Anonymous wrote:Amherst is a hard sell even for students who fit the mold. Remember, we are seeing kids who were locked up for two years of their lives getting to leave home. Locked up at Amherst would look very different than being locked up at Vandy, Emory, Duke, or anything in the northeast.

This makes absolutely zero sense.

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Anonymous wrote:The article was anti recruiting athletes. As an experiment Amherst should just forgo recruiting athletes and fill all of their varsity sports with walk-ons. I suspect that they would lose very game, Donations would plummet, and school spirit would die.

This would mean that elite academic applicants would start applying ED again. They don’t now because ED is a disadvantage (majority accepted ED are athletes); they apply to lower Ivies, the Chicagos and Vandys of the world - and they get in. By the time RD comes around, they are gone. You used to find geniuses at Amherst and Williams; those days are gone.

There are plenty of genius students at Amherst, Bowdoin, Middlebury, Williams, etc. It's actually easier now than in the past. 20 years ago the NESCAC schools had more athletic recruits than they do now and there was no uniform system for standards. You letting your feelings about athletics cloud your judgement.

Recruiting classes are also more diverse than in the past though this is still a sometimes fair criticism.

For what it is worth, my son's experience was that the academic requirements for athletes to be admitted to a NESCAC were rigorous. He is class of 2026 and was interested in two NESCAC schools, and at both schools the coach told him he was at the top of the recruiting class athletically, but at both schools he failed the admissions pre-read, and they stopped recruiting him. He had 1400 SATs on his first take, mostly A's from a good public school, but few AP classes, which both admissions offices said was his downfall. He ended up committing to play his sport at a D1 program at a school based in the south, larger than NESCACs, with less demanding academics, and more conservative social culture, which is an all round better fit for him. So our family is happy with the end result. But my takeaway that that in order to play a sport at a NESCAC, you have to be very close to a NESCAC level student to get in the door.

Amherst is a hard sell even for students who fit the mold. Remember, we are seeing kids who were locked up for two years of their lives getting to leave home. Locked up at Amherst would look very different than being locked up at Vandy, Emory, Duke, or anything in the northeast.

Anonymous wrote:The article was anti recruiting athletes. As an experiment Amherst should just forgo recruiting athletes and fill all of their varsity sports with walk-ons. I suspect that they would lose very game, Donations would plummet, and school spirit would die.

This would mean that elite academic applicants would start applying ED again. They don’t now because ED is a disadvantage (majority accepted ED are athletes); they apply to lower Ivies, the Chicagos and Vandys of the world - and they get in. By the time RD comes around, they are gone. You used to find geniuses at Amherst and Williams; those days are gone.

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Anonymous wrote:This is very funny. This is why I sent all my children to Williams.

At least at Williams, we win the Directors Cup.

Indeed you do. And it is something that so many posters on this thread will never understand.

Me being one of them.

Is a "Directors Cup" some kid of prize for D3 students?

It's a prize for D1, D2 and D3 based on the school that has the best overall sports teams each year.

Nobody pays much attention to D2 sports because they are typically a wasteland from both an athletic and an academic POV but it is very big for D1 and D3 programs. Horror of horrors Stanford dominates D1 and Williams dominates D3 though Emory, JHU, Middlebury, and Tufts have also won. The directors cup is a major reason why you will not see smaller sports programs cut at these schools. Stanford took a lot of heat when they tried to cut some programs awhile ago and quickly reinstated them.

Williams did dominate D3...but hasn't won it since 2019 (there were no winners for 2020 and 2021 due to Covid) and then it was Tufts, JHU, JHU and Emory.

Not sure if there is now a shift where the larger D3 schools will tend to win it or not, though that is certainly the trend for the last 4 years, and I would imagine will probably be repeated this upcoming year since Emory men's soccer made it to the D3 semis and women's soccer made it to the D3 finals...and Tufts men's soccer won the D3 championship and WashU women won the D3 championship.

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Anonymous wrote:This is very funny. This is why I sent all my children to Williams.

At least at Williams, we win the Directors Cup.

Indeed you do. And it is something that so many posters on this thread will never understand.

Me being one of them.

Is a "Directors Cup" some kid of prize for D3 students?

It's a prize for D1, D2 and D3 based on the school that has the best overall sports teams each year.

Nobody pays much attention to D2 sports because they are typically a wasteland from both an athletic and an academic POV but it is very big for D1 and D3 programs. Horror of horrors Stanford dominates D1 and Williams dominates D3 though Emory, JHU, Middlebury, and Tufts have also won. The directors cup is a major reason why you will not see smaller sports programs cut at these schools. Stanford took a lot of heat when they tried to cut some programs awhile ago and quickly reinstated them.

Thank you for defending the kids who represent these schools beyond the classroom. Better yet the kids who can do both!

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Anonymous wrote:Also every so often these slac schools use sports to increase their chances of gettting a top student.

My kids has 1580 SAT, 4.7 GPA, and will have 15 AP courses after senior year. Great leadership in a few different other areas besides the sport. Great service. Definitely a narrative. Ivy legacy.

But the kid wants to play the sport so it is looking like NESCAC or UAA league as not good enough to play at the Ivy.

This happens, but I doubt that often. More anecdata: a student-athlete classmate was talking about their 32 ACT and 3s on AP exams, in the context of saying how well prepared they felt for Amherst. Shortly after, they dropped the upper-level science class both had signed up for. My kid was a little perplexed about how the classmate was admitted in the first place. I had to explain athletes aren't necessarily held to the same standard they were. This was not a FGLI or URM.

Yea, well, your kid needs to get over their jealousy or insecurity or whatever it is when it comes to athletes. There’s no shame in having to drop an “upper level science class” at any top school no matter what your ACT score is.

You think my kid is jealous or insecure? They felt sorry for the other kid, who seemed over their head academically and off to a rough start. It's tough on the kids who are less well prepared academically, but hopefully it will work out for them.

Sure, a 32 ACT score is the mark of an absolute dumbass, right PP?

Reality is the athlete probably achieved their 32 and 3’s without resorting to tutors, prep classes, and spending most of their waking hours studying. Many of your kids might look better on paper (STATS!) but wouldn’t come out ahead in an IQ test against this kid.

Maybe "achieved" is the wrong word here.

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Anonymous wrote:Also every so often these slac schools use sports to increase their chances of gettting a top student.

My kids has 1580 SAT, 4.7 GPA, and will have 15 AP courses after senior year. Great leadership in a few different other areas besides the sport. Great service. Definitely a narrative. Ivy legacy.

But the kid wants to play the sport so it is looking like NESCAC or UAA league as not good enough to play at the Ivy.

This happens, but I doubt that often. More anecdata: a student-athlete classmate was talking about their 32 ACT and 3s on AP exams, in the context of saying how well prepared they felt for Amherst. Shortly after, they dropped the upper-level science class both had signed up for. My kid was a little perplexed about how the classmate was admitted in the first place. I had to explain athletes aren't necessarily held to the same standard they were. This was not a FGLI or URM.

Yea, well, your kid needs to get over their jealousy or insecurity or whatever it is when it comes to athletes. There’s no shame in having to drop an “upper level science class” at any top school no matter what your ACT score is.

You think my kid is jealous or insecure? They felt sorry for the other kid, who seemed over their head academically and off to a rough start. It's tough on the kids who are less well prepared academically, but hopefully it will work out for them.

Sure, a 32 ACT score is the mark of an absolute dumbass, right PP?

Reality is the athlete probably achieved their 32 and 3’s without resorting to tutors, prep classes, and spending most of their waking hours studying. Many of your kids might look better on paper (STATS!) but wouldn’t come out ahead in an IQ test against this kid.

People are putting down athletes because it feels unfair that they are held to a different standard for the same outcome.

And that there is an entry to college that isn't solely academic.

But honestly, no one prohibited your kid from squash/soccer/lacrosse/swimming....why didn't your kid get better at sports if they wanted to go to Amherst?

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Anonymous wrote:This is very funny. This is why I sent all my children to Williams.

At least at Williams, we win the Directors Cup.

Indeed you do. And it is something that so many posters on this thread will never understand.

Me being one of them.

Is a "Directors Cup" some kid of prize for D3 students?

It's a prize for D1, D2 and D3 based on the school that has the best overall sports teams each year.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is very funny. This is why I sent all my children to Williams.

At least at Williams, we win the Directors Cup.

Indeed you do. And it is something that so many posters on this thread will never understand.

Me being one of them.

Is a "Directors Cup" some kid of prize for D3 students?

The best thing about this thread is the fallacy that athletes can not be smart. I went to Amherst. My brother, who played football at Cornell, had higher grades and scores than I. Both are possible. All it takes is one.

Every school has a budget. Money is allocated each year across many areas, including sports and other non-academic activities. Families have often endowed these programs in perpetuity, never having participated themselves, whether it be the concert hall, a pool, a hockey rink, etc. Why? Schools need well-rounded students. Schools need lessons beyond the classroom. Guess what? They are right.