College Scholarships Explain Please?

[Mr Shifty]

As we are approaching the end of high school football (regular) season we start to hear increased talk about college recruitment, scholarships, offers, letters of intent. I just really do not know how this works and apparently not a lot of others do either because no one has been able to explain it to me in the past that I have asked. I'm sure others are curious as well.

Can anyone here, who really knows what they're talking about, explain it? What does it mean when a kid has an offer? Is that binding? If he signs a letter, what implications are in effect? What does it mean when a kid has an offer? Is that binding? If he signs a letter of intent is that binding? When and why can a college rescind an offer? how late can they wait?

[TigerBob]

An offer generally means a scholarship offer for most people and schools. Some “offers” particularly at lower levels, can be offers for partial scholarships or merely spots on the team. You could also offer a “preferred” walk-on spot.

Offers and accepting offers are non binding. Schools generally don’t like to do that without a good reason because it creates bad PR in recruiting circles.

Signing is actually signing a National Letter of Intent. This is binding, at least for a year, and binds the recruit to the school and vice versa. Again, it’s generally a year to year deal, but the vast majority of scholarships are renewed as long as the player remains a student in good standing at the school and with the team.

[RoadMan]

If a head coach who signed the player leave, I believe the NCAA has allowed the signee to re-start the process. There are a bundle of moving pieces involved with the letter of intent, both on the player's end and that of the school.

[Mr Shifty]

An offer generally means a scholarship offer for most people and schools. Some “offers” particularly at lower levels, can be offers for partial scholarships or merely spots on the team. You could also offer a “preferred” walk-on spot.

Offers and accepting offers are non binding. Schools generally don’t like to do that without a good reason because it creates bad PR in recruiting circles.

Signing is actually signing a National Letter of Intent. This is binding, at least for a year, and binds the recruit to the school and vice versa. Again, it’s generally a year to year deal, but the vast majority of scholarships are renewed as long as the player remains a student in good standing at the school and with the team.

Thank you very much. I always wondered what all this stuff meant but like I said never really heard anyone else say they knew

[greygoose]

An offer generally means a scholarship offer for most people and schools. Some “offers” particularly at lower levels, can be offers for partial scholarships or merely spots on the team. You could also offer a “preferred” walk-on spot.

Offers and accepting offers are non binding. Schools generally don’t like to do that without a good reason because it creates bad PR in recruiting circles.

Signing is actually signing a National Letter of Intent. This is binding, at least for a year, and binds the recruit to the school and vice versa. Again, it’s generally a year to year deal, but the vast majority of scholarships are renewed as long as the player remains a student in good standing at the school and with the team.

It's not a year-to-year deal anymore, I'd have to take a look but the Big Ten several years back became the 1st conference to guarantee 4 year athletic scholarships and would no longer do year to year. I also found an article that stated the year after the Big Ten done this all Power 5 schools would be handing out 4 year guaranteed scholarships.

[Bleeding Red]

Offers are not a binding contract. It is just intent on offering that player a National Letter of Intent as long as conditions dont change (injury, the school doesnt get a better recruit to fill that players spot, etc). Offers can be later taken off the table by the college and turned down by the player, even after accepting the "offer". Until the player signs a National Letter of Intent, there is literally nothing set in stone.

While offers are good, and the more the merrier, they are meaningless until the player signs on the dotted line.

[greygoose]

Offers are not a binding contract. It is just intent on offering that player a National Letter of Intent as long as conditions dont change (injury, the school doesnt get a better recruit to fill that players spot, etc). Offers can be later taken off the table by the college and turned down by the player, even after accepting the "offer". Until the player signs a National Letter of Intent, there is literally nothing set in stone.

While offers are good, and the more the merrier, they are meaningless until the player signs on the dotted line.

100% correct, an offer is just that nothing is binding until the NLI paperwork is sent in. Which sort of sucks for a player because they could be offered let's say OSU as a QB, and last second the #1 QB in the country decides to go to OSU, OSU has every right to pull their offer to the 1st guy and give it to the other recruit. As someone stated most schools stick to the offers they've and don't rescind them as it could cause problems on the recruiting trail with backlash of schools pulling offers. There's been plenty of players over the years that have offers and maybe got into some trouble or kids drag their feet in picking a school so schools will pull the offers as well. I know of a player he was one of 3 different players being looked at and the school had 2 spots open for that position, 1 kid committed and he was waiting on a particular school but during that time the other player decided to commit to that school also filling the 2 positions of need and he was left out. A lot of people I've spoke with who have had kids recruited and kids being recruited said you're better off finding the offer that best fits you early on and picking to sort of "lock" yourself in there and if something else pops open then take it.

[soggybottomtopper]

The transfer portal has changed the way this all works as well. But, explained very well with all of the information given.

[thebarlowbandit]

An offer generally means a scholarship offer for most people and schools. Some “offers” particularly at lower levels, can be offers for partial scholarships or merely spots on the team. You could also offer a “preferred” walk-on spot.

Offers and accepting offers are non binding. Schools generally don’t like to do that without a good reason because it creates bad PR in recruiting circles.

Signing is actually signing a National Letter of Intent. This is binding, at least for a year, and binds the recruit to the school and vice versa. Again, it’s generally a year to year deal, but the vast majority of scholarships are renewed as long as the player remains a student in good standing at the school and with the team.

It's not a year-to-year deal anymore, I'd have to take a look but the Big Ten several years back became the 1st conference to guarantee 4 year athletic scholarships and would no longer do year to year. I also found an article that stated the year after the Big Ten done this all Power 5 schools would be handing out 4 year guaranteed scholarships.

The Big10 is the ONLY conference that has made that “Guarantee”. However as previously mentioned, dumping kids is bad PR so many get medical or help finding other places and not just dropped. But per NCAA standards, athletic schollies are year to year renewable.