How to determine if you have received the perfect offer
So, you have determined what your perfect offer would be based on what you want and what you think you need. Now you need to figure out if those opportunities are going to be realistic. Can you get into the schools? Is the coach looking for you? If not, then you need to reshuffle and rethink and potentially target different schools if you are eligible.
When it comes to a perfect offer or any offer, there are six factors that everything will be dependent upon. Firstly, your academic history, your particular subjects. Student always before athlete. The second factor is your high school academic results and how does that put you on the spectrum when it comes to the US four-point scale.
Do you have an SAT or an ACT score? If so, what is that and where does that put you in the overall spectrum of test-takers from around the world? The fourth factor is your recent athletic history. What have you been doing over the last few years? What level are you competing at in the recent past? The fifth one is good video footage. What you are doing in the footage that really showcases yourself in a positive way.
Is the footage highlighting your best characteristics and assets as a student athlete? Is it showcasing you and the range of abilities that you’ve got? Those are the five things that are somewhat in your control. One factor that is completely out of your control is what the coach actually needs, and what he/she thinks of you.
These six things really determine everything. There may be a school that is perfect in every aspect for you. You have done all the research; your grades are spot on which could essentially mean that you could get some academic scholarship.
Your SAT score is great. You have some awesome video footage that looks really good and shows everything you needed to show and you are a really good athlete. But there is that one factor that you are not in control of – Does the coach believe all that?
Does the coach think that you are going to be a good asset? Because if the coach doesn’t think that, then you’re not going to get an offer. That is just the way that college recruitment works. A lot of families are working within a set financial parameter. Costs are influenced by the six factors mentioned.
Your grades from high school, your GPA and your SAT score can result in an academic scholarship, which brings costs down. If the coach deems you are worthy of a scholarship or wants to give you a scholarship, then of course cost can come down.
A lot of the time you won’t know the costs until you have gone through an application process or you have spoken with coaches to get an idea about the full costs. Firstly, what you need to do is determine what you want and determine what you are eligible for. We can quickly determine a student athlete’s eligibility for schools and divisions and conferences. We will give you honest feedback of where we believe you are at as well.
That is straightforward and through research, you can determine your own eligibility easily as well, and then determine what you want and where you believe your perfect offer will come from. How do you go about that? You research. When you determine what it is that you’re eligible for and what you want, you need to put all all your information in a centralized location. You need all those six factors mentioned. It is collating everything that a program needs to know into one place – your academic history, your grade reports nine through 12/13.
That is what a school is going to be able to look at and determine your GPA to then determine your academic scholarship read. Once calculated, you can then start looking at schools where your GPA and your grades are going to reward you based on your subjects.
Also, your SAT scores, teachers’ references, coaching references, your athletic history, awards, accomplishments, honours, where you’ve played, what level that is and where that sits in your particular country, information that can back up what you have said on your page. Being able to prove your results and what you have said on the pages is important. What we do for our athletes at IAM360 is we put that all into a profile with what they want to study and where they are at. We compile everything into one place so that it is easy for you to always reference, but it is also very easy for prospective coaches to look at and reference.
What you are trying to do is prove that you are the right fit for a particular school. Although it’s still up to the coach and they make the final decision, everything is in one centralized location. If everything on your side is perfect, you may have a chance of landing your perfect offer. The only limiting factor that you have got is the admission standard for a particular school. If you focus your energy on schools that you know that you can get into, that you deem is perfect, then you are more than likely going to get in and be a full-time collegiate athlete.
You need to be someone that the coach feels is going to help that program. Then it comes down to the affordability factor. If the perfect offer does not meet the financial side of things then it is never going to work. Cost is something you won’t really know until those later stages. Unless you have done research beforehand and can determine the affordability of the school and then proceed with it if it is in your budget.
The more money that a family has to spend, the more options they have got and the higher the chance that you have of landing your perfect offer. If you want something that you cannot afford, but everything else is good, you are not going to get over that hurdle if it is not financially doable.