment on the original question raised.</p>
<p>S is now a sophomore at an Ivy. He was a recruited athlete. </p>
<p>Loves, loves, loves everything about his school, his team and his sport. Living with five other team members this year and couldn't be happier.</p>
<p>Time management is an understatement for him, but maybe one of the issues is how much of a step up from high school the sport and the academics are in college? Plus the changes of living away from home and making new friends?</p>
<p>And, of course, the difference between a Div I and a Div III program, and even within those Divisions, the various schools' philosophies and attitudes toward their sports teams. And probably differences between sports, as well. If you're playing football at Nebraska, that's going to be a lot different than fencing, I suspect.</p>
<p>There are so many variables that I would hesitate to presume that because my kid has had a great experience as a student athlete that it's the right thing for every other student athlete. There's also a burn-out factor for some kids, who may have played their heart out in high school but who would just like to leave that behind and reinvent themselves at college.</p>
<p>Lots of ways to be happy, in school and in life.</p>
<p>MomofWildChild -- IT band surgery -- OUCH!!!!! Poor baby!</p>
<p>
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If you're playing football at Nebraska, that's going to be a lot different than fencing, I suspect.
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<p>Ha ha -- that's certainly true (spoken by a graduate of a school in the same conference ...)</p>
<p>Also funny, my fencer daughter is amazed to find herself in an apparent jock class and it is "Introduction to Akkadian." Huh? (I can't imagine THAT at Nebraska LOL) It has a bunch of football and crew athletes in it that she knows of, while she is one of the few there that actually wants to learn Akkadian and despairs that they are going so slowly and never meet for the entire scheduled time. I guess she has to wait until next semester to really get the language and can spend her extra time doing something else. I wonder if this is a calculated way for the Akkadian professor to actually get enough people to sign up for the course!</p>
<p>Any other memorable jock classes out there?</p>
<p>
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Any other memorable jock classes out there?
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<p>Sigh. Noticed a 2-page list in S's room the other day, typed, titled "Courses of Interest" listing a variety of courses, none "hard-sounding", in a variety of departments, grouped by time of day. I had a sinking feeling when I saw it and asked him about it. Sure enough, it is handed out by the coach (whether specific to his sport or athletic-department wide, I don't know) as suggestions for courses that do not require a lot of prerequisites. I said, "Oh, you mean these are dumb jock courses, right?" I was fortunate that all I got was a glare, but this makes me mad. I mean, they weren't exactly underwater basket-weaving, but they don't represent "world class academics" either.</p>
<p>Memorable Jock Courses</p>
<p>I took Geology 101 (Rocks for Jocks) my senior year. But I was the only athlete in Philosophical Systems of Kant and Hegel that year. </p>
<p>It all about balance ;-)</p>
<p>Your son is being given the realistic message that, at his college, he can either do sports well or academics well.</p>
<p>Well, (here is my "My Boy Walks on Water" CC archetype) HE is not taking those classes. OTHER athletes, maybe ;).</p>
<p>Not my intercollegiate daughter either. Like her teammates she is taking a full courseload, knocking out "real" courses.</p>
<p>My D is a political science major and last year she was the only freshman in a few of her classes. No other athletes though.</p>
<p>Luckily, she has a coach that requires the team to do mandatory study time this year in the library (had a few kids not eligible this year because of grades from last year). I forget how many hours she has to do. He has them get updated grades/progress reports every couple of weeks and if someone has a low grade, they have to do more time studying.</p>
<p>She is complaining about it, but she said she is doing great in her classes!</p>