Athletes Wanted: The Complete Game Plan for Maximizing Athletic Scholarship and Life Potential
My choice for reading during my recent vacation was a book by Chris Krause, the founder and president of Chicago-based National Collegiate Scouting Association. A graduate of North Chicago High School and Vanderbilt University, he is a former football player who has been in the recruiting business since 1989. His book, Athletes Wanted, is a must read for every parent and athlete who ever gets involved in the recruiting process. I ve read dozens of how-to books on recruiting over the years and most of them are helpful and well researched. But Krause s book is best of all, a complete guidebook for maximizing athletic scholarship and life potential.  I wanted to do it because there never has been a resource that looked at the end result in mind, the end goal, not just a scholarship but a meaningful degree that enables you to provide for your family, Krause said.  Kids say they want athletic scholarships or go to a Division I or II school. But they never graduate. They don t look at all of their options. Most people don t have a clue about the recruiting process when they start out. They haven t done enough research. They don t understand how the whole process works. And that includes the schools, coaches and counselors.  They don t know how to leverage the sports angle and negotiate the best financial aid package. In this book, I wanted to focus on the benefits of athletics, what sports can do for them. People don t appreciate the value of the academic support that colleges can offer an athlete. People don t realize that by playing sports you separate yourself from all others who are going into the job market.  Krause, who founded NCSA in 2000, tried to answer as many questions as he could in his 354-page book. A total of 2,000 copies were printed for an advance preview and so far, he said, no one has complained that he missed anything. No wonder. He had accumulated data for 20 years and did two years of research before making a decision to write this book.  I saw all the books out there, all the same thing, nothing that dug into the benefits of sports as to why your son should play in college or the benefits of playing in college and what it does for the rest of your life, Krause said. Most of the other books were how-to guides, telling kids to make a resume and call coaches and wish them good luck. I wanted to do something better.  The book, complete with dozens of interesting facts that would delight any trivia expert, includes chapters on the benefits of participating in athletics, the history of college recruiting, role of parents, how to communicate with coaches, marketing the student-athlete and everything you need to know about scholarships, videos, financial aid, admissions, camps, combines and recruiting services. --Taylor Bell - The Chicago Sun Times