It could have been us
- Thread starter EvanstonCat
- Start date
My source is my 3+ years in progressive roles working in the Northwestern football recruiting office from 2008-2011 where my primary responsibility was screening and processing the academic credentials of prospects. The standards are not publicly published, which makes sense.
Your turn.
Answer the question.
You could publish anything now if you wanted to. It’s 14 years ago. No one would be coming after you.
You’re still avoiding the question.
And I’ll tell you the benchmarks we actually used if you answer first. Got no problem doing it.
I certainly will not dispute that there are NU fans first and foremost because of these high standards.
However, I believe you can still do things the right way with relaxed admissions and don’t take as an extreme view as you do. No one has ever said “admit idiots” to win games. The real issue are these admitted students able to successfully manage the curriculum, graduate and become productive members of society?
So, I’ll ask you a question. If we lowered the standards ( let’s say to bare NCAA Minimum for this question) and our GSR and APR did not decline, would you be okay with it?
Are you really citing the Google Search AI overview on ANYTHING, much less on non-public information that isn’t searchable? JFC Northwestern people are supposed to be smarter than this.
Was the 19 ACT composite an “exception?” My recollection from my Rock days was we’d frequently have recruits who had like a 21 and were told they needed to score a 22 on the fall ACT to get in, I don’t recall 19s being discussed.
Dude relax. I was using that AI search for a simple roundup. I’m not an idiot. I’m aware AI hallucinates and is not a complete picture. But thanks for checking on me. I’m so touched.
Regarding the earlier question, no I am not for taking NCAA minimums regardless of if APR and GSR stayed high. What’s the point of doing that? We are better than that. Don’t turn your back on what we’ve stood for. Stop the “everyone gets a trophy” crap.
What did JFK say about going to the moon? “We do it not because it is easy, but because it is hard.” Northwestern and Stanford (and maybe BC and/or Rice) are the only academic institutions who actually have real standards for athletes. If we give into that like many others have purely to win then we have lost the plot. We would be the same as everyone else. We are not. I mean, FFS we were thisclose to leaving the B1G and moving to the Ivy in the late 70s. Fortunately, the institution gets it and is on the right side on this issue.
And I used to be someone who wasn’t always of the mind we should hold up our high standards - especially in basketball when we couldn’t even make the tournament - but I admit now that was the wrong stance. I’m a lot prouder when we succeed because I’m not naive. We are competing with two hands behind our back - yet still getting it done.
Regarding the earlier question, no I am not for taking NCAA minimums regardless of if APR and GSR stayed high. What’s the point of doing that? We are better than that. Don’t turn your back on what we’ve stood for. Stop the “everyone gets a trophy” crap.
What did JFK say about going to the moon? “We do it not because it is easy, but because it is hard.” Northwestern and Stanford (and maybe BC and/or Rice) are the only academic institutions who actually have real standards for athletes. If we give into that like many others have purely to win then we have lost the plot. We would be the same as everyone else. We are not. I mean, FFS we were thisclose to leaving the B1G and moving to the Ivy in the late 70s. Fortunately, the institution gets it and is on the right side on this issue.
And I used to be someone who wasn’t always of the mind we should hold up our high standards - especially in basketball when we couldn’t even make the tournament - but I admit now that was the wrong stance. I’m a lot prouder when we succeed because I’m not naive. We are competing with two hands behind our back - yet still getting it done.
It’s more about the full picture… if a kid had a very strong core GPA (I.e., 3.9 or better), then we felt pretty OK at 19 or 20 ACT so long as the English score was at or above the Composite.
You’re probably thinking primarily of Jacquez, who ended up at Syracuse because he had a 22 instead of 23 ACT. My understanding he had a 3.2 or 3.3 core GPA, which would require a higher standardized test to get supported by Admissions.
It was always much better to be a “high GPA, low score” guy than a “low GPA, high score” guy. Easy to spin the high GPA kid as a hard worker who’s just not a good test taker, etc., but the high test kid is more likely viewed as lazier and less motivated.
Jacquez was one but I also recall guys who needed to get a better score, succeeded, and came here.
I was mostly asking to set up the next question around exceptions: are we still using an “exception” model with a limited number of lower requirements, or is it always the same holistic scale for everybody? Because one easy movement if we’re still using exceptions is just making the exceptions the standard.
”We should make it more difficult on ourselves to win even though it’s already really hard at NU because we will feel better about ourselves if we are somehow able to pull it off.”
Interesting position.
Caleb Komolafe.
I have no idea how it’s set up nowadays, but (knowing NU) I very much doubt much has changed at all in the interceding 15 years.
Ish to Roy Munson in Kingpin.
Well, my grandpa always taught me to bowl 15 frames. It's like I told you before, we Amish, we do everything half again as hard as you do. Ten frames.
So you think we still have an "exceptions" model? How many was it in your day and how significant was it?
Yes I think we still have an appeal/exception process.
We used to get 2-3 annually. Generally for kids who didn’t hit 1 of the 3 major “metrics,” not “please let us take this kid that fits NCAA minimums.”
Makes sense. Simply making whatever the exception metric is the new standard would be a good start.
The guy had service academy offers (Army and Air Force) + Rice and Tulane and of course us. CK being a “lower end” (for our standards) qualifier? Hmm… don’t know about that.
Eh. Obviously, if there’s a kid who was from a broken home or something but persevered over that major obstacle and has slightly lower scores than normal given their situation? Ok. Otherwise… no.
He literally committed and was denied admission! He decommitted and Fitz went to bat with him with admissions and eventually reversed their decision.
This board is a joke
(other than @AdamOnFirst). Get back to the premium board asap. Grab @Gocatsgo2003 if you can.Ok? Guys can appeal and retake standardized tests. That happens ALL THE TIME. I did it, others I know did it too. And most of the time you improve the second time around. Some even take it three times.
My point was he clearly didn’t have a bad score on his (assumed) re-try - even when you take into account our elevated standards - because Army, Air Force, Rice and Tulane also offered. That’s a pretty impressive stack of offers from high academic institutions who have similar standards to us.
Yet another paid commercial message for The ReefThis board is a joke
*coquettish blush*This board is a joke
oh you
Rice and Tulane are meaningless on that list and have no meaningful academic restrictions remotely comparable to northwestern.
I honestly don’t know the rules for the service academies.
Why? Because we’re having a discussion?This board is a joke
Because none of those schools have meaningful academic restrictions for football scholar athletes, including the academies — they basically require a very strong character review but have lots of academic leeway, plus literally different NCAA rules when it comes to recruiting.
What do you think it takes to get into NU as a scholarship football player anyway? I’ll wait.
Except they don’t have similar standards to us for scholarship athletes. Why is this difficult for you to understand?
It isn’t a discussion if you refuse to acknowledge others’ experience and viewpoints. That’s a diatribe.
How long have you been around here? In December of 2022, this was probably the hottest topic on the boards. we literally have two guys that worked for the recruiting office explaining how the process worked, yet you continue to question sources when you spit out AI garbage or unknown “good sources”.
Komofale, never re-took the test because his first score was sufficient for admissions. He had a 3.35 GPA and a 1100 SAT. The reason he wasn’t admitted was his class rank was deemed too low. He committed after he and his family took an OV to NU. That’s how absurd this situation was.
Why was it “absurd” the admissions office wanted to dig into his class rank further? I don’t see any issue with that.
Admittedly, he went to a great HS (top 2% nationally) so I wouldn’t probably be as worried about his CR either given he passed the other 2 pillars just fine but admissions should do their due diligence. And the players should have to earn it - even through an appeal.
The bigger issue here is why do you guys want NU to slide down a slippery slope when it comes to our standards? NU and Stanford have the highest standards in FBS and that’s a good, frankly noble thing. It’s part of our core principles as a program and for the university as a whole. Changing that to NCAA minimums like everyone else - which it sounds like what you two want - because “well, NU is already hard once you get in” (I mean, no s*** lol) would be a betrayal of that core tenet. Frankly, our high standards are a differentiator for us. The degree means something extra because of how hard it is to 1) get in initially, 2) stay in and graduate and 3) succeed on the field.
Fortunately, the university and admissions (plus the majority of our fans and big donors - from what I’ve heard as this topic comes up) don’t want to capitulate to the current garbage trends we’re seeing more and more in college sports where it’s more about simple wins (hi, Vandy!) than maintaining real standards that make those wins actually meaningful given what the rest of the competition is doing.
Finally, I was not trying to be disrespectful earlier and I apologize if it came off that way. I just trust my sources very much - specifically my former athletic dept buddy and a few donors. They were/are in the know. And this issue is also one they’re passionate about so I think it’s safe to say they would be saying exactly what I have here.
Admittedly, he went to a great HS (top 2% nationally) so I wouldn’t probably be as worried about his CR either given he passed the other 2 pillars just fine but admissions should do their due diligence. And the players should have to earn it - even through an appeal.
The bigger issue here is why do you guys want NU to slide down a slippery slope when it comes to our standards? NU and Stanford have the highest standards in FBS and that’s a good, frankly noble thing. It’s part of our core principles as a program and for the university as a whole. Changing that to NCAA minimums like everyone else - which it sounds like what you two want - because “well, NU is already hard once you get in” (I mean, no s*** lol) would be a betrayal of that core tenet. Frankly, our high standards are a differentiator for us. The degree means something extra because of how hard it is to 1) get in initially, 2) stay in and graduate and 3) succeed on the field.
Fortunately, the university and admissions (plus the majority of our fans and big donors - from what I’ve heard as this topic comes up) don’t want to capitulate to the current garbage trends we’re seeing more and more in college sports where it’s more about simple wins (hi, Vandy!) than maintaining real standards that make those wins actually meaningful given what the rest of the competition is doing.
Finally, I was not trying to be disrespectful earlier and I apologize if it came off that way. I just trust my sources very much - specifically my former athletic dept buddy and a few donors. They were/are in the know. And this issue is also one they’re passionate about so I think it’s safe to say they would be saying exactly what I have here.
The “cutoff” that NU’s admissions office uses is being in the top half of a graduating class, which is incredibly dumb because (I) many high schools don’t even report that information and (II) there are a litany of factors that go into class rank that have exactly no bearing on a player’s ability to graduate from NU.
Because you danced around it so often, here’s the “baseline” criteria that NU’s admission office looked for back in the day:
- >3.0 core unweighted GPA
- >1000 SAT or >20 ACT
- Top half of HS class, if reported
Winning on the field while achieving academically and graduating our players is the goal, not some kind of lofty admission requirement that nobody outside of a small portion of the NU fan base even knows about.
Frankly, I could give two ***** how a kid performed academically in high school so long as he graduates from NU. And, even more frankly, it’s a whole helluva lot more difficult to get into NU than it is to graduate (especially with the special treatment and resources available to athletes).
To that end, the whole debate is this: NU has achieved extremely good academic success on the team with admission requirements well below that of the general population, so how much lower could those go assuming academic performance remains adequate and how much can/could that help us be more competitive on the field?
In my opinion I think NU’s coaches should have the latitude to operate within the NCAA framework so long as team academic performance remains amongst the best in the country.
I can only speak for myself on why I completely disagree with almost all of this.
I became a NU fan because of my perception that Fitz and his staff cared about the person as much or more than the player. I saw first hand back in the Stone Age how Universities “used” players for the good of their team and never taught them a damn thing. Their eligibility was gone and they were history.
As a D1 athlete in a non-revenue sport, I reaped the benefits of the revenue sports guys. Personally, I never would have went to college without an athletic scholarship. I would have been that electrician like the rest of my family. I didn’t go to a top 2 HS in the nation. In fact, academics wasn’t the priority the first 12 years of my life, getting home safely was. Everything changed when I moved into a middle class neighborhood. I realized there was more out there and if you worked at it you could be successful. I wasn’t a high academic kid, I wasn’t getting in most schools in G Pop, I was given an opportunity. I was this person you are advocating to deny admission.
You said you wouldn’t be in favor of relaxed admissions EVEN IF the GSR and APR didn’t deteriorate. Sorry, but if that isn’t an elitist attitude, I don’t know is! In essence, you are a proponent of keeping higher standards because it makes NU different not because it produces more graduates of the esteemed University.
1) I am not trying to be rude but I wasn’t dancing around anything. You were playing silly games. You could have said what you claim at any time. And, frankly, you need to show your work on your alleged claims if you were so close to it like you claim. What I mentioned with Pardon and his 23 ACT being a real struggle to get in, what you discussed with Jacquez (I don’t even know who that is tbh) and his 23 (I believe?) not being enough and the Mislav Brzoja 4.0 GPA situation seem to refute what you claim above - not that it wouldn’t be still a higher standard than almost anyone else nonetheless.
2) Am I understanding that you are ok with NU letting guys in with 2.3 GPAs and no standardized testing scores at all given what you said about “operating within the NCAA framework”?
3) I’m clearly not off my rocker given hdhntr1 and Just Gary’s comments earlier which were similar to mine.
From hdhntr1 earlier as a refresher:
That is what they have done at NU. What we are talking about is the academic credentials of FB players vs the academic credentials of the general populations students, If the average ACT scores of the general population is about 33 and the average HS GPA is around 3.8, FB players are allowed in with ACT scores of 22 and GPA's as low as 3.0. (these are numbers we have seen on incoming recruits) Average might be around 27 and 3.3. Though these numbers are very high for FB players, this is still not comparable to the general NU student population, But even so, it is still significantly higher than requirements at other D1 schools. The only other program with standards truly as high as ours is Stanford
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I have not seen any specific numbers on FB recruits so I have to try to piece things together. What I have seen on this forum, the absolute lowest numbers we can bring in seems to be about a 20 ACT (58th percentile) and more generally 22(67th) with a 3.0 GPA. General incoming population is a 33-34 and 3.9 GPA which is about the top 2%.
Therefore I would guess that average ACT is 25-27 and I put out the higher number. That is still in the 80th(25) and 86th(27) percentile. Even if it is 24, that is still 76th percentile. I used to be more familiar with SAT standards and there our recruits tended to be around 1100 which was based on the old scale. By comparison Mich State was beloe 800. I think the 1100 was about 75-80th percentile.