How does an Ivy commit

You ask, how do you get a committment. The answer is, you don't. What you can do is have the coach speak with the athletic liason to the admissions committee (each year a member of the admissions committee is assigned this task). If you were interested in applying early decision (most of the Ivies) or early admissions (Harvard or Yale), the coach would show your application to the liason who would give an indication that you would probably or most likely be accepted by the admissions committee. The coach cannot guarantee you admissions, nor can the liason - they do not have the final say on admissions no matter how much the coach would like to think he does. The admissions committee acts separate and distinct from the athletic department although the members do take into consideration that a coach wants a kid and the number the student is given on the coach's wish list.

The coach will tell you that the best chance for admission will be the early procedure for admission...however if a student applies early to one Ivy program and for some reason is denied admission, he can still apply to all the other Ivies and/or continue discussions with the other coaches. Most of the positions on the Ivy teams are filled with early decision kids, but that is not to say that a few get accepted regular decision.

The Ivy system isn't the most fair in that a kid can get disappointed if he ultimately is not accepted, and thus he has no recourse - that is why when my son applied to Yale, and indication was made that he most probably would be accepted, he still was working on many other applications to be filed by January 1st just in case things didn't work out. There are never any guarantees in Ivy admissions - with or without the athletic tag.

Did you ever receive a likely letter

No, I never heard of anyone receiving a likely for the baseball team at Yale although I do think there was some discussion before the acceptance letter went out for one of the players who needed to find out the amount of financial aid that would be offered. Thus, I would assume such a discussion was a pretty good indicator that the player was going to be accepted - and yet, still no definitive statement from the admissions office.

I do know of a student - a nonathlete - at Dartmouth who received a likely letter and then was not accepted...this happened at our high school a while back...so that is why I say there are no promises until you see that acceptance in black and white.

NY MOM very accurately describes the process.

I have learned about some students that did receive likely letters. In conversations with coaches I learned that these are typically sent to a high level recruit who is receiving attractive athletic scholarship offers from other schools. Since the ED admission acceptance date is after the early signing date, the likely letter is used as a form of assurance that your application for admission will be accepted.

Having said that, nothing is firm until you receive the officail acceptance letter.

Keep in mind that the 'commitment' works both ways. Without the LOI any incoming athlete recruited into an Ivy school can change his mind and attend a different D1 school, accept scholarship money, and effect no penalties on himself or the 'new' school.

We ended up elsewhere and did not apply but were told by Dartmouth that if we applied ED by a certain date that they guaranteed an answer before the NLI date

I have another question is a coach bound by any NCAA rules for contact immediately following the official visit. Does he have to wait the 1 week period form date of last contact..

quote:

Originally posted by TKD:
I have another question is a coach bound by any NCAA rules for contact immediately following the official visit. Does he have to wait the 1 week period form date of last contact..

I spoke to a coach about this very thing ... his Compliance Officer at the college interpreted the NCAA regs as meaning once/week with the week starting on Monday. A call on Saturday and again on Tuesday would be acceptable under that interpretation.

Another colleges Compliance Officer may not interpret what the NCAA state the same way and hold them to a stricter standard ... for some reason, "clarity of intent" isn't a quality that the NCAA possesses.