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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Somewhat off-topic, but given that the HW data appears to exclude athletes, how much does being an athlete help? [b]If my kid wants to go to, say, Harvard, does a sport only help if he is otherwise on equal footing? Or instead of having a 4.0, how low could the GPA go? If you are talking about a state school, would it change? Anyone have insight? [/b][/quote]

Being an athlete only helps a lot if you are actively recruited by the coach for that sport (and for a specific position they need). Different sports get different numbers of slots (eg football gets more than diving), and there are different number of slots for each position because you need all positions to field a competitive team.

Part of the Varsity Blues scandal was they were paying coaches to "recruit" their kids for specific teams and positions, eg paying the crew coach to hold a coxswain position for their kid or paying the football coach to hold a kicker spot for their kid.

Giant state schools will often have more slots and will not be as strict about academics compared to Ivy schools--though there are still minimums. But the athletic standards will be much higher to get recruited if it's a competitive big state school. So the average basketball recruit at UConn will have a much better basketball recruiting profile but lower academic numbers. Not always, but on average.

Also, Ivy league schools don't give scholarships and don't tie anything to you playing. Which means you could be recruited for basketball but quit or get hurt and there would be no implications. At state schools, there are usually scholarships tied to your playing.

In some sports, a trend has been to do a postgraduate year  in order to prepare the kid for recruiting for specific positions--either to improve the atheltic profile, the academic profile, or both. In hockey,  it's common to do a postgrad year at a boarding school in order to prepare for recruiting. In some other sports, you can do a postgrad year at IMG academy to prepare for recruiting.[/quote]

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