High school recruiting times

Karma Police wrote:

What about boys 200 and 400? And do they have a 400H time?

What age are we talking about here - 17-18yos?

Karma Police,

You can go to any of those school's websites I have listed and find their scholarship standards. Usually go to the track site and then look at their links until you see something like "recruiting standards" or "scholarship standards"

Even easier in many cases is to just do a Google search for "track and field scholarship standards". I just did that and one of the first links goes directly to the UNC standards list here -

And yes, 200 and 400 times and in some cases 400H times are listed in those standards. Age is usually junior and senior HS athletes.

Former Sub 14,

If you give a "full tuition" scholarship to a male athlete, how does that count against the 12.6 you are allowed to give? Is that considered 1, or is it less than one because it doesn't include room and board?

So, basically, does the 12.6 mean 12.6 full rides (tuition and room and board) or does it mean 12.6 full tuitions?

Thanks!

Full tuition is paying for their tuition and books, but not their housing situation. One "full" scholarship is defined as tuition, books, housing, and costs of living (such as a meal plan and money for other necessities they might need). If a kid only gets his tuition, books, and housing paid for, that is technically not a "full ride" anymore. Although a number of years ago it would have been considered that way before the definition was changed.

Covering tuition and books is about 35% of a "full ride" at our school. So you can imagine how programs are able to build very balanced track teams off of just 12.6 scholarships.

We also have a separate grouping of out-of-state waivers that cover international or out-of-state costs. Basically, it puts them at in-state tuition levels. These do not impact the 12.6 number at all. Private schools typically have much more of these available.

Excellent. I was hoping that was the case. Thanks for the education.

You cannot get in on just an XC time though, since there are so many courses that are pancakes or short. You have to get track times to back-up your XC times, which sucks (coming from someone who loves XC and has always been way better at XC than track)

Not necessarily. Track times do matter, but the reason why they are looked upon favorably is because its standardized. Everyone runs a flat 400m outdoor track. The meets that college coaches are going to pay attention to are large invites or championship meets where all the good runners in your state show up to. Basically, they look at meets most everyone runs in.

In California, Mt. Sac and the state meet course are looked at heavily. Kansas has its Rim Rock Farms course. Bob Firman is a big one for the Utah kids I believe. Illinois has the Peoria course and the east coast has famous Van Cortlandt Park. These are courses that you can guesstimate what their times might be come track season based on what previous kids did before them. We are totally willing to give scholarship out that way.

P.S. XC kids make good 10k or steeplers in college

Flagpole, those are great guidelines, but every kid is different. No two 11:00 3200 meter runners are the same. Usually we make up the standards to nicely be able to tell athletes they aren't fast enough. Sure, we want to mark a cut off where we'd stop recruiting time-wise, but the cookie-cutter approach isn't really a great barometer.

Whoever gave the advice to contact the coaches is dead on. We do pay attention, but sometimes athletes can slip through the cracks. I'd rather take an 11:05 kid who wants to be here than a 10:55 kid I had to convince in some cases, all other things the same.

To the OP, just focus on running as fast as you can, write down a few schools you're interested in, and when you feel ready then email them and see what your options are or what you need to accomplish to become an option. The earlier the better.

When I was an athlete, the only schools I received offers from were the ones I contacted.

I am aware that these times don't guarantee anything for anyone. I am just providing the info that is out there. Athletes still need to make contact whether they are under or over those times if they are interested and see what the current situation at that school is, so I agree with everything you said.

Sub 14 & Flagpole, Thanks for the insight. Pulling back the curtain on this process is helpfull to me as a parent. Looking to provide my Junior some guidance as she organizes her thoughts as to what schools will work best for her. It appears that most all schools have some sort of recruit questionaire - I am assuming that she should complete these before any direct communication takes place. Is that a good assumption? Thanks

No problem. Make sure your Junior really clicks with the atmosphere of whichever program she ends up choosing. That oftentimes has a bigger impact than some people would care to think.

Recruit questionaires are a good place to start. They are basically emailed directly to the Head Coach and serve as something similar to an email. However, the problem is that coaches often times sift through them if they get a lot in one day and might overlook your kid. I would honestly recommend a well thought out email that isn't too long so that the coach reads the whole thing.

I hope I'm not making it sound like all coaches are jerks, but you have to understand that some coaches just get a ton of emails from kids and if it doesn't stand out it might get lost in the shuffle. Also, if there is not a reply don't be hesitant to send an email again later to try and get a response.

Alsoran1 wrote:

Sub 14 & Flagpole, Thanks for the insight. Pulling back the curtain on this process is helpfull to me as a parent. Looking to provide my Junior some guidance as she organizes her thoughts as to what schools will work best for her. It appears that most all schools have some sort of recruit questionaire - I am assuming that she should complete these before any direct communication takes place. Is that a good assumption? Thanks

Former Sub 14 gives good advice.

Pretty much all D1 schools with CC and track programs have "Recruitment Questionnaires" on their sites. Many of them have the same look and feel. Your athlete DEFINITELY need to fill those out. My daughter, and now my HS son waited to fill out those for their target schools until after they got (will get) their SAT or ACT scores back. Before that though, they both sent e-mails to coaches of their top choice schools.

The questionnaires don't allow for much personal info, like why you are so interested in such and such a school, but obviously you can do that in an e-mail. I suggest sending the e-mail first and in the e-mail make reference to the recruitment questionnaire and tell the coach that you (the athlete...this should all come from the athlete, NOT the parent) will fill out the questionnaire when SAT or ACT scores come in. I do not pretend though that this is the only way to do this. If your daughter is really good, some unsolicited D1 letters or e-mails will come her way or through her coach.

In the case of my daughter, who has already gone through this process and is running in college, one of the coaches asked for a transcript (grades) from the high school, so she sent that in. They want to know that your kid has the grades to be admitted there. Fortunately this was not an issue for my daughter and will not be for my son either.

Good luck to your daughter. It is an exciting time.

Bump

I see that a lot of people (flagpole) say to go to the schools web site and find their scholarship standards. I have tried on 3-4 schools web sites and cannot find that info. Any hints on where to find it?

Only about 1/4 of the schools have one. But you should be abke to find one at an equivalent school if you check enough. What conference and event group?

Distance girls anywhere is Northeast.

what about walk-on time averages?

I don't think I'll be fast enough for scholarship, but would very much like to still run.

Also does anybody know anything about that process?

do you think with my times (2:01,4:24,9:36,15:53 xc and 15:24 road) should I wait for my senior season to get better times or just settle for a bad running school

Wanna run sub 4:20 wrote:

do you think with my times (2:01,4:24,9:36,15:53 xc and 15:24 road) should I wait for my senior season to get better times or just settle for a bad running school

Just say you ran those as a Junior. Ask about what improvement they want for your Senior year.. Sell it. Maybe do not mention 'road' and let them wonder.

I hope you realize that for most schools the recruiting standards are just numbers they throw out their to discourage slow kids from harassing the coaches. If you run the posted times junior year of high school, the kid will get offered probably 1/4 or 1/3 scholarship. If you manage to hit the times during your senior year expect to get books.

I see my school on your list. Their are multiple people on my team who hit the listed times during their senior year. Everyone who did run faster than those times does have a scholarship. As it happens the only scholarship that any distance runners on my team has is books.

Don't expect to get bumped onto a scholarship if you run those times in college. Once you get on the team, your scholarship is never going to change unless you do something about it. The only way I've heard of people getting a larger scholarship is by threatening the coaching staff that they will transfer if they don't get a larger scholarship. Obviously if someone is slow and they try to bargain with the coaches they will get kicked off the team. On the other hand, if someone has gone to nationals before and isn't on any scholarship, going in and bargaining will get them something for the next year.