What The Fuck are you talking about? Athletic scholarships are given on the basis of athletic performance, right? Eh? What school do you work at? That gives scholarships to 12-year olds? Where puberty is measured?
Member
Best test for athletic scholarship?
Mark
What would the best test be for an athletic scholarship?
The school I work at won't offer them because they argue that there's no reliable test. The example they gave was that giving a 12-year-old kid an athletic scholarship because he's good at rugby just recognises his having hit puberty earlier than his peers.
I want to argue for the vertical jump as a reliable test of the quality of a kid's neuromuscular system.
Thanks,
Will.
TMPHBITEU
What The Fuck are you talking about? Athletic scholarships are given on the basis of athletic performance, right? Eh? What school do you work at? That gives scholarships to 12-year olds? Where puberty is measured?
Member
I'm asking you what the best test is to determine whether someone is athletically gifted.Originally Posted by Mark Rippetoe
That's what I said, but they replied that one can't award a scholarship to a 12-14 year old on the basis of athletic ability because at that age he might have just developed faster than his peers: when they catch up, he won't stand out.
I work at an expensive private secondary school. They don't currently give sports scholarships, but I think they should. Many other schools do, and it struck me as stupid that the response to my suggestion was that athletically ability can't be reliably tested. The two ages boys could get them would be roughly 12-14 and 16.
RE: measuring puberty. 6'+ fourteen year olds with beards tend to dominate in rugby until everyone else catches up at about age 16.
Last edited by Mark Rippetoe; 03-28-2013 at 10:42 PM. Reason: Laundering.
TMPHBITEU
The standing vertical jump test is the standard for measurement of athletic potential.
Why would anyone grant an "athletic scholarship" to a child? Maybe the reason your expensive private secondary school doesn't currently grant scholarships to children is because that would be stupid.
The Tanner Stage scale is the standard way to scale puberty. You're still making no sense.
Member
This would be the equivalent of giving a scholarship to a kid with a high IQ test score.
Member
Private high schools often give scholarships to teenagers. They're not restricted to districts, so they can make their schools look better by having better sports teams. Rich suburban schools often send coaches into the inner cities to give out scholarships in order to get the best possible athletes. One of my closest friends does this for a Virginia school outside DC.
The OP wants his school to adopt this tactic, likely because his school is lagging behind other schools that do do this. His school's hesitancy is with the the testing methodology for giving out scholarships. Apparently, they don't trust their scouts to make the decisions for them (problem 1 with the scenario), so they want some standardized test in order to prove that a student is athletically gifted enough to carry him through his entire high school tenure (problem 2).
I would suggest the OP fix problem 1, and 2 will work itself out. The recruiters and coaches should be trusted enough to make this decision on their own, and if they can't, you need to hire better coaches.
Member
That's all I needed to know.
Hundreds of private schools do it for the same reason they grant other scholarships: they want gifted kids to benefit from superior facilities (e.g., a gifted musician or mathematician whose parents couldn't afford the fees), and they also want those gifted kids to boost the school's sports profile.
We currently do it for everything except athletic potential. I think that's stupid. Some kids are born with greater athletic potential, and the vertical jump is the standard measure of it. There shouldn't be a double standard - scholarships for some gifts but not for others.
Even if they aren't athletically gifted, the kids who reach Tanner Stage 3 earlier than average might seem athletically gifted until their peers catch up. They might be awarded an athletic scholarship based on their performance relative to their peers one year, but the next year their athletic performance might be average or below average.
If that still doesn't make sense, would you please explain why?
And would the vertical jump test suffer from the same problem - kids maturing at different rates?
Thanks.
Member
It's worse than that. They say that no coach could determine whether a kid is athletically gifted because there is no decent measure of athletic potential.
Member
What Charles Poliquin had to say on this subject:
Q: I'd like to test the natural athletic ability of my child, age 12. I've heard that there's a test performed by tossing a ball behind you in an explosive manner that's eerily accurate. I believe that it has something to do with the firing of the nervous system. Do you know of this technique and, if so, could you outline it for us?
A: What you're referring to is the caber toss. This throw was chosen as the best predictor of general athletic ability by the physical education systems of all of the Germanic countries. My own tests verified this concept with sports as varied as luge, volleyball, sprinting, and judo. I even know of a study in which it correlated strongly with the ability to learn windsurfing skills.
Member
It's a high school, correct? Is that the missing piece of the puzzle regarding why a school would offer a 14 year old a scholarship?
Last edited by Mark Rippetoe; 04-03-2013 at 03:50 PM. Reason: laundering
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