I (not infrequently) see parents pay a travel coach a lot of money assuming that he/she will get their daughter recruited regardless of her academic status or the recruiting work she's done (or not done) on her own behalf. And of course, almost every person in the stands knows of a player who was "magically" recruited simply by being seen somewhere playing on her travel team. (Or at least that's what her parents told you happened!)
So, you put 2 and 2 together--e.g., your player is as good as this or that player is, and your travel coach promised you'd be seen by colleges in all the right places—and it all totaled up to 4! SO...now you expect your daughter will be starting college in 12-24 months with a good portion of it paid for by someone else.
It is not unusual for me to see a partial (or even complete) lack of understanding on how softball recruiting works for the majority of players. But if you truly want to play in college, I want to encourage parents and players to go back to basics.
(First, however, let me apologize if some of this is "...like duh, so obvious" or if you are actually on top of all of these things If so, congrats! You can move forward with confidence.)
Nonetheless, I'm hoping if I once again explain how recruiting works for the overwhelming majority of girls, there will still be time for those seniors who are lagging behind to catch up. (And for sophomores and juniors to make sure they’re on top of their college search as it progresses.)
RECRUITING 101. 1) You will not be recruited if you are not academically eligible to compete at a 4-year school. For a specific description of what it takes to be academically eligible, please read Chap. 3 of my book, Preparing to Play Softball at the Collegiate Level. https://www.fastpitchrecruiting.com/book.html
In my book or on these sites, you’ll see you need 16 academiccore classes (NCAA) by the time you graduate and must have a certain minimum GPA (both NCAA and NAIA).
Note: You no longer need an SAT/ACT score for NCAA eligibility, and you don't need an ACT/SAT score for NAIA eligibility IF you have a 2.3 GPA when you graduate OR if you have a 2.0 GPA and are in the top 50% of your graduating class. If you only have a 2.0, but are not in the top 50%, you can still be NAIA eligible as a college freshman with a 970 SAT or an 18 ACT.
For NCAA Div. III, there are no set academic minimums, but you must be admissible to the specific NCAA Div. III college that is recruiting you.
And in order to be admissible to ALMOST ANY college (regardless of whether it's Div. I, II, III or NAIA), you cannot have Ds (or heaven forbid, Fs) on your transcript unless you made them up/repeated the class. (Yes, you might slip by with a D in Art or P.E. or a class that isn't required for admission to that college. But most colleges will NOT accept a D in English, Biology, Geometry, etc.—in other words, the academic classes.)
2) When you visit the NCAA or NAIA eligibility websites, you'll find that you need toregister with them if you hope to be recruited by an NCAA Div. I or II college or by an NAIA school. There is NO WAY AROUND THIS registration...and it costs $$. (There may be provisions for low-income families, so check the website.)
3) Most college coaches are—quite literally—inundated with emails, and depending on the time of year, they may hear from hundreds of players in a week. (Manyhundreds!)And unfortunately, a lot of these coaches simply scan emails and then dump them or reply with a generic invitation to a camp. (Hey, camps are gold mines for college teams. It's easy money in their pockets, and they may well discover a player or two they actually want to recruit out of the many girls who attend their camps.)
If you’re a senior and a college coach is communicating with you regularly, asking for transcripts, inviting you for a visit, etc., that's terrific! Call the coach and set up that visit ASAP! Until you start hearing from a coach about specifically recruiting you, however, you cannot assume there is any interest at all. If you want to know if a coach is a) aware of who you are and b) interested in recruiting you, PICK UP THE TELEPHONE!
Once you're a senior, recruiting either moves forward or it doesn't happen at all. If you call a coach (2-3 times) and leave a clear, detailed message, that coach will either call you back (or talk to you when you call) or ignore you. If he/she ignores you, MOVE ON! The average high school player has about a 1 in 15-20 chance of making any college team. If you waste time waiting for something to happen, someone else will get your spot on that college team!
3a) Unless a college coach has seen you play several times in person—at a tournament or camp—and—as a result—has expressed serious recruiting interest to you, YOU NEED A SKILLS VIDEO. It should be short and showcase your skills as effectively as possible. Again, I know these can be expensive, and I know this sucks, BUT IT IS WHAT IT IS. (My book, Preparing to Play Softball at the Collegiate Level, has a whole chapter on making your video, and the internet is full of good—as well as bad--examples.)
No college coach will respond to you with anything beyond a generic questionnaire or a camp flyer if they don't have a video or haven't seen you in person. Game footage clips are fine, but PLEASE UNDERSTAND, most coaches want to START with a skills video so they can see your mechanics, athleticism, repetitions of your skills and so on without other players in the frame or action going on elsewhere on the field.
If you don't have a skills video, you're going to have to hope that coaches see you, have their socks knocked off by the quality of your play, need your position, and then decide they really want you for their team. It only takes one coach at one school that you can get into and would be happy to attend, so it can happen. But the odds aren't great when you consider how many other really good players are attending every tournament or camp that you attended last summer or will be attending this fall.
4) The recruiting gods help those who help themselves! Yes, a few girls "get lucky". And you might be one of them. The problem is that by the time you realize you're not one of them, a junior college may be your only option because by then most of the spots on 4-year college teams will be taken. The good news is many coaches are just now getting serious about recruiting for the coming year. The bad news is that if you don't grab their attention quickly, it will be too late. In my book, I talk about would-be college players doing a snail mail mailing to college coaches using a personalized letter of introduction, a profile, a transcript, a video link, etc. If you're a very together high school senior, have a video and can put together this mailing in a few days, terrific, DO IT! If not, consider creating a postcard that would serve as an introduction. Why a postcard???? Because NO HUMAN on the planet can resist reading a postcard addressed to them, even if it's only from an Ace Hardware store.
After you drop your letter (or postcards) in the snail mail box, go home and send an EMAIL to each coach you wrote referencing the packet or the post card, saying who you are and that your profile/bio/transcript/video link is attached. ONE WEEK after you send the post cards and emails, start making follow up phone calls.
I realize most of you would prefer to just email coaches and hope for a miracle. And if you choose to do that, that's fine. But I know what it takes to win... If you want to pursue 4-year college teams, from this moment on you need to do these things. If you've done them, congrats! It will pay off. If you have not done them, talk as a family about whether or not you can get it together quickly and move forward. READ MY BOOK...it's all there in black and white. (And if you decide a junior college is your best option, that terrific too!) Whatever route you choose, just be sure you did everything in your power to make it happen so that you can be happy and excited about your collegiate future!