Did you use a counselor?

In terms of creating the initial list, the process for my 2012 and now my 2016 is going the same:

- ~50 schools with a mix of safety, likely, and stretch.  The list changes over time and will eventually get down to a a dozen or less.

- Have one or more knowledgeable coaches / scouts make an assessment as to what level they think sons can play.  Ultimately 2012 got a PG rating, so that helped focus us too.

- Start comparing schools with sons academic performance to date.  Match sons' PSAT/SAT, or ACT scores against the mid 50% (normal curve) of admits at a school.  So if a college's 50% ACT range is 30 - 34, and my kid has a 25, we punt that school.  But if we're in the ballpark (particularly if the score is within the 50% range or higher) we could keep the school.

- GPAs are very hard, if not impossible, to compare nationwide.  So that factored very little in the process.  We looked at a cumulative GPA of 3.0 as the floor to be considered at the most prestigious academic schools for my 2012 and that worked...for my 2016 that bar is much higher as he's not as strong a player.

- We knew a lot of schools regionally, and used other resources (coaches, friends, family, the Fiske Guide, Princeton Review guide, US News and Forbes college rankings, etc.) to add schools around the country.

Never had a counselor, but did have a lot of people (coaches, scouts, teachers, principals, et.al.) shoot straight with us about our sons' abilities both academically and athletically.  In my experience, those third parties helped us create vetted lists of schools that were targeted exactly where we should be looking.

Then we looked at the admissions side (admissions rep for our area, campus tour or orientation session, etc.) and the baseball side (the player needs to be seen by the coaches).  A lot of time and $$$.

JCG we did it all on our own. My son was borderline D1, high academic (borderline Ivy) and eventually went D3, primarily for academic/baseball compatibility reasons. He knew he wanted to go science engineering so at least for us it directed us toward schools that had his major, I actually came to the conclusion late in the process that D1 and science/engineering were generally incompatible, so I probably would have looked harder at D3 options sooner had we known this. 

It totally absorbed us as a family as we purchased the US News online subscription, Princeton,and several of the other school ranking books. Who is interested in your son more or less directs the process also, but this was from a D1 perspective, we started looking at D3's kind of late, and knowing what I know now we would have had more D3 schools on the prospect list. 

I am not sure if a service could help out because of the combination baseball/academics, but you do have to put a lot of time in; which I think also helps make sure your son/family really understands his choice with better clarity. If you don't have the time I could see a service helping make the large funnel smaller, but once you get down to 20 or so schools it really is on your shoulders.

My 2 cents. 

We were going to use a counselor, but by the time we got around to trying to hire one,  incredibly,  they were all booked.  We actually talked to something like fifteen different ones, none of whom had any more room for new clients.  Don't know what the demand for these services is like in other areas of the country, but in ours where too many people have too much money to burn, the demand is super high -- and the services are pretty costly.  

Our guy was a particular challenge because of a combination of not elite academics, a desire to study multimedia art (at which he is very talented)  and a desire to play baseball.   We did an awful lot of research on schools that might be a good fit for him on all fronts. We also did an awful  lot of reaching out to coaches, once it became crystal clear that D3 was the main option.  He also did an  awful lot of work on his portfolio (for the few places for which he had to submit one).  He also worked really hard on his many essays -- which,  given his middling academics,  turned out to be really, really crucial, I believe.  

I have to say the  kid was actually exhausted by the end of it.  So were we. It took an awful  lot of parental pushing to keep him on task, on schedule, and focused on telling a compelling story about himself. A counselor would probably have played the role of overseer that ending up falling to the parents much better than the parents did, but it would have been pretty costly to get the same level of focus that we brought to it out of a paid professional.  

We did not use one for baseball playing S but did use one for non-collegiate athlete D.

For S, he was required, however, to complete a full application (essays included). I thought his essays were barely ok, but he wasn't competing with regular applicants for a spot in his D1. D3, however, would have been a different situation; because admissions to D3s are much more uncertain, if we were heading in that direction we would have used a counselor.

We found that the money spent on D was well worth it - there was no tension about deadlines for writing, LOR, etc., and she could be very candid with the counselor. If you have the money, getting rid of the tension which can accompany the application process may be worth it depending upon family dynamics.

One real wild card in speaking with Ds counselor in later years about some athlete-clients is the fact that many counselors really don't inderstand the athletic component of the process. They may be experts about dealing with regular students and admissions, but have no or limited knowledge about athletic recruits.

There are definitely counselors who specialize in different kinds of students. Some of the folks we talked to were very knowledgeable about the arts.  others knowledgeable about athletics.   Hard to find one that is a jack of all special trades, as it were.   One of the reasons we didn't end up working with one is because we started out talking with with someone with a strong focus on the arts angle and we thought maybe we could just take care  of the baseball angle ourselves.  But then we decided we need to someone with wider expertise who could help us with the many sided puzzle that was our son.   But by then it was too late.  They were all taken. 

College counselors exist that have knowledge about athletic recruits whether D1, D2, D3, NAIA or Juco. Whether to use one or not depends upon your level of comfort with and time available to deal with all aspects of the admissions process.  A good college counselor will, ideally, have had experience with your student's interest (athletics, art, STEM, whatever). A good college counselor can  organize your deadlines, essays, tests, tours, interviews, etc. If there is any potential for merit aid, then money spent early on properly identifying the intersection of your student's academic and athletic abilities will be money well spent. Finally, who doesn't want that last year the student is at home to be relatively stress-free!  (Emphasis on the 'relatively'...seniors are teenagers, right!)  

Thanks for the replies, guys.  Very helpful.

We did use a college adviser/financial planner for our son.Not exactly a counselor but performed many of same roles (he looked at essays, etc) He has provided us with a better blueprint for how to pay/get loans for college. My wife and I think it has been well worth it and our guy also happened to be a former college D3 baseball coach so he was extremely helpful with lots of tips. Heck, just having them help fill out the financial aid application was worth it - that is a nightmare of paperwork.

My son has recently committed to go to Rose Hulman this coming fall.

No, we did not use a private councelor.  We did a lot of reading and networking.  Yes baseball and academics made it much more difficult due to oldest son's requirements.  My wife and I thought we could do a better job on our own.  Nobody was going to work harder (researching, etc) to get the best results for my son than the two of us, and I think we proved it.

If I could do it all over again, I wouldn't change a thing.  JMO.