Swarthmore

My latest communication with the coach through my PREP program has these notes attached:

Academic Standards-- We look for kids who sit in the 1900-2400 range on the new SAT (there are obviously exceptions sometimes but for the most part, that is where we look) and at about a 32 on the ACT. Applicants are typically top 5-10 percent of their HS class with multiple AP courses.2011 needs: we are, like everyone, always looking for pitching. We will also be looking to bring in 1 catcher and an impact bat that can play the outfield. A 1B/3B guy would also be a fit for us.We do not look for anything specific in terms of athletic numbers, but guys who can run sub 7.1 are always good in the OF. We mainly look for quality athletes who can fit in to the type of game we play here.This summer we will have coaches at Columbia's summer camp, Browns Summer camp, Penn's summer camp, Princeton's camp, as well as Selectfest, Top 96 Academic East, Top 96 New York (at Fordham in July), Lehigh's camp, Headfirst Long Island in June, and both sessions of Headfirst on Long Island in August. Events we host: We will be holding a camp in October of '10.

- Side notes: Coach Exeter is one of the truly great people. The facilities are top notch for a DIII. The professor to student ratio is one of the best. The campus is beautiful and the academic reputation is wonderful. I would not however expect admissions to lower their standards for an athlete.

Rambler:

Everything that Ozone posted seems to be right on with my son's experience being recruited there a couple of years ago. Coach Exeter is another one of the great people we met during the recruitment process. The facilities were very nice and the coaching staff works around the academic demands of Swarthmore. The school is supporting the baseball programs in a lot of ways but make no mistake, you have to be able to get by admissions on your own.

It is a great school where you can have a great college baseball experience.

Rightyshortstop is a freshman at Swarthmore which he chose over low D1 and Ivy opportunities. The program is definitely up and coming, Coach Exeter is an excellent teacher and my son is having a fantastic experience. The baseball players tend to join a fraternity that has had SEVERAL Nobel prize winners as members along with Lee McPhail (ex-president of the American League and long time Yankee exec.), and former Pirate, Dick Hall, etc. (another old Pirate, Bob Friend, joked that Dick Hall was "The smartest guy ever to play major league baseball...He once spent a rain delay calculating how much water the infield tarp was holding")

Swarthmore is a serious academic place and the kids are working very hard at both baseball and schoolwork. They had a great season last year, and a very strong recruiting class this year (of course I'm going to say that - I'm a DAD of a freshman!). Coach Exeter is the kind of guy that recruits athletes and turns them into baseball players. The centerfielder came in as a pitcher, the 2B came in as a catcher, etc. They play an aggressive speed game. Send me a PM and I can tell you everything you need to know. Swarthmore is an intense academic place that is now taking its sports very seriously. The s****r team was ranked #1 in D3 for several weeks and the Volleyball team is in the finals of the ECAC tournament tomorrow. The baseball team feels like they can make the NCAA tournament this year, but I know Haverdad and Haverson are going to have something to say about that. Beating Hopkins is the immediate goal. The final kicker for RightyShortstop was that Swarthmore was the prettiest campus we visited on "the trail".

Thanks for the information, everyone. As always, great information on here. How did folks weave their way through this process of finding out information (good or bad) on programs before boards like these?

Sounds like things are looking up for Swarthmore baseball.

Lefty, if I find some time, a PM might be coming your way. Thanks for your offer of help!

Improving baseball program - no doubt.

Is it true that top programs like Swarthmore and Heverford do not generally give academic scholarships, only financial need?

quote:

Originally posted by BK35:
Is it true that top programs like Swarthmore and Heverford do not generally give academic scholarships, only financial need?

That is true - many / most of the top tier Ivy-level / little Ivy / elite LA Colleges have a philosophy that all funds offered to students should be on the basis of need, not academic merit.'
They feel the funds should go to provide access for those who might not otherwise be able to attend.

It's true - need based only. My son just turned down Coach Decker and Coach Lambert at Trinity because there was no way to financially pull it off. Too bad. The Coaches are great people and it's a great program.

Programs at the DIII level cannot offer athletic based financial aid. This is part of the NCAA requirements at the DIII level.
The Ivy's and Patriot Leagues are DI level programs which are permitted to offer athletic scholarships, by NCAA Rule, but choose not to do so.

I would like to make a very important point here. The top LAC's (Williams, Amherst, Swarthmore, etc)have very large endowments. For instance, the Swarthmore endowment at nearly $1.5 billion which translates to almost $1,000,000 per student. This compares favorably to the Ivy league with the important difference being that the top LAC's use the money to support ONLY undergraduate education! The Ivy's and other well endowed private universities are also using the endowment to fund research and graduate school projects.

More importantly, at these schools financial aid is a consequence of admittance not academic or athletic achievement (those are assumed). When a coach has a significant need for a game changing player the school, within reason, is willing to support the coach in this way by supporting the player in admissions. If the admission rate at a top LAC is 15% a coach can change the odds considerably. The player is then entitled to financial aid that wouldn't be available, even as baseball money, at a big time D1 school. Swarthmore says that every dollar of demonstrated need will be delivered as aid (no loans), so you can't lose that money by hitting .150 or blowing out your knee. Most players on the Swarthmore team (equal to the larger Swarthmore student body) are receiving some form of financial aid. The average aid and scholarship award to the 70% of Swarthmore students that receive grants equals $34,000! All this information is available on the website of any school you are applying to. We did the math before RightyShortstop committed anywhere.

Geez - I have to edit these things before I post them! Sorry about the typo's above. Can't type and eat at the same time!

quote:

Swarthmore says that every dollar of demonstrated need will be delivered as aid

Swarthmore says that every dollar of demonstrated need will be delivered as aid

Yes that's true. You still have to demonstrate need. If you work through the FAFSA worksheet it is astounding what the EFC can be.

quote:

Swarthmore says that every dollar of demonstrated need will be delivered as aid

Yes that's true. You still have to demonstrate need. If you work through the FAFSA worksheet it is astounding what the EFC can be.

Thats the problem. We will not qualify for financial aid based on FAFSA. We cant swing the $50K per year that Swarthmore, Haverford and the NESCAC schools charge per year but love the idea of going to school and playing baseball at that type of school.

I would suggest serious consideration of applying Early Decision for any interested student-athlete. Coach Exeter really wants kids on his team who really want to be there. The more of his targeted player he gets via ED the less interest, and therefore less pull with admissions, there is in those that apply regular decision.

Early on, schools of Swarthmore's ilk were my target because I wanted to attend school in the Northeast. My early favorite was Haverford, Swarthmore's sister school, and I really loved the place. My number 2 was Wesleyan in Connecticut, and I also gave Trinity a look. However, I met the same issues that have been mentioned here. My family qualified for a bit of need aid, but not nearly enough for us to be able to afford going to each school. Calling each financial aid office got us a little more, but still not close to enough. Several even conceded that they had no idea how someone with our income could contribute what was expected, but the decision was out of the speaker's hands.

You don't have to forget the idea of attending an LAC, though. There are great LACs, especially outside of the Northeast, that do give merit aid and are much less formula based with their aid. As many know here, I'm attending Rhodes College in Memphis, TN where I received a great merit award that made college an experience that didn't come along with debt. While I'm open to responding to PMs and forum posts about Rhodes, I'll leave my self promotion at that. There are many other great schools that similarly offer merit aid. Some that I experienced were Grinnell, Illinois Wesleyan, and Washington and Lee. Here's a thread at College Confidential where an attempt was made to list schools that gave generous merit aid - LINK. The beginning of the thread has some outdated info (what stuck out to me was the mention of UChicago, who no longer gives out merit aid to undergrads) but overall it is a great resource and is kept updated and might help you look at schools that can help your son get things paid for.