NAIA AND NCAA SKIING SCHOLARSHIPS
What you need to know about College
Skiing scouting and Recruiting
This page contains specific
information about college skiing scholarships and the skiing recruiting and
scouting process. The information you need to assist you when you to apply for
college financial aid can be found here.
The NCAA approved its first national collegiate
skiing championship in 1954. The trial was successful, and the championship
became a permanent annual event in 1955.
Women's skiing was added in 1983. While women compete against one another in their own events, there is a single team championship, as in fencing, based on combined men's and women's results.
The National Collegiate Athletic Association allows each division 1 skiing program 6.3 scholarships for men and 7 for women. In division 2 the ratio is 6.3 scholarships for men and 6.3 for women.
Not all athletic scholarships are full ride like football and basketball, so called "head count" sports; most are classed as "equivalency" sports, like NCAA skiing. Put simply this means that coaches can "share" their allocation between a larger number of skiers.
This is good news for skiers. If we take women's skiing as an example we see that a coach can divide the "7" scholarships between a larger number of students. That could mean 12 partial scholarships instead of 7 full ride scholarships. If you are good enough of course then a full -ride scholarship is always a possibility.