Originally Posted by CageSage
Originally Posted by Anonymous
Cage - I recently filled out a bunch of online questionnaires for my 2017 daughter. After I was done, I realized that I put the wrong 1 mile time for her, by mistake! I put down 7:08, instead of 6:38, on any forms that asked for a mile time...I'm so frustrated and upset over it...can you give me any advice? Do you think I should fill them out again, or email the coaches, or just leave it alone? I'm so pissed! I appreciate your thought, or ideas, on it.


First and foremost : Completing online questionnaires should be a job for your daughter. While you can participate in the exercise of reviewing content (letters, schedules, resume details), your daughter needs to take an ownership role in the completion of these expressions of interest.

If ownership was in the right place, perhaps this mile time error would not have happened.

At this point, your daughter should draft a letter which can be sent to the target college coaches and introduce herself. In that letter she should explain that her mile time has improved since the original entry on the questionnaire. The last thing a college coach wants to hear from a potential player is "my mom did it wrong for me".

Most importantly, a target college coach that has yet to form a coach-recruit relationship with your student-athlete daughter certainly does not want that first contact coming through Mom.

Hope that this helps.


Thanks Cage. Definitely helps. I understand your point, and we don't plan to correspond with the coaches, until it comes time to talk real specifics, like finances, etc. (probably 2 years from now). She did fill out about 8 questionnaires on her own last night. They were so repetitive, and there was nothing on them that needed her personal input at this point, or that had any connection to her. It was all just the same facts over and over. So, to save her some time, I filled out a bunch today, while I had time. The mile time mistake came from her, not me. We previously (just two days before the questionnaires) emailed all the coaches (from her, not me), and attached a profile page, with her personal, school and club team information. Everything's coming from "her", as far as the coaches can see. Nothing from mom or dad.

Being that she's only a freshman, the questionnaires are half blank as it is (no SAT's, GPA, HS stats, etc.), so I was thinking about just leaving things as-is, being that she'll need to update all that other info next year, or in the late spring, I guess. That actually raises another question - when we have new information, or "faster" times, what should she do? Does she fill out the questionnaire all over again, or just email the coaches, with updates to the answers she originally gave, or left blank?

Back to my original dilemma - now that you know what we've done so far, do you think she should email each coach, specifically about the 30 second mistake on the mile time? She can't say her time improved, since it was just a few days ago. Maybe we wait until spring, and then send update emails, about her faster time? I'm not sure how critical that will be at this point, since so much other information is also missing, for now. What do you think?

As always, thanks for your advice, and input!