The Pay-to-Play Childhood - (link to article)

[Scrub It Kook]

Good point on the conditioning concern. Maybe track and field in spring and cross country in fall will help. But again maybe none of these so he can focus on academics and other passion projects.
It’s a little sad that I’m thinking about an exit strategy. My son’s self identify is wrapped around being a soccer player in a top league. It wont be easy to quit when that time comes.
How does college admission score being on an average ecnl/ pay to play MLS next HD team vs working at McDonald’s?

Better to have a plan for the off-ramp than to just come to a schreeching halt. Does your son want to play soccer past high school? If so, there are many options to do so, not just the school team. Many colleges have club teams as well.

In any case, enjoying the moments is critical. We all have to trade our passions for the real world at some point.

 

[Jamisfoes]

Better to have a plan for the off-ramp than to just come to a schreeching halt. Does your son want to play soccer past high school? If so, there are many options to do so, not just the school team. Many colleges have club teams as well.

In any case, enjoying the moments is critical. We all have to trade our passions for the real world at some point.

Yes you are completely right. We need to all enjoy the moment. In this sport, being a 95th percentile player gets you nowhere. You either up your level to 99.9 percentile or walk away.

 

[Scrub It Kook]

The difference is it's a real job you can get fired from it if you don't do well and show up on time, which given where the Zers are, it's what they are looking at. The fake charity is literally just that, a fake charity your parents throw money at or you organize your friends to do. the UCs, CalStates and Ivies do take hardship into account. In fact one of the UC prompts is the hardship prompt where you can complain about being poor, being discriminated against, being learning disabled, etc. But no one is going to sit there for an extracurricular on an application the reader spends 5 minutes on to try to figure out if the particular extracurricular was needed to make ends meet, get tuition money, buy a car, because your parents thought it would be good for you, or because you want it for your application. The assumption with the fake charities was, especially when the private schools began to mandate service hours, everyone was being forced to do it.

My company hires a lot of college graduates and those with real-world job experience tend to stand out. Those who had a cush summer job at their fathers company handed to them don't do to well.

A few years ago, one of the grads we hired had played in the DA during it's last year. He spent 2 seasons with a D1 program and never touched the field during a game, largely due to injury. Ultimately had to give up soccer and decided to put his energy into his career. That blend of high level college sport and hands on job experience has really boosted his career in a short period of time.

 

[shankbone]

Do high school coaches care if you quit club after you had joined the high school team? Let’s say my kid made the team as an ecnl player freshman year and then he quit ecnl to get a job at Macdonald.

Well... Does the HS Coach also coach Club? And is his/her club team highly represented in the HS? I think there are most likely a lot of HS coaches who would be fine with kids quitting club if they are good players if they don't already coach them - but it also depends on the CIF designation and how competitive the program is overall.

 

[Larzby]

Do high school coaches care if you quit club after you had joined the high school team? Let’s say my kid made the team as an ecnl player freshman year and then he quit ecnl to get a job at Macdonald.

It does depend on the school ultimately, but I think most HS teams will keep the former club kid around for the duration. His/her skills don't die off that quickly. This assumes everything else remains equal: attitude, team player, work ethic. I don't see many schools simply cutting a kid out of spite

 

[Socal-Soccer-Dad]

Ultimately had to give up soccer and decided to put his energy into his career. That blend of high level college sport and hands on job experience has really boosted his career in a short period of time.

I think the discipline required for playing at that high level definitely translates well in real life...

 

[aong cangkol]

Setting aside the wasted money and time on weekends up to 8th grade, most regions no longer carry a U16 AYSO so they consolidated the U16 team into a super area (e.g. North Valley, Glendale/Burbank, Conejo-Calabasas-Camarillo) which means you are driving big distances to play games. The trade off is no one cares so there's pretty much no practices unless the friends decide they want one and can get enough players. Latino League operates the same at this age...practices are optional...mostly friends doing futsal once a week. But then you have them coming onto the forum crying that the coach only wants letter league like that kid on here months back. So long as they are o.k. with not making the high school team (or paying for a small private or going to a small charter)...sure the terms are acceptable. It also means you'll have to look elsewhere for the extracurricular to put on your list (most colleges use a ranking system of some kind for extracurriculars...say 1-5 with international awards and competitions being a 5..Sunday League will be scored a 1).

p.s. small tangent. At the turn of the century, colleges were scoring working (like at fast food) "1s" and giving the fake charities that didn't survive graduation "5s". I remember getting into a huge fight with the admissions committee of my Ivy because they passed on a working mom I was pushing for because they said she didn't carry enough extracurriculars (just working at KFCs) and scored her a "1". Now days hearing lots of admission officers saying they are scoring real jobs (ie not internships, camp counselors, babysitting or helping out dad at the office) "4s" esp because it's so hard to get them these days. For quite a few admissions officers, on the academic (as opposed to athletic recruiting) route, kids will get more bang for their buck working than playing varsity sports (unless they pull down something like captain + All CIF or MLSN finals).

looks like you have insights on college admissions. I am always puzzled on how do they verify all of these? calling McDonalds? proof of paycheck?
same with sports or debate or math. yes if you are in olympic team easy to verify but how to show you are a bench in MLSN hg team?
or part of a robotic team competing in beijing? do you submit participation certificate with photos?
FBI varisity blues shows how coaches and parents easily manipulate these.
Are colleges really that naive? do they really believe they get the best potential students by choosing a girl in an ECNL team? over a girl in a high school tennis team? let’s say they have same AP classes/scores, same gpa.
first i don’t know how colleges verify this
second i dont understand what colleges trying to do by admitting a mediocre athlete over an unathletic student.

 

[Grace T.]

looks like you have insights on college admissions. I am always puzzled on how do they verify all of these? calling McDonalds? proof of paycheck?
same with sports or debate or math. yes if you are in olympic team easy to verify but how to show you are a bench in MLSN hg team?
or part of a robotic team competing in beijing? do you submit participation certificate with photos?
FBI varisity blues shows how coaches and parents easily manipulate these.
Are colleges really that naive? do they really believe they get the best potential students by choosing a girl in an ECNL team? over a girl in a high school tennis team? let’s say they have same AP classes/scores, same gpa.
first i don’t know how colleges verify this
second i dont understand what colleges trying to do by admitting a mediocre athlete over an unathletic student.

Unless you go the recruitment route, being an ecnl athlete carries far less weight than being captain of the varsity team or all cif. Being an ecnl athlete carries far less weight than a future doctor working at local hospital, future scientist with an nih research credential, young writer being admitted to Iowa young writers. Lying about being captain of the team or all cif, winning a state title in math Olympics, or being admitted to Iowa young writers is easily verifiable and if you are found to have lied on your application while at school you risk being expelled.

There is in fact right now rampant fraud going on with research credits. There are professors at schools who are selling research credits to students for minimal work. You especially see this being advertised in Indian American and Chinese American media targeted at parents. Admissions offices are aware of the fraud (including the last fad which was fake charities) and as a result have started weighting these much less respectfully unless it’s got a heavy hitting verifiable credential attached like mit or nih programs.

You could choose to lie about things on your resume but it’s always a bad idea to lie about in school activities since most of the heavy hitting colleges require a counselors report which lists the verified extracurriculars. If there is a major discrepancy the admissions people can and will reach out to the counselor.

As to work on the last election cycle some Harris supporters responded to trumps McDonald stunt by circulating a picture of her working at McDonald’s as a teen. It backfired. The picture was doctored and McDonald’s has computerized employment records. If you are going to lie about it it’s a bad idea to lie about working at McDonald’s (which gives you major brownie points) vs mom and pop diner (in which case admissions will ask why no employer letter of rec). Otherwise they’ll just write it off as a lower level activity. My son for example has a photography business on the side and has the Instagram output and website to back it up. Further it may impact your ability to get a sec traders license, medical license, admitted to the bar, hired in Hollywood if you are found to have lied.

So not that I condone lying but if you are going to lie it has to be about small things (I was a sub for an ecnl team!) that are going to negligibly impact your application. Even John and Ted were forced to do the school play as their 1 listed extracurricular for which they got high as guard 1 and 2. If you are going to do that why lie? Just go be guard 1 and 2 in the school play and do the gummy bear song as your audition

 

[aong cangkol]

Unless you go the recruitment route, being an ecnl athlete carries far less weight than being captain of the varsity team or all cif. Being an ecnl athlete carries far less weight than a future doctor working at local hospital, future scientist with an nih research credential, young writer being admitted to Iowa young writers. Lying about being captain of the team or all cif, winning a state title in math Olympics, or being admitted to Iowa young writers is easily verifiable and if you are found to have lied on your application while at school you risk being expelled.

There is in fact right now rampant fraud going on with research credits. There are professors at schools who are selling research credits to students for minimal work. You especially see this being advertised in Indian American and Chinese American media targeted at parents. Admissions offices are aware of the fraud (including the last fad which was fake charities) and as a result have started weighting these much less respectfully unless it’s got a heavy hitting verifiable credential attached like mit or nih programs.

You could choose to lie about things on your resume but it’s always a bad idea to lie about in school activities since most of the heavy hitting colleges require a counselors report which lists the verified extracurriculars. If there is a major discrepancy the admissions people can and will reach out to the counselor.

As to work on the last election cycle some Harris supporters responded to trumps McDonald stunt by circulating a picture of her working at McDonald’s as a teen. It backfired. The picture was doctored and McDonald’s has computerized employment records. If you are going to lie about it it’s a bad idea to lie about working at McDonald’s (which gives you major brownie points) vs mom and pop diner (in which case admissions will ask why no employer letter of rec). Otherwise they’ll just write it off as a lower level activity. My son for example has a photography business on the side and has the Instagram output and website to back it up. Further it may impact your ability to get a sec traders license, medical license, admitted to the bar, hired in Hollywood if you are found to have lied.

So not that I condone lying but if you are going to lie it has to be about small things (I was a sub for an ecnl team!) that are going to negligibly impact your application. Even John and Ted were forced to do the school play as their 1 listed extracurricular for which they got high as guard 1 and 2. If you are going to do that why lie? Just go be guard 1 and 2 in the school play and do the gummy bear song as your audition

 

[aong cangkol]

Thanks for confirming. it reinforces my believe that an average ECNL player does not get a better chance than an average NPL player or even ECRL or socal. minimal brownie point from colleges. Agree with you that captain of varsity team carries more weight than a regular MLSN or ECNL player.
After 10 years of soccer, my daughter is a freshman now, she will quit her NPL team and play flag football, soccer and track in high school. hopefully she can use the time to get a internship/volunteer opportunity plus part time job.
on a side note, without playing club soccer, i doubt she will make soccer or flag football team. this year 40+ kids were cut from flag football tryout and 30+club kids were cut from soccer tryout.
I told my younger son, it is easier for boys, just join football, no cut, guaranteed varsity team. same brownie point for colleges.