LMSC College Prep Night

Hit The Books, Kid

Why The College Scholarship Is A Pipe Dream

Squeaky wheels get the grease.  Everyone lauds the kid who grows up in, say, Philly, and stars for LMSC and Delco, then goes Division I at Colgate where he plays for a semester, drops out and signs with the Union.  Awesome story.  Really nice young man with a ton of talent.  And a rare thing.

I'm a dad, I get it.  Sam runs around with a soccer ball, and I wonder...But then I watch how he asks the dog, or his mom, or me to kick with him, how he giggles when he makes a "save" (rolls on the carpet) or laughs when he throws the ball up and it hits him on the head (what can I say, he's clearly my son...)  In some regard, when creating a great soccer environment for kids, we have to accept the list of things we can't control.  And in terms of the variables that lead to a Division I or professional career, that's just about everything.  To say nothing of the sheer numbers; 99.5 per cent of kids are finishing their career at DIII or lower.  The real question is how to make club and youth programs effective at both advancing the individual player's abilities and provide a fun and fulfilling environment.

Anyway, if your kid has some higher-level aspirations, encourage him or her.  Support those goals.  But be a responsible parent and understand the long odds.  Richard Williams and Earl Woods are grinding their teeth right now - well, Williams is, anyway.  There're some specifics here that might help any soccer parent manage expectations a little bit, as well as some food for thought on the value (cold, hard cash value) of youth soccer.
The Recruitment Math

It's worth mentioning for readers of 192 Square Feet, that for all the money spent on sport, it's still incumbent on a student to find a school, not the other way 'round.  So families, spend with great care; that money will not do the job of college selection for you.  It's like the fancy private school route (of which I am full former participant) - junior still has to get the grades, earn the recommendations and write the essays.  The institution can only do so much for a student.  And most families will spend more in youth soccer pursuits than the total dollar value of any scholarship they might be fortunate enough to receive; the vast majority of scholarships are partial, sometimes tiered- 50% scholarship the first two years, 75% the last two = 62% of a full-ride.  @50K per year, that scenario comes to $124,000 and some change.  Jackpot!

Right?

Now, @2K per year, a 10-year travel soccer career has cut into $20,000 of that scholarship.  Figure the kid goes to three camps a summer after Frosh/Soph/Junior years, at $700 per: $6,300 ($26,300).  And before you buy these for $200 each year for five years ($27,300), or calculate the gas money, the meals on the road, the hotel rooms, the flights to the tournaments, the recruiting services (if you're into throwing good money after bad...), the private coaches, extra training sessions, running shoes, gym memberships...oh, and don't forget the tutors and SAT prep instructors.  And let's just hope there's no torn ACL, ER visits, or other medical issues.

Doesn't take too long to spend the scholarship.

Worse deal than a new car.  And heaven forbid your baby wants to play for Penn State...somewhere between $16,000 and $21,000 for an in-state freshman this fall.  The coaches there will treat a 62% scholarship like it's the same thing as that percentage at Duke (just under $62,000 this year!), so be sure to do that math!  No one said coaches are smart.  Or subtle.  Or honest.

Per year, that's $9,920 to the good if junior goes to Penn State on a 62% ride.  $38,440 if it's Duke.

For the boys, of course, there's only 9.9 full scholarships per team; women's teams may have up to 14 full rides.  But what no one will tell you is that not all programs are fully funded in scholarship dollars.  Colgate, for instance, as of spring 2012 had 12 women's scholarships and 9 men's.  And most rosters include 25-30 players.  But back to PSU and Duke...a family has spent 50% of the scholarship at PSU before junior graduates from high school...and 20% of the Duke deal too!  What else could that +/- 35,000 dollars have got your family over those ten years?

And That's Just The Money

For boys and girls the circumstances are notably different due to the number of programs.  Title IX's lasting impact on women's college sports is pretty evident in this little word problem.

There are, roughly, 4 million soccer players registered with the USSF-affiliated programs in this nation.  Divide that number by 13 (ages 5 through 18) and we have 307,000 players per year/age group, or 153,500 per gender.  Those high school seniors who play the game are competing for spots on 598 teams (men's division I & III) and 735 (women's division I & III).  The NCAA division II (men's top 25 / women's top 25) and NAIA schools are less-traditional higher education options- comprehensive colleges, small state schools, religiously affiliated, etc. - and virtually none of the top liberal arts or research universities fall into these two categories.  Presuming that most players would rather go to Williams or Stanford than Hastings College or Lindsey Wilson College (2011 NAIA Men's Finalists...) we'll work with those numbers alone.

That leaves us 255 players graduating from high school per year, per NCAA team (DI & DIII). Over four years, each of the DI & DIII teams have a pool of about 1,000 players to pick from.

Gulp.

The Dirtiest Secret

Haverford College, 2012 breakdown

The biggest advantage, then, is in all likelihood the benefit that a sport can offer a student in terms of getting into a college.  The top colleges and universities are all sliding under-qualified kids into their dorms because they can run, kick, throw, tackle, swim or whatever better than the poor nerd who had really good grades, but not great.  It's sadly laughable to see kids suing the University of Michigan for racial bias when they can't get into school...they ought to sue for athletic bias.  Far more jocks benefit than any racial, ethnic, artistic, theatrical categories in the admission process.  40% of Haverford College students are varsity athletes, though the college can boast a 37% multi-racial or non-white population.  Says a lot about how we value athletic prowess as a virtue, doesn't it?  Ditto Williams, Middlebury, etc...

So, when your child is trying to get into schools, the bar will be considerably lower if the soccer coach finds them helpful in advancing the team's cause.

That's probably worth a few bucks to most of us.

Pretty cynical reason to play the beautiful game.  And, as the numbers above show, you need to be an athlete in the top 1% to make the grade.

Conclusions

Bottom line?

Be a better student.  Even if you do everything in your power athletically, the odds are so long it's not even funny.  No, it's not even rational.  And unless you recruit kids for a living, please, please don't make the mistake of comparing your kid favorably with other players- you only see the kids in your league, remember, and that sample size doesn't quite cut it.  If you're a great student, even at a highly selective school you'll only face a 25% acceptance rate.  Far better odds than trying to stand out in the tens of thousands vying for roster spots.

Athletically, find a fun training environment and create an energetic soccer culture around a kid, give them coaches who can get them to the next level (including contacts at the college level...) and let nature take its course.  Just because the Joneses are forking over cash and spending their entire lives in the car sending junior to every competition under the sun doesn't mean their kid is going to be better off...or that it'll make your kid any better.  Or happier.  Remember that 110 training sessions and 20 league/state cup games (plus how many tournaments?!) will require significant sacrifices; no school play, maybe no second sport for the high school, things like that.  But it does leave time for jobs, volunteering, other extra-curricular activities at school and so on.

That said, there's enough attrition over the years that virtually any kid who wants to can find a place to play for four more years.  A little leg work, honest self-evaluation and passion can find a college program where meaningful soccer can be extended.  There are, after all, around 3,000 institutions of higher education in this country, and many of them offer soccer...anything is possible!  But everything is a compromise.  Be forewarned.

Lastly, most college programs experience attrition year over year, with class sizes diminishing year over year.  A class of ten players this fall at any given school will experience somewhere between 25-50% reduction over the four years.  Sometimes more, sometimes less.  While that does mean my numbers above may not represent the true number of opportunities, it should be a red flag begging the question: why are all these kids not lasting for four years?


Resources

https://www.collegesoccerconnector.com/opportunities.shtml
http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-liberal-arts-colleges/spp+25
http://www.forbes.com/colleges/haverford-college/
http://www.usyouthsoccer.org/media_kit/ataglance/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Youth_Soccer_Association
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/24/sports/soccer/24soccer.html?_r=0