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Upper-level athletes have their sports agents to guide them in their professional careers. It’s not uncommon now for the high school athlete looking for the right fit in pursuing his or her collegiate career to use a college recruiting service.
Such services proclaim to aid the prep player in getting notoriety and recognition, and in earning scholarships or financial aid. Services can vary widely. Some contact college coaches on the athlete’s behalf and help find schools searching for players in a particular sport. They help create a profile.
According to an article in The New York Times, there were at least 75 recruiting services nationwide. Cedar Valley Athlete magazine is aware of one in the state of Iowa – Clement Sports Recruiting Service located in Des Moines.
Bruce Clement, a 1971 University of Northern Iowa graduate, spent 31 years coaching and teaching at Newton and Southeast Polk High Schools. He retired in 2003 after coaching football, baseball, track, wrestling and swimming. Since 1997, he has videotaped events for Newton and Polk, UNI-Dome football; and state baseball, softball, track, soccer and wrestling tournaments for the Iowa High School Athletic Association and the Iowa Girls High School Athletic Union. He also has taped for Des Moines Menace soccer games and Iowa Sports Connection.
“After retiring, I had two goals for my next endeavor,” Clement says in his promotional materials, “to be able to use all of my past experiences in education and sports; and to keep helping student-athletes. (Clement Sports Recruiting Service) is one of the most rewarding things I have ever done.”
Clement believes that if enough college coaches know about a student-athlete, he or she will have a greater chance to find the best possible match. “I feel the ideal school choice is one that is correct academically, athletically and financially…Taking the passion they have for their sport and using it to participate at the collegiate level will help shape their lives forever.”
Parents’ goals, he says, should be to get enough schools interested in their child so there is a choice, rather than a compromise, in the selection made. Clement works with between 40 and 50 high school athletes each year.
Several local high school athletes have used Clement’s services, including Cedar Falls High School soccer player Emily Hester. Parents Sherry and Jack Hester believe the service was well worth the $875.00 fee.
“We could have done the search for colleges all by ourselves,” Sherry said. “We could have gotten lucky. But using Bruce was well worth the cost. It pays for itself. Getting Emily a scholarship wasn’t necessarily the goal,it was about the right fit. Emily wanted to play.”
The Hester’s began their college search during Emily’s junior year. She emailed coaches and made use of a lot of on-line profiles she could fill out. The family had made about three campus visits prior to contacting Clement. But they didn’t get real serious until the spring of her junior year after the ACT test had been taken, which is a necessary part of the student’s profile package. They were admittedly late beginning the process, which included footage of Emily’s games in order to provide tapes to prospective schools.
“It’s hard to get responses, especially in a sport like soccer, unless (coaches) are watching you already, they’ve seen you somewhere,” said Sherry. “There are so many kids. I talked with some coaches who said they mayget 20-to-25 emails a day. They usually don’t get back to all of those.”
Sherry spoke with another local family who had gone through the recruiting process. That’s when she heard about Clement’s services. “They said it was the best thing they’d done.”
Clement’s services include developing the student’s profile, faxing or emailing that profile to colleges throughout the country, accepting the phone calls from college coaches, and assisting in the production of the tape. He communicates with ESPN, Scout.com, Nike, Rivals, CSTV, Iowa Preps, Iowa Sports Connection, Iowa High School Sports Network, and the high schoolathletic associations. He tailors the recruiting process based on the individual’s needs and preferences.
He believes college coaches value a recommendation from a respected recruiting service over self-promotion via letters and DVDs.
He says the student’s responsibility is to keep track of phone calls and emails, forms and applications; he expects them to communicate well with their parents, to keep grades up, and to not get involved in situations that will jeopardize a student-athlete’s future.
“It ended up working out well,” Sherry said. “Emily had interest from all different levels. It improved her confidence level to get so much interest and she also grew as a person. Starting out, she didn’t want to call anyone back or send an email.
“We parents can only do so much. The kids have to be involved in the process. Our role was to help her through it, we got Bruce on board, he would do his part to facilitate, but there still was a lot of work to be done. Emily had to do all the follow up.”
“My junior year I was kind of disappointed because I only had three or four schools looking at me,” Emily said. “This year I was getting a lot. Last summer and fall I would come home and I would have like five emails and I thought this was unexpected. It built my confidence because I was wanted. I always knew I was good enough to play somewhere but to be noticed and to be considered is an honor.”
The Times article reported that these services aren’t necessarily for the outstanding blue-chip prospects in the high-profile sports because coaches probably already are aware of them. It says they are popular among athletes a notch below in exposure or from less-celebrated sports, like soccer, perhaps. Some coaches say recruiting services are a useful “if elementary tool” in providing names to data bases. Some coaches say they are a waste of time, with some going so far as saying to avoid the services.
In surveying several local coaches, Cedar Valley Athlete found a mixed review. Former UNI wrestling Coach Brad Penrith said he doesn’t respond to emails from recruiting services.
“I don’t see them as a waste of time for Divisions II or III or lower,” he said. “But in Division I wrestling, you know who the kids are through word of mouth, tournaments or other ways.”
UNI offensive line coach Rick Nelson says he prefers to go through the high school coach directly in his recruiting practices. “I don’t spend much time reading or listening to recruiting services,” he said.
UNI track coach Dan Steele says he usually doesn’t give the services as much attention as he does to personal contacts from the student-athlete. “These are usually more sincere inquiries,” he said. “I generally see services as a waste of time and money. A prospective student-athlete would get more bang for his or her buck by putting together a free video or picture page/site and personally contacting the schools they are interested in with the appropriate links.”
However, Wartburg women’s basketball coach Bob Amsberry says he receives numerous contacts daily from recruiting services. He usually filters the contacts by academics and geography first.
“We have contacted student-athletes and started recruiting them based on receiving this information,” he said. “(Bruce) is much more personal in his approach than many large national services. Many times these services do help a student-athlete and sometimes maybe not so much. Every situation is different.”
Clement’s business is growing. He recently added former UNI basketball player Andy Woodley to his staff to help him assist student-athlete basketball players. He has help from another individual in the production of game tape. Emily was the first soccer player to use his services.
She graduated in June and will attend Bellevue University in Nebraska, a NAIA school, in the fall, majoring in Sports Management or Health and Human Performance while playing soccer. Bellevue was not even on her radar until working with Clement.
“We got people interested (in Emily) that we wouldn’t have on our own,” Sherry said. “One thing Bruce did for Emily is includeall of her community service on her profile, along with all the camps she had attended. It sparked a lot of interest.
“If you get 25 emails a day, who stands out? Her complete profile got her information out there from a third party. It started the process and was very beneficial. Going through the recruiting process and finding the right college is a lot of work whether you use someone or not but we would do it again in a heartbeat.”
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