As a former Division I athlete, transfer student, and current senior admissions fellow, I’ve had a unique vantage point on how athletics intersects with college admissions. The process is often clouded by assumptions that collegiate athletes are admitted with fewer academic credentials or that coaches wield outsized influence on admissions itself. The reality, at least at Swarthmore, is much more nuanced.
Once a coach determines serious interest in a recruit, they can request a “pre-read” through the Admissions Office. A pre-read is when admissions evaluates the prospective student’s grades, test scores (if submitted), coursework, and even essays, weeks before admissions open to non-athlete prospective students. Importantly, passing the pre-read is not a guarantee of admission, and does not bind the student-athlete to the college if they should pass. It’s more akin to a temperature check: How does this student compare to others in Swarthmore’s first-year pool; How likely is this student’s chance of admission into Swarthmore compared to other first-year applicants?
If the coach and student remain mutually interested, the admissions decision eventually arrives like it does for everyone else: an acceptance, rejection, or waitlist. Unlike coaches at schools with larger athletic programs, Swarthmore coaches don’t have the power to “push” applicants through the admissions process. Recruits have to independently meet the rigorous academic standards set by college in order to gain acceptance. Still, it’s fair to note that athletes commit an extraordinary amount of time into their sport — time that non-athletes often devote to academic, research, or other activities. Prospective student-athletes, then, simply may not have the time to devote themselves into as many extracurriculars compared to their non-varsity peers matriculated at Swarthmore and similar institutions.
My own transfer process underscored the complexity of student-athlete admissions. When I applied to Swarthmore, my coach had a sense of my academic stats, but I didn’t receive the full pre-read of essays that is common for prospective first years. However, there are some cases where transfer athletes are provided pre-reads through their coaches and the Admissions Office. Notably, transfer admissions depend heavily on the size of the first-year class and available on-campus living spaces. The transfer pool also reflects different backgrounds Swarthmore actively searches to welcome, such as the Admissions Office’s recent efforts to admit more community college transfers. Due to this initiative, the profiles of transfer applicants don’t always match those of prospective first years in regard to lived experience or goals. Transparent discussion and understanding of this unique process, I think, helps clarify what’s often misunderstood: athletes don’t bypass admissions, but athletic recruitment definitely shapes the context in which applications are read. Whether that process is fair makes for a good debate. After reading an article in The Atlantic titled “College Sports Are Affirmative Action for Rich White Students,” I found myself wondering what Division III sports might look like if all roster spots were filled entirely by walk-ons: athletes who are successfully admitted into the school without aid from a coach’s recruitment and then get onto a varsity team by trying out or being promised a roster spot if admitted and enrolled. Would it create a more equitable environment or strip away opportunities that athletics can provide for various minority and underprivileged communities? At the very least, pulling back the curtain a bit may help students, athletes or not, better understand how admissions and athletics interact at Swarthmore.
