Men’s and Women’s College Soccer Scholarships
Men’s Soccer
Women’s Soccer
Are scholarships guaranteed all 4 or 5 years?
Scholarships are not guaranteed for an athlete’s entire duration of time at the university. Each year, scholarships are renewed and conversations regarding aid can change. Coaching preferences, family situations, or the status of players’ academic and financial aid can cause scholarships become somewhat volatile. Scholarships are not supposed to be lowered due to poor on-field performance, but there is usually an expectation that a greater scholarship opportunity warrants greater on-field performance. College coaches will generally expect more from those on money than those without.
Even academic scholarships rely on a certain GPA (typically a minimum of 3.0 cumulative) to retain the academic money awarded.
Can I earn a scholarship after my Freshman Year?
Yes! If you are playing or earning time or adding value to your team in any way you can always ask for athletic scholarship money. The earlier you ask, the better! This allows coaches time to plan money out of the available scholarships they have to offer. Each coach is different but having these conversations before joining a program and while on the team are critical in making this happen for you and your family.
Academic money is generally not awarded after a student enrolls, but outside scholarships are almost always accepted.
Financial aid can also change based on family situations and each university has financial aid officers who can help walk you through how their institution’s financial aid works.
What happens if I get injured?
Scholarships are not allowed to be taken away due to injury and are guaranteed even if you redshirt. However, if you do plan to stay a 5th year or continue on with a graduate program while on a scholarship, you should plan to involve your coach as early as possible.
What is an NLI?
A National Letter of Intent is the document a prospective student-athlete signs that guarantees an athletic scholarship for the following year. This signing date is during the senior year and allows the university to then write a press release highlighting the next incoming class of recruits to that soccer program.
Do all programs have the max number of soccer scholarships?
No. This is a great question for college coaches who have scholarships to offer. Even if a program possesses the maximum number of scholarships allowed for that NCAA division, that is not enough to be spread out to each player. For divisions with fewer scholarships, this is even more true. 7 scholarships divided by 30 players is much more difficult to spread out than 9.9 or 14. If you would like an athletic scholarship, ask that program’s coaching staff when you engage with them.
How are athletic scholarships divided up?
Each program is different. This is another good question for a college coach showing interest. Every program has a different strategy, a different plan for their players, and a different plan for their recruiting athletes.
What is countable aid?
Think of countable aid as stackable aid. Meaning, stacking academic scholarship money on top of athletic scholarship money to provide a package of aid. You must meet certain minimums of GPA and/or Test Scores to meet the threshold for programs and schools to stack aid.
Example:
If a DI Prospective Student-Athlete (PSA) has a 22 ACT and a 2.5 cumulative GPA upon graduating HS and gets $10k in athletic scholarship and and $10k in academic scholarship aid, they are not permitted to stack the aid without it counting toward the 9.9 (men’s) or 14 (women’s) scholarships. So, if the school cost $40k total and a PSA got $20k total aid, then a half scholarship would count against that 9.9 or 14 total available scholarships.
If a PSA meets the threshold for GPA and/or Test Score 3.5 cumulative GPA or high SAT/ACT score then that academic aid $10k and $10k of athletic scholarship aid only counts as the $10k athletic scholarship thus only counting as a 0.25 scholarship against the 9.9 or 14.
Can financial aid be added to my soccer scholarship?
In most cases, no. Unfortunately if you receive $1 of athletic scholarship aid and $40k of financial aid it all counts against a programs max possible athletic scholarships. This is a good question to ask a coach in a lower division if you have received academic or financial aid at that institution and have interest in joining the program.