Centre College
Centre College ... Among America's most "Student Athlete Friendly"
Our approach encourages readers to carefully target a handful of “best fit” colleges early in high school years, and to focus on recruiting their coaches. (Yes, we coach our readers to "recruit" college coaches.)
Because there are thousands of colleges, far too many to deal effectively with, our College Focus Method helps you zero in on your best opportunities. The objective of this analysis is to identify those colleges that :
1. Will recruit your student athlete
2. Will graduate him/her with a marketable degree
3. Will NOT graduate him/her into debt (average American college student graduates with over $20,000 debt)
We analyze the following:
HOW BIG - everyone has a preference here.
HOW DIFFICULT - remember, all athletes have two jobs.
HOW GENEROUS - the ratio of aid to cost.
HOW SA FRIENDLY (SAF) - derived from:
A. Financial aid (freshman average, all sources)
C. All costs (presumes out of state tuition rate)
D. Academic difficulty (1-5, 5 most difficult)
E. Enrolled undergraduates (thousands)
G. Graduation rate (percentage points)
T. Number of varsity teams funded
We publish the formula and score every college we recommend in our College Opportunities for Student Athletes magazine and will include the College Focus method in the 2008 edition of our Winning Your Scholarship book ... both publications are available at; www.student-athlete.net.
Centre College Colonels Logo
Centre College ... Among America's most "Student Athlete Friendly"
Centre College’s Commitment To Athletics
Kentucky’s Centre College is a top-50 national liberal arts and sciences institution that offers a challenging, custom education from one of the nation’s finest faculties. With a reputation for outstanding alumni giving and study abroad experiences, Centre provides all of the small college advantages with big-time opportunities.
With a winning athletic tradition and commitment to academic excellence, Centre College, founded in 1819, is one of the nation’s oldest schools. Centre competes in 19 intercollegiate sports – 9 for men and 10 for women with 40% of the student body participating in one or more intercollegiate sport. The College also offers 15 intramural sports in which 80% of students participate.
The Centre Colonels compete in Division III of the NCAA and the Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference, recognized as one of the top Division III conferences in the country.
The Colonels’ tradition of excellence can be traced back to what some publications have named the greatest sporting upset of the 20th century – Centre’s victory over then undefeated and number one ranked Harvard in 1921 to win the national football championship. Since then, Centre athletics has continued that tradition, during the last 18 years, 30 Centre athletes have been named Academic All-Americans and 49 have been named to regional and national All-America teams.
Two of Centre’s last four Rhodes Scholars were varsity athletes and three other varsity athletes won Fulbright Scholarships in 1996, 1997, and 2000.
Centre’s commitment to athletics can be seen in the continual improvement in athletic facilities. In 2003 it began a $12 million dollar renovation and construction project to the Sutcliffe Athletic and Recreation Center; see inset photo. This project will bring Centre’s athletic and recreation capabilities to the forefront in the region. Along with the improvements to the indoor facilities, the College is constantly upgrading the athletic and recreation outdoor playing fields to accommodate the increasing demands of the student body for quality playing surfaces.
As an NCAA Division III member, Centre does not offer athletic scholarships but annually does award over $8 million in academic scholarships and need-based financial aid.
Since 1980, Centre Football has achieved another high level of excellence. The Colonels have won seven Conference championships and have been invited to the NCAA Division III playoffs. Varsity sports include:
BASEBALL
BASKETBALL (M,W)
CROSS COUNTRY (M,W)
FIELD HOCKEY
FOOTBALL
GOLF (M,W)
SOCCER (M,W)
SOFTBALL
SWIMMING & DIVING
TENNIS (M,W)
TRACK & FIELD (M,W)
VOLLEYBALL
We like Centre College because of its excellent score on our Student Athlete Friendly calculation (see page 4, Issue #29) and because of its attitude. More about the attitude later. Centre ranks 544/600 or above 90% of all the schools we have evaluated. Only schools like Harvard and Notre Dame edge Centre out, and then only marginally. Do the math and you will see how our method helps you find Student Athlete Friendly schools by utilizing our six paramaters to measure what’s most important in a student athlete’s college selection process.
We like Centre’s attitude a lot. Athletic Director Brian Chafin was among the first to volunteer his department’s help in our College Opportunities for US Military Families Program (see page 14, Issue #29). With Brian’s help we hope to be broadcasting this important program in cooperation with Centre’s corporate sponsors. And that is very good news for millions of Americans. Centre folks are our kind of people.
GO Colonels! see: www.centre.edu
