QDSN - Worth the $?

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Black Ice:

Get yourself a copy of Kaplan's Guide to Colleges or the Princeton Guide to Colleges. Those are pretty much the leaders when it comes to college guides. Ted and I are very familiar with US colleges and we still referenced Kaplan's frequently when our kids were looking into colleges.

 

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Black Ice

To help get my DD on the path, I put together this google map so that she could visualize where some schools are located, and then do some online reviews of the schools. Each pin has a link to the school's website and the softball team's website. It is not all inclusive (not enough time to put every school on it), just focusing on states where she had some remote interest.

Here's the link:
http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=U...2350495107974166782.00046f8d42e44f55fb3df&z=5

 

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Thanks to All: Here is a follow-up question .. not sure if it can be answered. It seems to me that the first step to all of this (with or without any scholorship) is DD trying to figure out which college she might be interested in. With so many .. how does one start this process? Is there a list somewhere of schools and some sort of comparison as to size, cost, offerings? Seems daunting .. We had enough trouble deciding between 2 area High Schools .. lol .. Any suggestions?

Have her check with the counselors at her high school. DD has been working with the college counselor at her school, they know what information to get out of the kids to get them looking in the right places.

 

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Wow, fastpitcher, how long did it take you to put that map together? Thanks for sharing it with us.

 

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Who has heard if they made it yet?

 

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Notifications were received Friday and more will be notified by today.

 

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Two of our players received their notices on Friday.

 

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Wow, fastpitcher, how long did it take you to put that map together? Thanks for sharing it with us.

Thanks cgs,

Took a few weekends (researching the school names and where the schools were located was the toughest part). This was my project while sitting in the hotel room on Friday and Saturday nights during the summer tournament season.

 

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In addition to what has already been suggested, I recommend taking your daughter to different size colleges and also in different settings such as big city and rural areas. It will help give her a feel of where she would feel most comfortable. Find schools with the major your daughter in interested in, and visit as early as possible. It never hurts to find a school that offers a large number of majors in case your daughter changes her mind.

I agree with cgs. The one thing we found was that some coaches prefer email, and some prefer mail. My daughters' foundation was email, but on certain occassions they followed up with mail. Being creative really helps.

 

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We found out Friday morning our daughter made it in.

 

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how far away do players come from for QDSN?

 

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Thanks for the update everyone! Yes we finally heard yesterday that dd made it!

 

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For information on colleges... use the SAT site http://www.collegeboard.com/student/index.html?student . You can do searches based on every type of criteria you can imagine. Distance, division, cost, rural/city, number of students, academic offerings, sports offered... much much more. Plus, you can save your searches and create others with different criteria. Then, you can choose a college that meets that criteria and see the particulars of the school and then you can map it and get an idea of the college layout. Finally, the link to the schools web site is also available. A great place to shop.

 

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Irish:

I know that one of the years our DD played, there was a player from the West Coast. Canadians often attend and one year she played there were 5 players from the Netherlands.

Akron Sapphires1: congrats! I might be working the Showcase and in any event we will be there for both the Kent State and the QDSN events, so if you see elderly folks in Buckeye Heat garb, introduce yourself.

And this would be a good time to remind parents of girls in the younger ages that they should not approach college coaches. The NCAA rules for freshmen through juniors allow you to say hi and that's it. Don't put the college coaches in an awkward position by trying to get involved in a more substantive discussion about softball. One of the reasons that we are attending is that the college coaches CAN talk to us about our players who are participating.

 

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If DD is selected to play in the QDSN (Queen of Diamonds Showcase N) the "event" fee is $245.00. Does anyone have experience with this event N or S? Is it worth the fee? I know college coaches are there, but they are also at other tournaments that are part of the teams regular schedule and you can access them through e-mails, letters, profiles. So is this particular event worth the $ .. Any input appreciated. TKS

Sort of funny, but we helped our dd apply without even looking up the fee. She is a pitcher and they are still finalizing the pitchers so she was in the running over the weekend but has not received the final word. I am leaning toward her only doing this once and then letting her attend college camps.

 

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Thanks to All: Here is a follow-up question .. not sure if it can be answered. It seems to me that the first step to all of this (with or without any scholorship) is DD trying to figure out which college she might be interested in. With so many .. how does one start this process? Is there a list somewhere of schools and some sort of comparison as to size, cost, offerings? Seems daunting .. We had enough trouble deciding between 2 area High Schools .. lol .. Any suggestions?

Starting down the path to college ball should be an exciting process! Sure, it's a lot of work, but with the proper organization and planning, it can be VERY rewarding. Of course, the level of play your DD is capable of and her talent is obviously the huge determining factor.

The athletic scholarship should be the LAST thing to consider. Getting invited to the team should be your DD's ultimate goal. If she does get some athletic (or academic) assistance, it's icing on the cake!

Get a copy of Cathi Aradi's book "Playing Softball at the Collegiate Level". I'm pretty sure it's still the "Bible" of college recruiting for women's softball. It has EVERYTHING you'd want to know - timelines, what to ask coaches, recruiting rules, and even lists every university in the U.S. with a college softball team!

 

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sarah4, we tried the collegeboard search and found that there are a lot of colleges missing from that list. It is a good tool to start with though.

 

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DEFINITELY WORTH THE MONEY!!! Watching your DD achieve their goal of playing college softball is PRICELESS!!!

We have done both the North & South. Anywhere you are able to showcase your talents in front of college colleges is worth it! You have to let the coaches know you are going to be there though.