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<p>They are beginning to get those deals.</p>
<p>Through the last few months, I began to wonder more and more why Ivy League coaches weren’t down here in the South actively pursuing athletes, especially football, but also swimming, baseball/softball and a few other sports that are particularly strong down here. Well they are, it is not just overly publicized yet. Close to 70% of the boys at my kids school play football - now certainly most are not good enough to play in college, even DIII or Ivy League, but some are, and some have the grades to go with it - multiply that by dozens of small schools and larger public schools in the South, and you have to have a resource for players.
We have 2 players in our city - one white, one black - signed by the same Ivy League school (I guess someone up North is thinking the way I am). Academically, they actually published the public school boy’s ACT score (by the way, he is white, but from “up the country” as we say) in the newspaper, which I didn’t agree with, so I won’t repeat, but he is in line to be sal at his high school (3-400 graduates). The Af-Am young man attends the OTHER private school, my kids’ school’s big rival, by report he is a bright young man, who while not sal at this more rigorous school, is doing well - his parents are not doctors or lawyers either.</p>
<p>There is no point to these anecdotes, other than I know from word of mouth and newspaper reports, that neither of these young men has test scores down in the 1100 range. I also wonder about their high school records and test scores predicting their chance of success - if they had not played football and been able to spend more time with academics, or if they had lived in an area where college admissions is a blood sport, how would they have fared?</p>
<p>I have no problem with Swat’s choice, I think other smaller schools may be forced into the same decision, and some may make that decision for philosophical reasons without too much “forcing”. I’m glad though, there still are schools that want to continue football, even if it plays havoc with their admit statistics, particularly if it does NOT play havoc with the graduation statistics - some kids do want a choice of a more traditional college experience.</p>
<p>By the way, the 2 guys I spoke of? They are headed to that school that is 7-53, they do not have SATs that are 400-500 points below the average (200 maybe, if they even took the SAT), and I’m very glad that young Mr. Williams is going to be on “our” side now, rather than running up and down the field against us as he has for the last four years ;).</p>