Dating Rituals of Elite College Recruiting

The Dating Rituals of Elite College Recruiting While there are over 900 tennis programs in the nations and plenty of options to play, if you are flirting with the idea of being recruited by the DI Ivy’s or the DIII schools of NESCAC, you may want to be clear about your date-ability factors. Before they will pursue you as a top athlete, coaches will want to know: 1) your Academic Index or 2) your Band, respectively. What is an Academic Index? The Ivy League uses an Academic Index (AI) to determine whether you will pass through the admissions process. Coaches at Princeton and Harvard may absolutely love you as a serve and volley line 2 player, but unless you can meet the required academic index, the courtship won’t continue. In past years, all Ivy League member schools have mutually agreed to level the playing field for recruiting athletes by setting a floor for academic requirements. In 2012 this floor was raised to 176 out of a perfect AI of 240. This number combines three 80 point sections based on GPA, SAT 1 and SAT 2 scores. There is a conversion table for ACT scores and there are several online calculators available, but the basic formula is simple: Take the average of your SAT Critical Reading and Writing scores. Add that to your math score and divide by 20. That comprises 1/3 of your score. The second 1/3 is factored from your GPA; a 4.0 on a 4.0 scale is worth 80 points. The last third is determined by the average of two SAT 2 tests divided by 20. So if you are wondering whether to retake your SAT’s in an attempt to raise your scores from a 640 to a 700, the answer is YES… go for it! What is a Band? The New England Small College Athletic Conference (NESCAC) is made up of selective liberal arts institutions with academic requirements of similar strength to the Ivy League schools. NESCAC uses similar criteria to the AI, but it is somewhat more flexible since it still includes class rank and types of courses in the calculations of each tier or ‘Band’. Each school is typically allotted so many recruits within each band each year. Criteria of each band are briefly highlighted below. A Band = 1) average SAT scores of 700+ 2) average SAT II scores of 710 3) GPA: 92+ 4) Top 5% with APs and Honors Classes B Band = 1) average SAT scores of 650+ 2) average SAT II scores of 640 3) GPA: 88+ 4) Top 15% with some AP and Honors courses C Band = 1) average SAT scores of 630+ 2) average SAT II scores of 600 3) GPA: 85+ 4) Top 20% with Honors courses These are realistic benchmarks to aim for academically, but the real tests come when you narrow down your search to a few candidates. As you communicate with coaches about your tennis abilities and accomplishments, they will want copies of your test scores and transcripts to run by their admissions office to determine if they will continue to call and offer you a dance card. As with all things in life, the college process is about finding a good match. These factors should help with a portion of that matchmaking.