Foreigners in College Tennis

[chalkflewup]

Originally Posted by floridatennisdude

Yea, totally unfair

Living in Florida could also be viewed as a detriment. Too much play means too much wear and tear on the body

[floridatennisdude]

Originally Posted by chalkflewup

Living in Florida could also be viewed as a detriment. Too much play means too much wear and tear on the body

Ok, then...only players from Florida can play college tennis. The rest have to take their healthy bodies straight to the tour.

[Misterbill]

This recruiting process is just like a job interview. College coaches receive thousands of resumes from student athletes from all over the world. The college coaches are going to hire who they feel is the best candidate for the job. Often, the international athletes out- interview the American athletes by reaching out to coaches and players with more anticipation and by building better relationships with them.

As far as speaking English is concerned, the international athletes all have to take the SAT and TOEFL. This means that English is set at a certain standard for all students. They also tend to do very well academically once they are at American universities. Being American or international does not benefit the student/athletes, how they interview will be the deciding factor whether they are chosen or not versus another athlete with similar abilities.

Those aren't my words. That's Ross Greenstein of Scholarships for Athletes speaking. You can find the entire interview at the link posted by tennisconsultcom in the Junior forum, "How to get a scholarship" thread.

http://www.tennisconsult.com/choosin...tennis-player/

Silly Ross Greenstein. If he had read some of the posts (by others) in these threads, he would have learned that coaches select foreign players by soliciting bribes........and get them by offering 4-year scholarships!

[gully]

^^
Mr. G runs a good business and my family has benefited from his often freely-given, generous expertise. However, I do think it's worth asking "who benefits from" this business model of the "three-year interview."

One answer to that question is companies like SFA. The longer, the more complex, and the more international the process is, the greater the likelihood is that his services will be needed. So they help perpetuate the notion that recruiting "must be" like a three-year job search, in fact leading every interview they post on TRN with a version of that question.

BTW, that link to the article on the similar operation run in the UK by Sarah Borwell is good reading. American players and their parents should know that they are competing for scholarships with players -- and, essentially, their agents -- across the world.

Whether or not that's a good thing.

[klu375]

Originally Posted by Misterbill

This recruiting process is just like a job interview. College coaches receive thousands of resumes from student athletes from all over the world. The college coaches are going to hire who they feel is the best candidate for the job. Often, the international athletes out- interview the American athletes by reaching out to coaches and players with more anticipation and by building better relationships with them.

As far as speaking English is concerned, the international athletes all have to take the SAT and TOEFL. This means that English is set at a certain standard for all students. They also tend to do very well academically once they are at American universities. Being American or international does not benefit the student/athletes, how they interview will be the deciding factor whether they are chosen or not versus another athlete with similar abilities.

Those aren't my words. That's Ross Greenstein of Scholarships for Athletes speaking. You can find the entire interview at the link posted by tennisconsultcom in the Junior forum, "How to get a scholarship" thread.

http://www.tennisconsult.com/choosin...tennis-player/

Silly Ross Greenstein. If he had read some of the posts (by others) in these threads, he would have learned that coaches select foreign players by soliciting bribes........and get them by offering 4-year scholarships!

Dear Misterbill,
Tennis recruiting process is not like a job interview. As you probably know US job market is protected to a large extent. When you go for a job interview here you are mostly not competing with the whole world. Because if they had to the majority of US Citizen would lose because they are too old, too young, do not have enough skills, wrong gender, too lazy, etc. I do not know what you do for a living but I am sure they can easily find somebody among 6 Billion people who can do your job better for less pay and this person will not even post on TT during working hours. So I do not see it as normal that our US kids have to compete with the whole world for the right to play tennis in US college. Tennis after all is just an EC. And I do not see it as normal that parents have to yank their kids from the regular school and make them train twice a day so that they could play tennis in college. And this is where things are going. You can have couple of conferences that will be breeding grounds for future pros and they can benefit from the top foreign competition but the rest of college tennis should be for regular kids who value education and not looking to become tennis pros.

[Misterbill]

Originally Posted by klu375

Dear Misterbill,
Tennis recruiting process is not like a job interview. As you probably know US job market is protected to a large extent. When you go for a job interview here you are mostly not competing with the whole world. Because if they had to the majority of US Citizen would lose because they are too old, too young, do not have enough skills, wrong gender, too lazy, etc. I do not know what you do for a living but I am sure they can easily find somebody among 6 Billion people who can do your job better for less pay and this person will not even post on TT during working hours. So I do not see it as normal that our US kids have to compete with the whole world for the right to play tennis in US college. Tennis after all is just an EC. And I do not see it as normal that parents have to yank their kids from the regular school and make them train twice a day so that they could play tennis in college. And this is where things are going. You can have couple of conferences that will be breeding grounds for future pros and they can benefit from the top foreign competition but the rest of college tennis should be for regular kids who value education and not looking to become tennis pros.

Ha ha.

Klu, talk to Ross Greenstein, not me. Those are his words. Brought to us by our fellow poster tennisconsultcom. Maybe you can talk to tennisconsultcom too

What do I do for a living? I'm unemployed. Got laid off from my job putting those little stickers on apples and pears. Great gig while it lasted!

But thanks for the info

[klu375]

Originally Posted by Misterbill

Ha ha.

Klu, talk to Ross Greenstein, not me. Those are his words. Brought to us by our fellow poster tennisconsultcom. Maybe you can talk to tennisconsultcom too

What do I do for a living? I'm unemployed. Got laid off from my job putting those little stickers on apples and pears. Great gig while it lasted!

But thanks for the info

I think you repeatedly supported the idea that pure meritocracy and open competition was a great thing. No point to talk to Ross - he is probably OK with the status quo. If not he will let us know during his next TR.NET interview.
I suspect your job got outsourced - pears are now arriving with the stickers attached.

[Misterbill]

Originally Posted by klu375

I think you repeatedly supported the idea that pure meritocracy and open competition was a great thing.
CORRECT!
I suspect your job got outsourced - pears are now arriving with the stickers attached.
NO TEARS.

See bold inserts above

[floridatennisdude]

Originally Posted by klu375

Dear Misterbill,
Tennis recruiting process is not like a job interview. As you probably know US job market is protected to a large extent. When you go for a job interview here you are mostly not competing with the whole world. Because if they had to the majority of US Citizen would lose because they are too old, too young, do not have enough skills, wrong gender, too lazy, etc. I do not know what you do for a living but I am sure they can easily find somebody among 6 Billion people who can do your job better for less pay and this person will not even post on TT during working hours. So I do not see it as normal that our US kids have to compete with the whole world for the right to play tennis in US college. Tennis after all is just an EC. And I do not see it as normal that parents have to yank their kids from the regular school and make them train twice a day so that they could play tennis in college. And this is where things are going. You can have couple of conferences that will be breeding grounds for future pros and they can benefit from the top foreign competition but the rest of college tennis should be for regular kids who value education and not looking to become tennis pros.

Have you been in a hospital lately? Not too many US born doctors anymore. Foreigners might not be traveling to the US to interview for entry level sales jobs that pay no relocation, but they certainly are for expert skill jobs and high level executive positions. Head hunters, like coaches, will find the best people in the world for those roles.

[andfor]

Originally Posted by floridatennisdude

Have you been in a hospital lately? Not too many US born doctors anymore. Foreigners might not be traveling to the US to interview for entry level sales jobs that pay no relocation, but they certainly are for expert skill jobs and high level executive positions. Head hunters, like coaches, will find the best people in the world for those roles.

You've just scratched the surface on problems that are far more serious to this country. Employment, trade deficits, foreign purchase of U.S. debt, terrorism, bailouts etc. take up far more attention then the very small percentage of athletes that happen to play college tennis.

[10ismom]

Originally Posted by floridatennisdude

Have you been in a hospital lately? Not too many US born doctors anymore. Foreigners might not be traveling to the US to interview for entry level sales jobs that pay no relocation, but they certainly are for expert skill jobs and high level executive positions. Head hunters, like coaches, will find the best people in the world for those roles.

Part of the reasons for that is higher education costs a lot more in the US compared to many countries.
You could find more MD, engineering degrees per capita in many other countries. They are willing to work for US companies from their home countries or willing to come work in the US .
Many US citizens wanting to be a doctor or a vet have to go get their affordable degrees elsewhere. I have seen some from the caribbean schools, Canada, etc.

If things are not changing, think about it....high paying jobs are for non-US citizens. Lower paying jobs for US born ?

[floridatennisdude]

Originally Posted by 10ismom

Part of the reasons for that is higher education costs a lot more in the US compared to many countries.
You could find more MD, engineering degrees per capita in many other countries. They are willing to work for US companies from their home countries or willing to come work in the US .
Many US citizens wanting to be a doctor or a vet have to go get their affordable degrees elsewhere. I have seen some from the caribbean schools, Canada, etc.

If things are not changing, think about it....high paying jobs are for non-US citizens. Lower paying jobs for US born ?

Yes, 10ismom, as andfor stated...we are just scratching the surface of the political problems in the US. Tennis isn't the only thing that we aren't as good at anymore.

[Gatorluver]

This argument about foreign players gets old. However, I do know if your American kid wants to play tennis at a top US
college, you better yank them out of middle school and sign them up for a full time tennis academy ASAP. It's the only way they will be competitive with the 20 year old foreign kids our top US coaches favor.

[lstewart]

One issue I've noticed in men's tennis related to this topic is the number of schools that no longer have a men's program. I played NAIA tennis in the late 1970's for a good program. We had a couple of South American players, but got alot of out talent from Texas. At that point just about every school fielded men's tennis, and I played many, many, many foreign players. Now most of those schools no longer offer men's tennis, including the school I played for. I think it was due to budget cuts with the increasing expenses of fielding all the required women's sports, and offsetting all the money spent on football. Now i have a ranked 16 year old son, and he is interested in playing in college. Of course there are still many international players, but also many fewer schools offering programs for him to consider. My older son was a college golfer, and he had many more programs to consider. I assume this may be the case across the US, with many smaller public colleges no longer offering men's tennis.

[gully]

Originally Posted by lstewart

One issue I've noticed in men's tennis related to this topic is the number of schools that no longer have a men's program. .... I assume this may be the case across the US, with many smaller public colleges no longer offering men's tennis.

I have some NCAA statistics on men's tennis participation from three data points: 1981-82, 2004-05, and 2009-10 (most recent available).

Men's Tennis, 1981-82: 690 teams overall (267 D1); 7,340 participants (2,884 D1)
Men's Tennis, 2004-05: 742 teams overall (265 D1); 7,386 participants (2,613 D1)
Men’s Tennis, 2009-10: 738 teams overall (258 D1); 7,894 participants (2,644 D1)

I don't know if men's tennis participation in NAIA has been similar or not, but in NCAA's three divisions, it has remained pretty static, with the number of teams and participants both increasing.

[gully]

Sorry, I can't find NAIA participation statistics. As far as the NCAA goes, there are as many teams and positions available in tennis as there were three decades ago. That may or may not be true of the NAIA. I'd love to see the numbers if anyone can dig them up. (I'm an old NAIA guy from 81-82 myself!)

[tennis5]

Originally Posted by andfor

You've just scratched the surface on problems that are far more serious to this country. Employment, trade deficits, foreign purchase of U.S. debt, terrorism, bailouts etc. take up far more attention then the very small percentage of athletes that happen to play college tennis.

Nafta.... But, then again this is a tennis site.

[gameboy]

Originally Posted by klu375

So I do not see it as normal that our US kids have to compete with the whole world for the right to play tennis in US college.

Over 2.5 million H-1B visas handed out over the last decade says you are are wrong.

The only reason there aren't more is because it is expensive to get those foreign workers relocated. Which is also the reason why foreign outsourcing is so popular.

Don't think you are not competing against those workers in China and engineers in Germany. Because you are.

[floridatennisdude]

Originally Posted by gully

I have some NCAA statistics on men's tennis participation from three data points: 1981-82, 2004-05, and 2009-10 (most recent available).

Men's Tennis, 1981-82: 690 teams overall (267 D1); 7,340 participants (2,884 D1)
Men's Tennis, 2004-05: 742 teams overall (265 D1); 7,386 participants (2,613 D1)
Men’s Tennis, 2009-10: 738 teams overall (258 D1); 7,894 participants (2,644 D1)

I don't know if men's tennis participation in NAIA has been similar or not, but in NCAA's three divisions, it has remained pretty static, with the number of teams and participants both increasing.

US Population 1980: 227,224,681
US Population 2010: 308,745,538

I think there are more people fighting for those spots now than there was in 1980. That point I concede to the anti-foreigner movement.

[Delano]

Originally Posted by floridatennisdude

US Population 1980: 227,224,681
US Population 2010: 308,745,538

I think there are more people fighting for those spots now than there was in 1980. That point I concede to the anti-foreigner movement.

I think the problem isn't so much that demand for college scholarships has grown as it is that the supply hasn't kept pace. A huge number of international students are now interested in college scholarships that simply aren't available internationally. So there's only one place to go - the US. Unless the US vastly expands the number of college tennis scholarships, or universities overseas start offering tennis scholarships in large numbers, some Americans who would have had a scholarship in the past will no longer have that opportunity. I'm all for efforts to raise the level of tennis in the US, but I can't see how even a very successful effort would have more than a minor effect on these numbers.