Smh at someone doing 30 year returns on college education of football players. Then trying to use that to access what one kid would be getting.
They take a wide sampling of all of the college's graduates reported incomes. There is zero hocus pocus involved. People who support/went to less prestigious schools always downplay the value of going to a more prestigious school.... but there is a reason serious students choose Harvard over, say, an Alabama or Boise State. It does matter and it makes a difference in your career/post-graduate future. If it didn't matter, everyone would just go to the cheapest/most fun/closest option for college. It is borderline nonsensical to suggest anything to the contrary.
Here is the truth, if a top 300 kid wants to get a great education he can do it at many school in his top 10. It is up to him. ND is a great intuition, but top 300 recruits are choosing a school for other reasons. If Jaylon Smith was from Cali do you think he chooses to go to ND?
Like I said... go look at our recruits from last year and show me which ones didn't choose ND for in large part the academics. There are only two that you can argue academics was a secondary factor... for all others it was primary. It's a very serious recruiting tool for more top talent then you would imagine. Two brief examples: 95 rating 4
KeiVarae Russel from Washington chose Notre Dame over USC and Washington because, and I quote, "The prestige of Notre Dame and knowing that it has a 98 (percent) graduation rate, so I know I’m going to graduate from school at Notre Dame"... and then went on to say that a degree from Washington would be great if he wanted to stay in Washington, but the alumni network of Notre Dame and value of that degree wherever he went in the world was a big factor. 5
Stephon Tuitt from Georgia is ONLY at ND because of the academics and the weight he/his mother put on the value of a Notre Dame degree... anyone who paid even remote attention to his recruitment knows that.
Last year Nelson Agholor had ND on his short list. If he would have chose ND I feel some people would have said it was because of ND academics. The truth of the matter is he would have chose ND because he liked what the athletic program brought to the table.
I agree many schools push kids into general studies classes but those are not the kids we are talking about. Kids that want to challenge themselves academically in college can do that at many institution around the country. So if that's Kelly's number one recruiting tool like Lax said Kelly is in trouble.
So go ahead and go crazy on this post. I will continue to root for ND and drop info on the Florida kids ND is recruiting.
Nothing you're saying here is wrong. Like I said, you can get a good education at just about any top 50ish school in the country if you want to push yourself to do it. But the Notre Dame education truly is our biggest recruiting tool right now and it does work... even on a large portion of Top 300 style kids. Of course it wouldn't work if we didn't also have the NBC deal and the facilities and the history and everything else... so I get what you're saying. Without that, we'd just be another Northwestern or Duke. But you should really appreciate that there are a large number of talented athletes (and their parents!) who put a very strong emphasis on education, so I don't necessarily think Kelly is "screwed." Recent examples include Andrew Luck going to 1-11 Stanford as a Top 100 style player... Ifeadi Odenigbo going to Northwestern as another Top 100 style player.... there are more players out there than you might expect.
