Do athletics play a role in admissions?

pwoods
Wed, 27 Jul 2011 02:28:09 +0000

“He has gotten many, many letters from Harvard and Princeton expressing their interest in him playing football for their schools. He’s not choosing either of them because he’s gotten offers from schools that are more sports oriented and have better football programs.”

This is why it’s (relatively) easy to get recruited at an Ivy League school. Their sports programs are DI almost by default—since they’re in the Ivy League—but the majority of the student body cares much more about academics (and other ECs) than sports, and the school only cares about sports to the extent that they keep their DI rating and get old alums to donate. It’s not like, I don’t know, some powerhouse football school (seriously, I can’t think of one…Michigan maybe? Ohio? I don’t follow NCAA football!) where the football team is the most powerful institution on campus.