Sharing a big baseball scholarship money tip: 89% – The magic number. It’s the minimum grade point average that allows you or the college coach to go after academic-educational grant money for college. Emphasis on academic, because there are two different kinds of scholarships—academic and athletic.
Athletic scholarship money is dedicated to athletic performance and is usually available at the Division 1 or 2 levels. Academic educational grant money is money set aside by a college for students who have performed well academically, and on average have a GPA of 89% or higher. Division 3 coaches urge their potential recruits to strive for this GPA because it could be the one thing that will help their recruit to afford the tuition and get them playing college ball. This magic number was the carrot that kept my son motivated, although I wish we had learned about this “magic number” when my son entered high school.
I’m sure you’re saying to yourself, “Well, my son wasn’t even thinking about college at that point!” and I agree, whose son usually is? Our son didn’t come to us until the end of his sophomore year saying that he might be interested in playing college baseball, and the three of us were kicking ourselves wishing we had known about this 89% average a year ago. Paying it forward, I thought this information would be important to share if you think there’s even a remote chance that your son might like to pursue baseball beyond high school. Having this conversation with him now, while the slate is clean, might keep him motivated to keep his grades up.
If it turns out that your son has Division 1 or Division 2 talent, great! How incredible would it be to couple athletic money with academic money and potentially get a full ride to college? If your son is a Division 3 or NAIA level player, or not an athlete at all, how fantastic would it be to receive academic money to a school that you may not have been able to attend if your GPA fell below 89%? There’s a surprising amount of grant money out there for students who are academically successful! Starting great grades at the beginning and maintaining them throughout high school will give you access to such monies! Waiting until 11th grade to improve grades could be too late, so share this magic number with your son now, and who knows? He may be setting himself up to attend his dream school, just because of this magic number!
