Athletes 22 5/21/09
Making the Choice
How Top Prep Runners Select a College
By Jim Gerweck
As featured in the May 2009 issue of Running Times Magazine
The college admission process is a harrowing one for most high school seniors, with the pressure of SATs and transcripts, essays and
applications making it one of the most trying times of anyone's life. It's much the same for the top scholastic runners in the country,
although for somewhat different reasons.
Unlike the majority of their peers, athletic blue-chippers don't have to worry as much about being accepted as they do about picking from
dozens, perhaps hundreds, of schools that are recruiting them. In a turnabout from the normal high school senior's experience, the main
concern is choosing rather than being chosen. It might seem like a pleasant problem to have, but it doesn't make life any less stressful,
as recruiting letters and phone calls and official campus visits add to an already busy schedule.
Three of the top runners from the class of 2009 -- Jordan Hasay, Kathy Kroeger and Trevor Dunbar -- reveal some of the thought
process that went into their final decisions.
Jordan was one of the most decorated runners to come through the American high school ranks in the past decade, sandwiching Foot
Locker national championships as a freshman and a senior around medals in the world junior track meet and a finalist spot in the U. S.
Olympic trials 1500m, where she set a high school record of 4:14.50. She was the last of the three to announce her college decision,
waiting until the day before the national signing period on Feb. 4 to make her somewhat surprising decision to go to the University of
Oregon.
"You have to go where you feel it's right for you," she said prior to making her choice public. "Try to picture yourself at that school. You
have to make sure you're confident in your decision." Jordan was 90 percent sure after visiting Oregon in the fall, but wanted to make
certain she'd explored all her options. "I almost cancelled my last two visits, but I wanted to be sure I'd seen all the schools." Jordan
advises potential recruits to do a lot of research ahead of time and narrow their choices down to a manageable number.
Kathy, who succeeded Jordan as Foot Locker champ in 2006, began looking at schools her junior year. "I knew I was looking for someplace
with good academics, particularly in science and math," she says. During her junior year spring break, she visited several schools
unofficially. Once the recruiting process began in earnest, she narrowed her choices to Wisconsin, Stanford and Duke. "When I came back
from visiting them, I knew it was going to be a hard choice," she recalls. "All the coaches were great." After talking to her coach,
Olympian Jim Spivey, she sat down and analyzed all her choices. "Ultimately, at Stanford I felt like I really belonged. That, and their
history of producing so many Olympians, decided me." Also, the move to the West Coast was a factor. Kathy wanted college to be "really
different" from high school in Tennessee. She made her choice on New Year's Eve and says, "I was so relieved -- I couldn't stop smiling."
Trevor couldn't do much smiling at that time -- he'd just had four wisdom teeth removed -- but he was equally happy and relieved to have
finalized his college choice as well.
Coming from Kodiak, Alaska, Trevor's college environment would almost have to be different, but he chose to stay relatively close to
home by attending the University of Portland.
"Every coach I met had knowledge to offer me and improve my running, but Portland kind of won out because I felt the most comfortable
there," he says. "What set it apart was the area, the small environment of the school, running trails and surroundings -- it was a place I
could enjoy for the next four years." There was also a personal connection to UP -- his parents met there, and his mother was a top runner
for the Pilots.
Another big factor was coach Rob Conner's track record of taking good high school runners and developing them, through a program of long
distance mileage, into some of the top collegians in the country, able to hold their own against more decorated recruits from other
schools. As the Foot Locker runner-up, Trevor is doubtless the best high schooler to matriculate to Portland. "I'm hoping I get the same
effect that everyone else has there," he says.
Copyright © 2009 Running Times Magazine - All Rights Reserved