The Making of a Student-Athlete Testimonials
Learn how families are using The Making of a Student-Athlete to succeed in the athletic recruiting process
Many parents over the years have purchased The Making of a Student-Athlete. Some had kids that were looking to play at a small D2 or D3 college, some were looking to play at Ivy Universities or other high level academic institutions, and others had kids that were evaluating current scholarship offers or were talented enough to soon be receiving athletic scholarship offers from D1 colleges. Others were looking to transition to NAIA schools, Prep schools or junior colleges before advancing to an NCAA college. Regardless of your son or daughter’s skill level or where you are in the process, The Making of a Student-Athlete can assist with not only getting your recruiting process off the ground, but making the best decisions for your college future.
Please read some of their words below…
“First of all I would like to thank you for the candid wonderful book you wrote for all the Student Athletes. We would not have had the knowledge necessary to make the final decision without it. It has been like a bible for us these last few months. I told you I would follow up and let you know the results of Michael’s choice. We found the perfect fit. Not the one we thought it would be. Michael will be the Big Fish in the Little Pond but I really believe it fits him well and he received a $70,000 scholarship. The coach has also given us an indication that he will see significant playing time as a freshman. Again I would like to thank you very much. I will be recommending your book to anyone in our position that will listen.” – Mike – Michigan
“I Got your newsletter today and thought I would report in on an email exchange we had last month regarding a verbal offer my daughter got for a scholarship. If you will recall I was concerned about it not being binding and worried there was nothing to hold them to the offer. Well, we took your advice and contacted the coach, first my daughter and then I had an email with him and we feel very confident of the offer. My daughter gave the coach a verbal commitment and will be attending ******** in the fall on a full scholarship. Needless to say we couldn’t be happier and honestly your book and newsletter was our resource for her recruiting process.” – Jay – Massachusetts
“I wanted to thank you for writing such a great book! I ordered your book a couple of years ago when my son was in 9th grade (or 10th). Now that he is a senior and has committed to play in college I really think your book was a large part of his successful quest. He’s been fortunate to be on a great high school team with excellent coaches and to play on a great travel team, also with excellent coaches. All these coaches have helped him tremendously but I think following the basic recruiting info in your book helped him to get more exposure. He’s not a blue chip athlete, is a great student, and wanted to play in college. You have so much great practical advice that I think our family was really prepared for the pitfalls in recruiting. So, between reading the high school baseball web site and your book I think we were more realistic than most parents and became very proactive because of our newfound knowledge. You probably saved us thousands of dollars because we did all the recruiting research/contacts that many parents pay other people to do. I am ordering another book to pass on to parents with younger players. Keep up the good work. Thank you again” – Gayle F.
“It has been several months since I purchased The Making of a Student-Athlete for help in the recruiting process for my daughter and I wanted to give you an update. It was quite an experience. We followed your recommendations to the letter and there is no doubt in my mind that all the information you provided in your book was extremely accurate and very helpful. As you may recall, our daughter had ambitions to play DI field hockey. We ended up arranging 12 interviews with DI head coaches throughout New England and down as far as Washington, DC. All of the visits went surprisingly well, and I was actually surprised at how attentive the coaches were with us. She also went to the College Connection camp at UMass as her showcase camp. This was great because of the huge number coaches in attendance as it promoted. Just before she left for camp we all sat down and took a realistic look at her chances for each of the schools and matched it with her preferences academically. In the end she decided Sacred Heart University was her top choice all things considered. We decided as our “ace” that she should attend their camp which she did after CCC. Well this turned out to be key as although she did well at CCC and did in fact hear from several schools, it wasn’t from her top choices.
She performed extremely well at the Sacred Heart camp and at the end Coach Blais was arranging for an official visit in the fall. During the summer she also played lacrosse for a club team that went to a few showcases in NY and MD and she did well. ironically she caught the interest of Coach McCue at Fairfield. She ended up with an official visit and an offer to play there as well, but it was for lacrosse. In the end, field hockey was her first love so she accepted SHU’s offer and has received a significant scholarship. She also applied early decision and has been accepted, so that has been a huge relief. After going through the process and finally committing, her confidence really grew. As one of the tri-captains, she help lead her high school team to an 18-0 season culminating in the first state championship for her High School. She then made all-state and made it through 2 tryouts to earn a spot on the Granite State/Twin State All-Stars who will play the VT All-Stars next June. So, as you can see it was truly a storybook ending. I have been working with some of the parents of the underclassmen who also have ambitions to play college field hockey. I have already provided the business cards for your book and linked them to the web site. Please feel free to use any of this info in your promotions as I am a strong believer in your system. I have to say you and Ray did an outstanding job. The Making of a Student-Athlete is very thorough, yet clear and concise and the timing of the book was perfect for my family.” Brian – New Hampshire
“Just wanted to send a note letting you know that after a long but exciting process that involved multiple offers from numerous schools my son just made a verbal commitment to UNC Chapel Hill to play football. Your book has provided us with a fantastic resource throughout the whole process. It took the mystery out of the “Coach Speak” that we got from a few of the coaches and understanding the entire process as well as knowing what questions to ask and more importantly knowing ones which ones not to ask! I have already recommended this book to many of our friends looking for some insight. I even donated my copy to our school’s college counselor. Since she had never gone through the recruitment process before she needed the resource too.” Eric – Virginia
“My son was a talented quarterback on his high school team as a senior this year. We expected that the recruiting process would take care of itself. We’ve come to realize that expectation was unrealistic given the size of our school and the type of offense we run. We really like his coach, and assumed he would be handling the recruiting process for our son, but he hasn’t been as proactive as we’d have liked him to be. Your book is exceptional and has really guided us through this process. My only regret is that we didn’t learn about it sooner. By the time we learned what to do in the recruiting process and really started to contact schools on our own as you recommend, we found very few opportunities and even less scholarship money available at such a late date. I’ve recommended your book to several people and hope they’ve followed my advice. Your section in the book on D3 schools is exceptional and really opened my eyes to the opportunities that exist at many other schools.” Jeanne – Parent, AL
“I have read two other recruiting books but I found The Making of a Student-Athlete by far the best. What separates this book from others is not only the number of individual topics they cover but the depth and level of detail Dave goes into to explain each one in much detail. I got the sense that the author truly care about the success of families involved in the recruiting process and that is reflected in their writing and in their web sites.” – Andrew S – New Orleans, LA
“I really hope you purchase The Making of a Student-Athlete because it will give you a huge advantage in the athletic recruiting process, and I also hope you don’t purchase The Making of a Student-Athlete because it will give me a huge advantage over you!” – Brian T – New Jersey
“Chapter 5 (Athletic Recruiting) could have been its own book and the rest of the information was icing on the cake. Fantastic!” Claire T, – Parent – West Virginia
“I have read two other recruiting books but I found The Making of a Student-Athlete by far the best. What separates this book from others is not only the number of individual topics they cover but the depth and level of detail Dave goes into to explain each one in much detail. I got the sense that the author truly care about the success of families involved in the recruiting process and that is reflected in their writing and in their web sites.” – Andrew S – New Orleans, LA
“I have just ordered a second copy of your book. I have other parents fighting over the first copy! I would sincerely appreciate if you could get it sent as soon as possible.” Alex C, – Parent – Pennsylvania
“The information on visiting, selecting, and applying to colleges was more in depth and informative than 2 other books I purchased solely on admissions and the authors tie in the athletic recruiting process and the college selection and application process extremely well.” Sara L, Parent – Buffalo, NY
“After reading your book and receiving your email, we made the adjustments you recommended…and then…to distinguish herself, we made a brief clip of 6 goals she had allowed…not great saves…rather…great shots by another person she didn’t block. She wrote a couple sentences on each what she was thinking and what she would have done differently the next time. One coach said, that was a first for him, it showed she was willing to admit and accept responsibility, she studies film, she saw what she could do differently and that shows she is coachable. He would take a coachable/teachable kid all day long” Parent, California
“I recently purchased your book; “The Making of a Student Athlete” Your book has been passed around and a few have been purchased by parents I’ve talked to. We’ve received lots of positive replies from loads of college coaches in response to your books’ advice. It has taught us how to research and target schools that are a better fit for our daughter and as a result we have had many meaningful recruiting visits with several college coaches who have expressed an interest in recruiting our daughter.” Rick B, – Parent, Massachusetts
