Why do elite SLACs and Small R1s value athletic recruits

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was watching another thread where moms were arguing back and forth over athletic recruiting and it seemed like both neither side was talking about what I think is the real question. Why do they place so much value on them? It's not just the top SLACs, (they are very heavy on recruits) but it is the smaller R1s as well. MIT, Chicago, JHU, WashU, Rochester, etc. all recruit a large number of athletes. NYU as well. These[b] schools obviously see great value in athletic recruiting, what are we missing?

It is still too much, but JHU is 10% athletes (Rochester is 9%) while Williams is over a third. In that sense, your R1 analogy falls flat.
https://ope.ed.gov/athletics/#/institution/details

Their analogy doesn’t fall flat, it’s just that the schools are larger. MIT has the largest athletics program in D3. JHU, WashU, Emory, and MIT compete against Williams, Amherst, Middlebury and W&L for the top spots in D3 year after year. They are all very serious about athletics.

Oh, OK, I guess they are the same after all — 3-4X the proportion means nothing. Carry on!

Nobody is talking about proportion, the OP was asking about importance and athletics success are just as important at these schools as at the top SLACs based on how much effort they put into fielding the best teams in the country. Carry on!

OP was asking about recruits = admissions. It is in the thread title, kiddo.

[Anonymous]

Athletics have been a fabric of these colleges since they were founded. An important part of American culture. Who wouldn’t want that at their campus.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was watching another thread where moms were arguing back and forth over athletic recruiting and it seemed like both neither side was talking about what I think is the real question. Why do they place so much value on them? It's not just the top SLACs, (they are very heavy on recruits) but it is the smaller R1s as well. MIT, Chicago, JHU, WashU, Rochester, etc. all recruit a large number of athletes. NYU as well. These[b] schools obviously see great value in athletic recruiting, what are we missing?

It is still too much, but JHU is 10% athletes (Rochester is 9%) while Williams is over a third. In that sense, your R1 analogy falls flat.
https://ope.ed.gov/athletics/#/institution/details

Their analogy doesn’t fall flat, it’s just that the schools are larger. MIT has the largest athletics program in D3. JHU, WashU, Emory, and MIT compete against Williams, Amherst, Middlebury and W&L for the top spots in D3 year after year. They are all very serious about athletics.

Oh, OK, I guess they are the same after all — 3-4X the proportion means nothing. Carry on!

Nobody is talking about proportion, the OP was asking about importance and athletics success are just as important at these schools as at the top SLACs based on how much effort they put into fielding the best teams in the country. Carry on!

OP was asking about recruits = admissions. It is in the thread title, kiddo.

“Why do they value athletic recruits” says nothing about admissions. All of these schools obviously recruit heavily based on their success and the chatter on this board.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was watching another thread where moms were arguing back and forth over athletic recruiting and it seemed like both neither side was talking about what I think is the real question. Why do they place so much value on them? It's not just the top SLACs, (they are very heavy on recruits) but it is the smaller R1s as well. MIT, Chicago, JHU, WashU, Rochester, etc. all recruit a large number of athletes. NYU as well. These[b] schools obviously see great value in athletic recruiting, what are we missing?

It is still too much, but JHU is 10% athletes (Rochester is 9%) while Williams is over a third. In that sense, your R1 analogy falls flat.
https://ope.ed.gov/athletics/#/institution/details

Their analogy doesn’t fall flat, it’s just that the schools are larger. MIT has the largest athletics program in D3. JHU, WashU, Emory, and MIT compete against Williams, Amherst, Middlebury and W&L for the top spots in D3 year after year. They are all very serious about athletics.

Oh, OK, I guess they are the same after all — 3-4X the proportion means nothing. Carry on!

Nobody is talking about proportion, the OP was asking about importance and athletics success are just as important at these schools as at the top SLACs based on how much effort they put into fielding the best teams in the country. Carry on!

OP was asking about recruits = admissions. It is in the thread title, kiddo.

“Why do they value athletic recruits” says nothing about admissions. All of these schools obviously recruit heavily based on their success and the chatter on this board.

You got me again! So much “chatter.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was watching another thread where moms were arguing back and forth over athletic recruiting and it seemed like both neither side was talking about what I think is the real question. Why do they place so much value on them? It's not just the top SLACs, (they are very heavy on recruits) but it is the smaller R1s as well. MIT, Chicago, JHU, WashU, Rochester, etc. all recruit a large number of athletes. NYU as well. These[b] schools obviously see great value in athletic recruiting, what are we missing?

It is still too much, but JHU is 10% athletes (Rochester is 9%) while Williams is over a third. In that sense, your R1 analogy falls flat.
https://ope.ed.gov/athletics/#/institution/details

Their analogy doesn’t fall flat, it’s just that the schools are larger. MIT has the largest athletics program in D3. JHU, WashU, Emory, and MIT compete against Williams, Amherst, Middlebury and W&L for the top spots in D3 year after year. They are all very serious about athletics.

Oh, OK, I guess they are the same after all — 3-4X the proportion means nothing. Carry on!

Nobody is talking about proportion, the OP was asking about importance and athletics success are just as important at these schools as at the top SLACs based on how much effort they put into fielding the best teams in the country. Carry on!

OP was asking about recruits = admissions. It is in the thread title, kiddo.

“Why do they value athletic recruits” says nothing about admissions. All of these schools obviously recruit heavily based on their success and the chatter on this board.

You got me again! So much “chatter.”

I’m actually curious about what people think about this. Why do the most academically elite small schools work so hard to field athletic teams that match their USNWR rankings?

You my dear are just a tool.

[Anonymous]

What is to say the recruited athletes also don’t have strong academic stats? Athletes demonstrate hard work, perseverance, dedication, and leadership skills.

They also have higher graduation rates, donate more as alumni, and the stronger teams are good PR for the schools and build school spirit, some sports are revenue generating while others have higher overall GPAs.

Schools want diverse communities that include athletes, artists, and musicians. If you don’t like that model, many European colleges offer straight academics.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What is to say the recruited athletes also don’t have strong academic stats? Athletes demonstrate hard work, perseverance, dedication, and leadership skills.

They also have higher graduation rates, donate more as alumni, and the stronger teams are good PR for the schools and build school spirit, some sports are revenue generating while others have higher overall GPAs.

Schools want diverse communities that include athletes, artists, and musicians. If you don’t like that model, many European colleges offer straight academics.

Exactly. These colleges like the kind of people these athletes tend to be and want them on their campuses. They know that kids involved in athletics frequently go on to be successful in life.

“A strong mind in a strong body” is a common saying that expresses characteristics that many western colleges highly value. Thus, it is not the least bit surprising that liberal arts colleges recruit athletes to be part of their college community.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think for the SLACs, it helps bring in men. Especially straight non artsy ones. And full pay families who want their son to play college lacrosse.

Recruiting men, rather than NCAA athletes of both genders, is more effective at bringing in men. If you want non-artsy ones, then weigh artsy ECs negatively and non-artsy ECs like boy scouts and sports (of all kinds, not just NCAA-approved ones) and going to the gym and hiking etc more positively.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:University of Texas (Austin) has 581 athletes — and 39,600 undergrads.
Williams College has 680 athletes — and 2,100 undergrads.

I think you meant 691 athletes at UT Austin, and I wonder how much you know about the costs of and emphasis on the mens’ football program at Texas?

At least that brings in money and has a school spirit benefit. The campus of Williams does not go into a frenzy when the lacrosse team is playing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I live in the DMV but work for a small PA college that recently added a football team. Athletics are great for recruiting non-athlete students. It's one of those things that some student are interested in, as part of their college experience, even if they don't play. The year after the team was added, applications to the college went up significantly.

While students may have applied to that school because of their football team, I can assure you virtually none of the non-recruited-athletes accepted by Williams chose to apply to and attend Williams because of their D3 football team.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What is to say the recruited athletes also don’t have strong academic stats? Athletes demonstrate hard work, perseverance, dedication, and leadership skills.

They also have higher graduation rates, donate more as alumni, and the stronger teams are good PR for the schools and build school spirit, some sports are revenue generating while others have higher overall GPAs.

Schools want diverse communities that include athletes, artists, and musicians. If you don’t like that model, many European colleges offer straight academics.

If the athletes had the academic stats, there would be no reason to recruit them, and schools could just have a walk-on team for each sport. There's a reason universities don't do this and instead recruit for NCAA sports.

Playing team esports also demonstrates hard work, perseverance, dedication, and leadership skills, but virtually no one recruits for that. So does FIRST robotics. No recruitment. So does polo. No recruitment. Clearly, none of these factors are the cause for why a very small set of extracurricular activities are so much more highly valued than others.

The only thing that seems to distinguish these activities from others is that they fall under NCAA. But what that has to do with why universities recruit for them is still a mystery to me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What is to say the recruited athletes also don’t have strong academic stats? Athletes demonstrate hard work, perseverance, dedication, and leadership skills.

They also have higher graduation rates, donate more as alumni, and the stronger teams are good PR for the schools and build school spirit, some sports are revenue generating while others have higher overall GPAs.

Schools want diverse communities that include athletes, artists, and musicians. If you don’t like that model, many European colleges offer straight academics.

Exactly. These colleges like the kind of people these athletes tend to be and want them on their campuses. They know that kids involved in athletics frequently go on to be successful in life.

“A strong mind in a strong body” is a common saying that expresses characteristics that many western colleges highly value. Thus, it is not the least bit surprising that liberal arts colleges recruit athletes to be part of their college community.

This is a great reason for admissions highly valuing all kinds of sports as a valuable EC in a holistic context. It does not explain why there needs to be a special backdoor for a specific set of sports but not others.

Why wrestling, but not Judo or Brazillian Jiu Jitsu? Why lacrosse, but not polo? Why swimming, but not synchronized swimming or water polo? Why skiing and ice skating but not luging or speed skating? Why snowboarding but not skateboarding? Why ice hockey but not curling?

Is there a significant difference in who the former vs the latter tend to be? Obviously not. Are only the former capable of building a strong body? Obviously not. Your justification clearly does not work.

[Anonymous]

Many jobs/employers also want athletes. For example I know NASA prefers athletes (at any level) because it demonstrates the ability to work on a team.

[Anonymous]

Our kid is being recruited by some highly selective slac schools. 1550 SAT, top 5 percent in highly selective public, most rigorous curriculum, other extracurricular and leadership besides the sport. Basically the kid has the stats to have a chance anywhere, and without the sport, probably would end up at an Ivy. But I have a feeling the kid will choose the slac the kid wants to keep competing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Athletics have been a fabric of these colleges since they were founded. An important part of American culture. Who wouldn’t want that at their campus.

This. "Mens sana in corpore sano" . . . also a thing in the elite prep schools that traditionally fed elite colleges (and pedagogical canon that dates back to ancient times).