As a prospective student athlete, it is critical to prioritize finding the colleges that align with your needs and career goals, regardless of sports considerations. Just like the college selection process for the non-athlete, the first step is to identify the factors that are most important to you. When looking at finding the best fit colleges, consider these factors:
- Academic | Examples include potential majors, rigor, class structure
- Physical | Distance from home, college size, size of city (big city, rural town, suburb, or college town), weather
- Social | Personality or academic traits of students on campus, sports culture, or school spirit
- Financial | Budget, merit scholarships, run net price calculators for colleges you’re interested in
For more information on finding your best fit, read this blog post.
Identify Your Sport Priorities
What are your feelings around playing in college?
- Very high priority, willing to compromise on some areas of best fit
- Would really like to play but college must have other factors first
- College priorities come first, sport is secondary, would be happy playing on a club team
Are you open to all levels of competition?
- Must cast a wide net: DI, DII, DIII, NAIA
- Are you ok sitting on the bench for 1 or 2 years, do you want to be playing year 1 or do you want to come in as a major contributor?
Research Teams
NCAA
NCAA Eligibility Center: look at classes and other requirements
https://www.ncaa.org/sports/2021/2/8/student-athletes-future.aspx
Search Schools
https://www.ncaa.org/sports/2021/5/3/membership-directory.aspx
NAIA
NAIA Eligibility Center
https://play.mynaia.org/
Search Schools
https://www.naia.org/schools/index
Evaluate Your Level of Play
- Discuss your interest in playing your sport in college with your club or high school coach
- Look at college rosters and review player backgrounds
- Watch colleges play, in person or many teams will live stream games
- Once you start reaching out to college coaches, which ones are responding with genuine interest?
Reach out to coaches via email and fill out prospect forms
- Create highlight videos: videos are very important
- Create athletic profile or add info. to your introduction email: include contact information (email, phone, position, graduation year, height/weight), academic information (GPA, test scores, course rigor, honors, awards)
- Write an introduction email: include your high school and club team information, how you spend your free time, what you hope to study in college, why you like their school, athletic profile information, and links to highlight videos
- The student is the only person communicating with the coach and is leading the process
Evaluate Responses
Does the coach send you a generic camp invite or do they send you a personal email? Either way, ask for a phone call (especially if you intend to spend money to travel to and attend their camp). Use this as an opportunity to build a relationship with the coach, ask questions about the program and school, and learn more about the environment.