Latest / The Christy-Faith Show / Ep. 132 - Can Homeschoolers Play College Sports? NCAA Eligibility Explained (Part 2 of 4) // Natalie Mack

Transcript

Ep. 132 - Can Homeschoolers Play College Sports? NCAA Eligibility Explained (Part 2 of 4) // Natalie Mack · The Christy-Faith Show

• 0:00
  Christy-Faith: Welcome back to episode two. You are in the middle of an amazing series that we're doing here with Natalie Mack on homeschooling high school. And a funny thing, as we brain stormed this session, I was at my hair salon in one of those salon suites with with dye on my hair, and we're on the phones saying to each other, we should split this up. Yeah. Yeah.
• 0:22
  We should make this a series where each episode focuses on one particular path for a student. Mhmm. And I just thought that was a brilliant idea. Natalie, thank you so much. And she Thank you.
• 0:34
  Graciously split up the the episodes for me and said, hey, Christy, I think we should do one on just general high school. We should do another one, which is today, episode two of our series is gonna be on homeschool athletes and the NCAA, what families need to know before college recruiting. Right. The episode after this, episode three of our series is going to be about college. If your child is college bound and all the ways that that looks because it's not always a traditional four year.
• 1:03
  Natalie Mack: Right.
• 1:04
  Christy-Faith: And then the last episode is well, I'm so excited about learning this is from homeschool to military service. Yes. But, Natalie, first, I have to read your bio. Okay. Because this might be the first I know.
• 1:16
  It's always hard to hear your own bio.
• 1:18
  Natalie Mack: Yeah.
• 1:18
  Christy-Faith: But this might be the only episode that someone listens to in the series. And appreciate so I want them to know how qualified you are to be here and advising. And plus, I don't invite just anybody.
• 1:29
  Natalie Mack: Thank you. No. I do know that. So I am honored to be on The Christy Fave Show.
• 1:45
  Christy-Faith: Okay. So Natalie Mack has a master's in education. She's the founder of Homeschool Natalie Mack and a homeschool consultant, TEDx speaker, and author of a 101 tips for homeschoolers. With more than twenty three years of homeschooling experience, she helps families confidently navigate high school, transcripts, college admissions, military service, and other post secondary pathways. Natalie is passionate about equipping parents with practical guidance so they can make informed decisions.
• 2:19
  And I wanna let you know that, I'm not gonna Natalie, I'm not gonna have you explain all of your kiddos and their path again.
• 2:26
  Natalie Mack: Yes.
• 2:27
  Christy-Faith: For those of you who are curious, why is she qualified to speak on all these pathways? It's because she literally had her kids go through each of these pathways. And so if you wanna hear the story about all of her kids and what they are doing now, please go to the first episode of this series, and you can find that out. And I'm sure it'll come up as we're just talking about episode two here of our series. So you did have an NCAA athlete, a d one soccer player.
• 2:55
  Yes. Right? Yes. Talk to us about that.
• 2:58
  Natalie Mack: Yes. So wow. I'm gonna segue real quickly. Also, if they wanna know more about me too, tune in to the two the TEDx on YouTube. So Oh, okay.
• 3:08
  Yes. The impact of homeschooling, and I think it's at 40,000 views. So I must have said something in a little bit over eight minutes that made sense to people and resonated. But
• 3:19
  Christy-Faith: Oh, good. And you know what? Why don't we go ahead and just put a link to that We'll put a link
• 3:22
  Natalie Mack: to show notes Thank you.
• 3:23
  Christy-Faith: So that people don't have to hunt. Yeah. Yeah. No. Okay.
• 3:26
  Let's do that.
• 3:27
  Natalie Mack: So yeah. So our youngest daughter started playing soccer when she was seven, and not long after said, I wanna be a division one athlete mom. And I'm thinking, okay. Like, you don't come from a family of athletes. So I'm thinking, okay.
• 3:41
  Let me figure out what she's talking about because I didn't fully know. And I'm thinking when I found out, I'm like, oh, how does she know? She's like seven. Right? She showed us that she actually knew, and she continued to express that.
• 3:57
  But not only just by saying, oh, I wanna do this. She actually showed up on the soccer field. It became something she was amazing at. And we started with rec soccer. We started with recreational soccer on military installations.
• 4:11
  And then we also segued when we moved to Virginia Beach to homeschool soccer leagues homeschool sports leagues, which were amazing. So I shout out the Denny's family who is in Virginia Beach who coach Denny was the one who said, you know, she needs to go to travel to club level. You know? She's done great here, but she needs to move on. And thank you, coach Denny.
• 4:32
  I see him every year at the HEAV convention, he and his wife, Becky. We moved on to club soccer, and then eventually, yeah, of course, we went through as she got older for the high school process, which we'll talk about today, is that eligibility process. And so she played four years after and then got picked up and went over to Italy for a year. And then and she still plays soccer, of course, recreational. She's a licensed clinical social worker.
• 4:57
  It's her main job, but she still plays soccer. Yeah.
• 5:01
  Christy-Faith: Oh, that's fantastic.
• 5:03
  Natalie Mack: Yes.
• 5:04
  Christy-Faith: So when we had our learning center in Los Angeles Mhmm. We I don't know if you know this, but we ran a homeschool out of our center. So I was homeschooling knew that. Yeah. I was homeschooling other people's kids before my own kids.
• 5:17
  Wow. Right. I always caveat it, and I don't talk a lot about it because it wasn't like, let's start a classical homeschool. No. No.
• 5:25
  No. These were actors and mostly actors and pre pro athletes.
• 5:31
  Natalie Mack: Okay. Mhmm.
• 5:32
  Christy-Faith: And so we we are very familiar
• 5:36
  Natalie Mack: with Mhmm.
• 5:37
  Christy-Faith: Athletes and what it takes. And it was it was very stressful at times, but these these are kids that would have been truant in traditional school because we had a pre pro surfer actually. She was always going to Australia and places like that.
• 5:51
  Natalie Mack: Yeah.
• 5:51
  Christy-Faith: She ended up doing very well. I think she's still around. And I do know of homeschooling families. There was a family that I knew here in town for a while who the reason why they were homeschooling was because of golf. Okay.
• 6:04
  Because of the opportunities for golf.
• 6:06
  Natalie Mack: Mhmm.
• 6:06
  Christy-Faith: So let's talk about this. A lot of people think that homeschoolers aren't playing sports. You know, all these
• 6:13
  Natalie Mack: Right. All these. Right.
• 6:14
  Christy-Faith: All these. Stereotypes of us. Right. Yeah. So but okay.
• 6:18
  My first question for you is, can homeschool students compete in NCAA college athletics just like traditionally schooled students? I think that's a good first question.
• 6:26
  Natalie Mack: Yeah. Yeah. And that's a that's a that's a good question because it's a common question for families who are homeschooling who don't know and who will pivot back to brick and mortar unnecessarily. Right? So, yeah, definitely.
• 6:37
  Homeschooling doesn't prevent students from competing in NCAA athletics in college. And the difference though for homeschooling families is you are wearing that guidance counselor hat. So that means that you are responsible for making sure that academic record is documented correctly and going through the NCAA eligibility requirements and making sure that your student, especially for division one and two, you know, that they're meeting all the benchmarks that are needed.
• 7:09
  Christy-Faith: I'm curious your take on this. Some people say just follow the NCAA requirements in general, even if you don't have an athlete. Have you ever heard people say that?
• 7:17
  Natalie Mack: I haven't, but they're pretty they're they're good and strong, and they they work. Like, we talked on the last podcast, right, episode, you wanna build that sound foundation. It keeps all doors open. So the requirements academically for NCAA are pretty sound requirements that definitely would open just about any door, I would imagine. They don't require you to do AP or dual enrollment, so you can, and there's a place for that.
• 7:46
  And I guess I would say that would be the one difference if someone's pursuing, admission to a service academy, then I would say you definitely wanna look at some APs and some dual enrollments, but we'll get into that. I know we're gonna do the military part later. But yeah, that would be one thing I just wanna throw out there just in case families are kind of like because sometimes you have a family, you have a student who wants to go to a service academy and also wants to play their sport at that service academy. So they kind of navigating two paths at once, which is what I tell families anyway, with this whole NCAA You process, have to meet the eligibility requirements that the NCAA eligibility center requires a family of students rather, but you also have to get admitted to a college. And these are what I would say, these are simultaneous.
• 8:34
  These are pathways that families need to journey down at the same time. One doesn't guarantee the other, meaning a student can get cleared through the NCAA, but they won't get admitted to that college. So just because a coach is saying, Oh, we want to offer you an opportunity, you have to be admitted, that's a different process. And the coach is not sitting on the admissions committee making that decision. And so students have to show up well.
• 9:01
  The NCAA GPA like for division one, I think the minimum is a 2.3, which isn't high. It really isn't high. That won't get you in the door for a lot of schools academically. So that's why I say don't just look over and do that, do both. Create an environment where the student is meeting the benchmarks for admission, you know, and then definitely the benchmarks for NCAA.
• 9:28
  Christy-Faith: Now this is a question actually I just I'm curious about because I don't know the answer to this. Yeah. What are those? Is it just an extra year of language? Is it is it things like that that that the NCAA requires?
• 9:41
  What are those little distinctives or some of them?
• 9:43
  Natalie Mack: Okay. So the NCAA has an eligibility center. Students and parents need to go to find it on on Google, right, website or whatever your search engine is. Then we give Google props, but whatever search engine you have and look for the homeschool toolkit, t o o l toolkit. You wanna download that.
• 10:04
  You follow that toolkit. This is not the independent homeschooler doing what we want, which I support. High five independent homeschoolers doing what we want, but this is following the NCAA. And in that toolkit, it tells you the requirements that will be needed and you need to follow everyone. So specifically, like academically, it's all they focused on.
• 10:25
  They are not assessing your athlete's athletic ability. That's totally has nothing to do with it. They're just saying your student needs to meet these benchmarks, take these subjects, get this amount of credit in these core subjects so that we can feel like the student will be prepared academically on a campus while they are also pursuing their sport. And so that's super important. And so when you download that toolkit, it talks about the requirements.
• 10:52
  There's like this, I'll real quickly, there's 16 core courses, that are needed or credits rather. And they cover like the English, the social science, the math, the whole arena like that. And then you have a ten seven window. So 10 out of those 16 must be completed by the start of the seventh semester, which is fall of senior year. And they are specific about what 10 credits those are.
• 11:23
  And so they call it the ten seven rule, 10 of the 16 before the start of the seventh semester. And so that's why I say all that's laid out in the toolkit. But what trips families up or what can be a little intimidating for families is one, this is a very unique process that most people have never never really looked into. So you're a little anxious. You already are apprehensive potentially about high school in general.
• 11:49
  And now you have this extra several hoops you need to jump through and you need to get them correct. So there is that pressure, but it's doable. And I help families, I offer consultations on this, because it's super important. And we went through the journey ourselves. It was several years ago, because our youngest daughter is a little bit older, but the process has changed a little bit, but not a whole lot.
• 12:11
  And one thing that's really also I want to throw out that it comes to mind is, again, students don't have to do AP or dual enrollment, but there's a process for those to count the AP courses as well as dual enrollment. You can find plenty of online schools that have gone through and become NCAA approved, and they will say that on their website. So make sure that if you're looking online for courses, look and see if they are NCAA approved. But you can also use regular courses, what I call mommy courses. You just have to fill out something called a CCW and that stands for CORE, C O R E course worksheet.
• 12:48
  And you want to make sure you fill those out for all of those, mommy courses, those courses that are now already approved by NCAA. And once you get the pattern of filling out that worksheet, it's just, you know, repeat, repeat, repeat. What is helpful is to go ahead and fill those out as your student finishes each year. You may need to look and see when your student is getting ready to actually, she or he is getting closer to spring of eleventh grade, you start to upload those papers, those CCWs, or you email them rather than say upload, you email them out. You wanna make sure that the most common, the current one is what you're actually submitting.
• 13:31
  But I mean, at that point, copy and paste is better than having to redo or having to do what's at that point, you're what, three years of courses. Right. What six to eight courses a year. Like, how many CCWs is that? Right?
• 13:47
  Yeah. So don't do that. But I help families. I walk through and help them. I check CCWs.
• 13:53
  You know, the final authority goes with NCAA. So I tell parents that as a disclaimer. But I can help you and be a second I- Yes. Downing board.
• 14:03
  Christy-Faith: Right. Yes. So when should a family start thinking about NCAA eligibility then? Homeschooling four kids means I'm juggling roughly 24 different subjects at any given time. And a few years back during a particularly busy season, I hit a wall.
• 14:17
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• 14:35
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• 14:52
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• 15:17
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• 15:42
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• 16:04
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• 16:30
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• 16:46
  So when should a family start thinking about NCAA eligibility then?
• 16:51
  Natalie Mack: Yeah. So the clock starts to tick at ninth grade. So Okay. Ideally before ninth grade would be good. That way you start ninth grade with the plan in hand.
• 17:01
  So the NCAA plan would be the larger house, and then within that would be The larger house is like graduation, right? And so that would be like the NCAA would be a separate room in the house. And so you want to then say, okay, what do we need in this room? And that's where you would follow those guidelines and they mesh really fine and well with regular high school requirements that you typically are gonna have your student embark upon anyway for college bound. But that clock starts at ninth grade, and they give you four years to finish those 16 core credits.
• 17:40
  So some families actually start looking into this before, obviously, ninth grade looking at like and I work with families. Some of them are like seventh and eighth grade. They're just kind of like looking at keeping those doors open that we talked about. And the earlier you know for these like narrow paths, the earlier you know, the less stress because you're like, oh, okay, we're keeping this door open. Our child is an athlete, they might want to play in college, so why not just kind of follow that so that we're prepared.
• 18:09
  If they get to become eleventh grade and they're still loving the sport, they still are performing well, coaches are knocking on the door, then you're ready. You're ready. You haven't lost a thing. You're well ahead of the game. Because being a guidance counselor, right?
• 18:27
  Especially that senior year, it's it's you know, you're wearing that hat, so you wanna be prepared. Right?
• 18:35
  Christy-Faith: Yes. Yeah. Do it.
• 18:37
  Natalie Mack: So don't be afraid. You can do that. I'm not saying you can't. Plenty of people do.
• 18:41
  Christy-Faith: Yes. But and I'm so with you loud and clear. Yeah. The last thing a mom needs is, you know, a forty hour work week catching up four years of coursework. Right.
• 18:51
  Yeah. And you know, and you forget. You forget what you've done anyway.
• 18:54
  Natalie Mack: Yes. Yes.
• 18:55
  Christy-Faith: Yeah.
• 18:56
  Natalie Mack: I'd have a pint of ice cream and some bonbons and everything if I had to do that right. Oh, yeah.
• 19:00
  Christy-Faith: Well, don't don't make it sound better. Right. You know, I've downloaded the NCAA toolkit. Yeah. And they lay it out really well.
• 19:12
  They do. They it's it's easy to understand.
• 19:15
  Natalie Mack: And Yes.
• 19:16
  Christy-Faith: But, yeah, I agree with you that if you have a kid where you know, not that you're pressuring your kid to get a college scholarship or anything, but if they're a good athlete and this could potentially be something, it's just a smart way to go about high school.
• 19:29
  Natalie Mack: Right. It is. It is. And I tell families also, be aware that, and I'm trying to think of what the percentage is. It's a pretty low percentage for students who actually get full athletic scholarships.
• 19:41
  Right? So again, remember that 2.3 is low because your student is probably gonna need well, I don't know what your student, depends on finances, but most students need assistance with college because the cost is so substantial. So we're looking at what? Merit money. We're looking at merit, academic scholarship money.
• 20:03
  So that 2.3 is not likely gonna get you merit money that you probably will need to to kinda merge with that athletic scholarship money because it's not likely to be a full ride.
• 20:17
  Christy-Faith: That's right. I you know, I had a podcast episode. I had an expert on this exact thing Yes. On the the percentage. It's just so sad what they what they do to kids and what they make kids believe.
• 20:30
  Yeah. That and Yeah. The I think the average college sports scholarship is I I haven't looked at I will say I haven't I did look at the data at the time, and it was around $2,000 a year is the average. Like, that is nothing. That's nothing.
• 20:45
  Yeah. But you can say you got a sports scholarship. You know?
• 20:47
  Natalie Mack: Right. Right.
• 20:49
  Christy-Faith: And you play you've paid more than that in a semester of club sports. It's not You're right. The GPA does matter because you do need if you especially if you get the scholarship to a very expensive school and they're only paying a small percentage.
• 21:04
  Natalie Mack: Right. Exactly. Yeah. And if it's division one, that's the most competitive division. You're less likely to get that full ride with that division.
• 21:14
  Division two, you have a little bit more of a chance to get a little bit more money. And then division three, really the NCAA doesn't really have any academic eligibility requirements for D3. The individual schools handle all of So that's good to know. And so some families and students will take a look and go, you know, maybe a D3 looks pretty good. And the reason is a d one is like your all time committed, passionate.
• 21:44
  I mean, you're on deck. Right? You're on deck. It's it's full. Like, you don't really typically get time for other clubs and activities or, you know, hanging out with friends, which is what, you know, on college campuses, you know, you might wanna do.
• 21:57
  Right? You might be kinda okay to hang out with a few friends. So you're really busy. Like you are moving from practice to courses, to ice baths, to literally being on a bus going somewhere or flying somewhere or whatever it is to a game, doing your schoolwork on the bus and coming back and then maybe popping in and taking a test, right?
• 22:18
  Christy-Faith: Yeah.
• 22:19
  Natalie Mack: D2 is a little bit less intense. And then D3, again some families choose that because one, you're gonna get potentially the opportunity to get some of that academic money right there. As well as you can kinda have the best of both worlds. If especially if your student loves the sport, but they also like, I really just wanna have enjoy my college experience Yeah.
• 22:46
  Christy-Faith: So Well and I know homeschool families who didn't go d one route Uh-huh. Mainly for playing time. Yeah. More more money at the d two and d three schools, and their kid was a really good athlete, but not the best ever. Right.
• 23:01
  You know? And the kid wanted to play.
• 23:03
  Natalie Mack: Yeah.
• 23:04
  Christy-Faith: He wanted to play. Yeah. So playing time is something to consider too. Yeah.
• 23:07
  Natalie Mack: Exactly.
• 23:07
  Christy-Faith: So I think you may have already answered this, but I wanna give you an opportunity to add to it at all. And that is what does the NCAA consider a homeschool course, and why does course documentation matter?
• 23:17
  Natalie Mack: Yeah. So in reference to course documentation, it really matters. And a lot of families that have students who are college bound are keeping track of course descriptions anyway. Right? So that's where that would help you fill out those core course worksheets that I mentioned at the beginning.
• 23:34
  And you want to make sure that everything that you put on those CCWs matches the transcript exactly. So like don't change course titles and credits and things like that, and it all needs to match up really well. NCAA considers homeschool courses. They're really looking for ones that there's an instructor that the student can engage with. And so they are not anti homeschooling.
• 23:57
  So I would tell parents sometimes you think, oh, they're going be against no. They really want homeschool athletes to become eligible as well. So if you have questions, they are really easy to talk to. I have their email. I email them when I need things, and they're really good about that.
• 24:12
  But you wanna just kinda make sure that you are just following that toolkit completely and keeping track of all of the documentation that's needed.
• 24:21
  Christy-Faith: Yeah. Well, and of course, they would be homeschool friendly because so many of these like, if you look at just the Olympics, for example Yeah. The gymnasts. Like, all most of these child athletes like this Yes. That are competing at high levels
• 24:33
  Natalie Mack: Yes.
• 24:33
  Christy-Faith: Are homeschooled.
• 24:34
  Natalie Mack: Exactly. You don't have time to go to a brick and mortar and sit there.
• 24:38
  Christy-Faith: Yeah. And you know what? I will say for our athletes, so when I when we ran our homeschool out of our center that Yeah. Yeah. Athletes that we did have, it was really about just fulfilling the requirements.
• 24:50
  Like, wasn't Yeah. This heartfelt, let's read let's go out in nature and do a read aloud.
• 24:56
  Natalie Mack: Yeah.
• 24:56
  Christy-Faith: That's not what that homeschooling was. Yes. It was these kids were basically and they were not college bound.
• 25:02
  Natalie Mack: Oh, interesting. Yeah.
• 25:03
  Christy-Faith: They already kinda had their career and were making good living with their sports, which, you know, that happens too. So let me ask you this. What mistakes then can homeschool families make that could create eligibility problems? Not following the toolkit.
• 25:18
  Natalie Mack: Right. Now following the toolkit, waiting too long, because remember that clock's ticking.
• 25:22
  Christy-Faith: Too long. Yeah. Okay.
• 25:23
  Natalie Mack: That is a big thing. If you wait till junior or senior year to look and see what those requirements are, probably missed a few important ones and you may not have enough of the core credits in each of those core subject categories. You may think that every online course will work or you may sign up for like an asynchronous course where there's no actual, like a lot of engagement from the instructor. So you may need to take a look at that. Like you just haven't kept track of your documentation.
• 25:52
  Like you don't what textbooks were used for what course, you didn't didn't really track all the things that that course entailed, what the course description was. I mean, one of the beauties though with that, I should tell parents is if you're using a curriculum, say for science, you're using apology or chemistry, Use apology as description and the table of contents. That's public. That's Copy and paste that stuff. You're not stealing.
• 26:20
  It's public on their website. So you can use it. So keep things simple when you can. If you're creating your own course, make sure you can say what the description is, what you had the student do, how you graded them, how basically your grading scale, how you determine the credits that were allocated for that, all those kinds of important things. And so those can be mistakes that parents just might not know.
• 26:47
  I always see a parent, oh, I didn't know that there was a requirement. We have a student who has said, I wanna play in college. And we've been going through the academics, feel good about potential admissions here and there. But we didn't know that there was a separate process for NCAA. So parents go, oh my gosh, Obiah.
• 27:09
  And for some for a lot of parents, you all, that are homeschooling with a plan to keep doors open, you probably are okay and have met the benchmarks. You just need to look and make sure. And then do it early enough where you can at least add in some summer courses or whatever you need Mhmm. To get in place there. So
• 27:33
  Christy-Faith: I wanna stop and ask you right now that if my podcast series has been helpful to you in any way, would you stop and do something for me? Even right now, it'll only take you ten seconds and it costs you nothing. Would you hit that thumbs up, give the show five stars if I've earned it, leave a comment, or maybe click that notification so that you get a little bell that rings when a podcast episode drops, and make a comment about the show or ask a question. Those little tiny things that can be done so quickly, they tell the algorithm, those robots behind the screen, that this show is worth showing other moms. There's probably a mom really overwhelmed right now that needs this podcast series, and just by you engaging in a little way, that can help her find us.
• 28:16
  And it also helps me give you oodles of value for free because when a lot of people watch the show, the sponsors are happy. And if someone comes to mind while you're listening, maybe a friend who's nervous about homeschooling, googling at night, not sure what to do, please go ahead and send her this series. And thank you so much ahead of time. Even if you only do one or two of those things, I really appreciate it from the bottom of my heart. So for a mom listening, I'm just gonna play devil's advocate for a second here.
• 28:43
  Yeah. She might say, this is just overwhelming. Why why would I piece this together? I can just send them to a brick and mortar and ensure that all this will be NCAA. What would you tell that mom who's feeling overwhelmed by this and, okay, well, if I do an online class for homeschoolers, have to make sure it's NCAA approved.
• 29:02
  If I do a class, I have to fill out this form. What are the other options? Yes. What would you tell her?
• 29:07
  Natalie Mack: Yeah. Because homeschooling has probably been working fine for your family. So remember, I always say there's academic choice and then there's lifestyle, right? So segueing to brick and mortar, totally your choice, people do it. I affirm parents knowing what they need to do and make the right decision.
• 29:28
  So I will support you. But if you are unsure and you're making it because you doubt, then I would say look at the benefits of homeschooling as a lifestyle. And if it's been working for you, for your student, for your family, then you can continue. So yeah, there's a few hurdles. There's plenty of documentation to help you, plenty of information out there.
• 29:50
  I would say that quality of life for your student is important. So this is one part of who they are, but it's not the sum total. So the sum total lies in your homeschool life, your lifestyle and journey, and maybe being home still, time to mature, less peer pressure. You know, they're gonna complete these courses likely anyway to get to college admissions. So then they still have the time to segue into passions and interests apart from the sport.
• 30:24
  They have time to show up on the soccer field or the sports field or the pool to practice on their own without, you know, trying to fit it in after school. So my daughter would get all her work done. She got up early, got her work done, and she was on the pitch before anybody else. And that was it just fed her soul because she was a strong academic person. She just needed her work, kinda like you mentioned with your son, just give me to work.
• 30:51
  Right? I'll come to you when I need help. And and then she was able to, like, go do her thing. And so yeah. Look into holistic piece.
• 31:01
  Christy-Faith: And I love that you mentioned that because it brought to mind, I interviewed once a homeschool graduate who who is an adult now. And they were in a situation where they had it wasn't military, but the dad was in sales, and they did move around a lot. And he was very good at fencing.
• 31:20
  Natalie Mack: Got it.
• 31:21
  Christy-Faith: Yes. And he is so thankful that he was homeschooled because as you can fencing is pretty niche. Yeah. Right? It is.
• 31:30
  And they would move to a new city, and the, like, the best fencing organization or club in a particular city would be full. You wouldn't get a spot. People are on wait list forever. But he said, I could train in the day. I could train during the day.
• 31:45
  Yes. And I was able to get really good. Yeah. But, you know, with athletes who are doing such adornment amount of training Right. This is why I love homeschooling because we still want our kids to have what developmentally they need.
• 31:59
  Yes. So what happens is and when I had a guest on the podcast, this was something that he was talking about in how the early professionalization of sports has robbed kids of their childhood.
• 32:09
  Natalie Mack: Yeah.
• 32:09
  Christy-Faith: And it's a major problem because they're not developmentally getting what they need.
• 32:14
  Natalie Mack: Right.
• 32:14
  Christy-Faith: Right. Because of our sports culture and what it requires now, it's it's basically to me, it feels like an alter. I know that's a strong visual. I get you. But Yeah.
• 32:25
  Yeah. But I do feel like that we we I live in Colorado. We have had to make that choice. Mhmm. And we just would not sacrifice what I know, you know, to compete at those particular levels, it wasn't a fit for our family.
• 32:40
  But what I would say is I do think it is it would have been possible with homeschooling. Yes. Like, if we had chosen to do that, there were other just before moms come after me, there were other reasons why we chose not to take that path.
• 32:53
  Natalie Mack: Right.
• 32:54
  Christy-Faith: For our family, there were other factors to it. But that's where you have those scholar athletes
• 32:59
  Natalie Mack: Yes.
• 32:59
  Christy-Faith: That we talk about
• 33:00
  Natalie Mack: Mhmm.
• 33:00
  Christy-Faith: That that are well rounded. Mhmm. It can it's so easily
• 33:04
  Natalie Mack: It's doable with homeschooling. It's
• 33:06
  Christy-Faith: doable when you're home schooling because they can have a hobby, they can have a part time job, they can have an internship, and they can still train.
• 33:13
  Natalie Mack: Exactly.
• 33:13
  Christy-Faith: And they're not at, you know, the school eight hours a day. I mean, I was just being a varsity athlete, not I mean, I was decent, but not great. Yeah. My entire probably kept me out of trouble, honestly. But my entire high school all I remember is basketball practice.
• 33:28
  It was till it was dark at night and then every Saturday and
• 33:32
  Natalie Mack: Yeah.
• 33:32
  Christy-Faith: You know, usually tournaments on Sundays.
• 33:34
  Natalie Mack: Yeah.
• 33:35
  Christy-Faith: So Yeah. How do you do other things? Right?
• 33:37
  Natalie Mack: The student can be passionate about a sport, but have other interests too. So how do they fit that in? But homeschooling actually gives them that time flexibility.
• 33:46
  Christy-Faith: So how do you manage dual enrollment and online courses and co ops? We have actually, in my co op, we have some athletes who are managing that really well. Mhmm. Navigating public school athletes as a homeschooler.
• 34:00
  Natalie Mack: Right.
• 34:00
  Christy-Faith: And outside instructors. You talked about how if mom teaches a course or is in charge of the course, then there's that form. But what about these other things? The dual enrollment online courses, co
• 34:11
  Natalie Mack: ops, So so all of those are totally fine as well. The dual enrollment, which is really neat about that is that if a student is enrolled in dual enrollment, then the parent does not have to complete the core course worksheet. So that's neat. You don't have to do a CCW. Just need to ensure that that local community college, sends that transcript and that's totally fine.
• 34:34
  Co ops can count. You can you can use your co op class. You just need to again make sure that it fits within those 16 core credits and be able to give the documentation. You can even list like for co op courses, I still list, recommend parents still list themselves as the main instructor and then you can put the co op instructor as a secondary one as well. Online courses, you can still actually use those.
• 34:59
  People like say if you again, I go back to I don't why I'm thinking apology in today. Apology, you're getting a lot getting a lot of shout out today, but it's there. And so
• 35:08
  Christy-Faith: How about how about a shout out for BJU Press Homeschool?
• 35:10
  Natalie Mack: Yeah. Yeah.
• 35:11
  Christy-Faith: Yeah. Yeah.
• 35:13
  Natalie Mack: Hey, Zane. Hey, Zane Tyler and Mike Potts.
• 35:16
  Christy-Faith: Hello. BJU Press Homeschool.
• 35:18
  Natalie Mack: We love Yeah. BJU Homeschool. Right?
• 35:20
  Christy-Faith: Definitely. Science courses. Okay.
• 35:22
  Natalie Mack: I love it. I love it. So, you know, there's a variety of options. So you don't have to change. You're not changing really anything.
• 35:31
  Just making sure that you're checking boxes and, you know, that's literally it in a nutshell, you're making sure that, okay, we get, instead of two masks, which if you're college bound, you'd need more than two masks. But instead of two masks, you're getting four, that type of thing. And again, that's where that plan and starting early helps. But it's not like this additional work you have to do. It's just taking the work that your students likely are already gonna be doing and putting it into the CCWs and seeing that it counts.
• 36:07
  Christy-Faith: So wait. But let me ask you. So for those of you who are you're listening and maybe your kids are younger and you're like, how does homeschooling even work in high school?
• 36:14
  Natalie Mack: Yeah.
• 36:15
  Christy-Faith: Well, the way it works is we source really well. And so we've kind of piece things together based on what our kids need, what their friends are doing, what the co op's doing. Right. And so that's how we're doing things. So Lincoln is taking chemistry next year.
• 36:27
  I am not teaching chemistry. We have we're doing it at the co op, it's gonna be awesome. So but my point is is that say a student does do some of these online classes. So there are some homeschooling institutions that aren't accredited. Right.
• 36:42
  When they take, say, a high school foreign language and that online course doesn't say NCAA, does the mom just have to fill out one of those forms, or is are she in trouble?
• 36:54
  Natalie Mack: Yeah. No. No. No. The mom would fill out the CCW, but you just wanna make sure you look at the homeschool toolkit because it will tell you what is needed to be.
• 37:03
  Like, for example, the the mom has to find out, like, the instructor. You have to have instructor time engagement. It cannot be just like the students doing whatever And not that, you know what I mean? Like a synchronous classes, sometimes there's very little instructor engagement. So that's pretty critical.
• 37:21
  And so that's some of the benchmarks and the toolkit mentions those benchmarks that the parent needs to look at in reference to, like, those type of courses. But people will use online programs to meet the benchmarks that's needed.
• 37:35
  Christy-Faith: Okay. Yeah. I'm thinking of some classical institutions, for example
• 37:40
  Natalie Mack: Yeah.
• 37:40
  Christy-Faith: Really don't have interest in being NCAA.
• 37:43
  Natalie Mack: Right. You know? Exactly.
• 37:44
  Christy-Faith: And like, if your child takes Latin
• 37:46
  Natalie Mack: Yeah.
• 37:47
  Christy-Faith: Will that and the answer is yes. There is a way to make that fit into that NCAA box even if that school doesn't say NCAA
• 37:55
  Natalie Mack: approved on
• 37:56
  Christy-Faith: their website.
• 37:56
  Natalie Mack: Right. Yeah. And you just wanna make sure again, follow that toolkit because it will tell you all the factors that the parents need to look at to make sure that that course would count. Yeah.
• 38:06
  Christy-Faith: Is your child struggling with attention, memory, reading, writing, math? If you're experiencing this, you know how heart wrenching it is to watch them face these hurdles. You've poured love, time, and attention into their education, yet the struggle persists, leaving you feeling stuck and desperately searching for answers. You guys, I want you to know about LearningRx, a proven program designed to help your child's cognitive skills, enabling them to think faster, learn more easily, and perform at their best. I'm talking getting real long term help here with things like ADHD and dyslexia.
• 38:38
  LearningRx is backed by thirty five years of research, and their results are transformative. Use code HOME 50 for $50 off your cognitive skills assessment. Go to learningrx.com or click the link in the show notes. So what should parents be doing in middle school? You kinda mentioned if this is the path you should probably know before ninth grade.
• 38:59
  Anything else regarding maybe a mom who's listening, whose kid is in junior high? Yeah. Is there anything else that she should be thinking about now?
• 39:08
  Natalie Mack: Yeah. So just begin to do that research. Look at the different divisions. Begin to think about the division one, division two, division three, realized that this is not being scouted. This is still a separate process from being scouted.
• 39:26
  So parents often say, Oh, my student, he's so good on he plays the baseball, he's phenomenal baseball player. I mean, there's so many phenomenal baseball players and we as a parent tend to think our student is the best and the most phenomenal. It could be, right? Objectively, I just don't know. But I'm just saying, you wanna make sure that you are doing the research you need to do and that your student has the opportunities to get scouted as well.
• 39:54
  The other piece is that you wanna make sure you are starting to help your student look at this is the potential route down. So you're wanting to do division one, look at the different, schools that are fall within division one. They're now all, apples to apples. Like if you wanna play pro, if you if your student says, oh, I really wanna be a pro player, then that means they've gone through like college and then they get picked up professionally. So not all d one schools lead, have the highest conversion to playing pro.
• 40:31
  So there's different leagues. And so there's a lot to look through. And again, the biggest thing too is don't just chase the money. And I'm and I say that I say that with love. Like and I'm not implying that that homeschool or any parents are chasing money.
• 40:48
  College is expensive. So there's the reality. Let's just talk about the elephant in the room. College is expensive. If a student wants to play in college and if they can get a scholarship athletically and then get merit money, then okay.
• 41:00
  Great. That's what they wanna do. But at the same time, you know, you wanna make sure that the student wants to be on that college campus too. So you're helping parents understand that let's start looking at colleges that fit in these different divisions. Is this going to be one that you're going to be comfortable on?
• 41:16
  Can we do some college visits when we get this kid gets a little bit older, right? And factor because there's the broken leg syndrome that means literally and I've when I've been doing workshops on NCAA at homeschool conferences, I parents go you know, you see the reaction of like, broken leg. What are you talking about? But that's the reality. Sports, people get injured.
• 41:39
  So if you get injured playing your sport in college and you what happens if you can't play it anymore? What happens if the injury is too detrimental to that? Then do you still wanna be on that campus? Does the college still have what you need to ultimately graduate? Because the goal is to graduate.
• 41:57
  Right? Right? You're playing soccer or your sport while you're there, but the goal is to graduate. You can't stay there forever. So is this a place that fits me holistically?
• 42:08
  Not just because they are saying, hey, we have some money for you and here's the carrot, right? So I'm not saying turn down money, I'm just saying make sure that it also fits your student and that they have what they want. Like for example, academic advisors, what is their advising system like for athletes? Athletes are so busy, they need help. Like Liberty, I'll give a plug for Liberty in reference to that when our daughter was there, I assume it's still the same.
• 42:35
  The academic advisors that they had for the athletes were phenomenal and helped her so much because she was trying to do all these things and she needed help. They helped navigate professors who would say were a little bit more friendly to the athletes, meaning they still had to do the same amount of work. But say the test was on a day they were gonna be on a bus to a game, like the professor could make arrangements to assist that athlete and still being successful in that course, as well as showing up for their commitment to the team. So, yeah. And it's a lot of mouthful of stuff, but.
• 43:09
  Christy-Faith: No. I mean, it I'm just think because you know, we worked with thousands of students over the years that we ran our center. There was one young man in particular who got a full ride for tennis and busted his knee. Yeah. Yeah.
• 43:26
  And that was that was a very hard journey Mhmm. For that family Mhmm. And that young man. And so and I think that's just, you know, I can't help it because we we just have to be so careful with achievement culture. Right.
• 43:39
  This this particular child was not equipped. Yeah. Let me just put that. Yeah. Guess.
• 43:44
  Was not equipped mentally
• 43:47
  Natalie Mack: Yeah.
• 43:47
  Christy-Faith: To be able to handle that life change. Mhmm. And because his identity was wrapped up in Mhmm. His performance and in his that he was a tennis player.
• 43:58
  Natalie Mack: Right. That was his identity. I am a tennis player. So when I Yeah. Yeah.
• 44:02
  And who am I? Right?
• 44:03
  Christy-Faith: Right. And you hear of all of these Olympic gold medalists. They actually joke they it's a joke, but it's not a joke. It's not a funny joke, but it is a joke that after they win their medals, they fall into deep depressions because Yeah. Right.
• 44:17
  I think that too, most of us who are homeschooling, even homeschooling athletes, we see that gift and we wanna nurture that gift, but we're not going to worship that gift.
• 44:27
  Natalie Mack: Right. Exactly.
• 44:28
  Christy-Faith: You know, we don't want that to be the idol. We want Right. You know, wow. You know, you're really gifted with this. Let we we can Let's look at that.
• 44:36
  Absolutely. Right. This is a gifting and Right. And we're all only a part of you.
• 44:41
  Natalie Mack: Right? Whole piece? Right. Exactly. Yeah.
• 44:43
  Yeah. And we can do that as homeschooling parents.
• 44:47
  Christy-Faith: It's like one of our benefits, like I said in the earlier episode, this is a flex that we can Yes. In a world where what anyone cares about is performance. I mean, I'm can I tell you, Natalie? And this relates to athletes too. Yeah.
• 45:01
  I had the first year because I blew up overnight. I don't know if you know this. Yeah. I blew up on TikTok overnight. I was not prepared.
• 45:09
  Yeah. I had to go into therapy. Yeah. I can imagine. First year, I had to go into therapy because I did not know what to do.
• 45:17
  And then all of a sudden, people are now judging me for how many views or how many likes or how many this. And I had never judged myself in that way before.
• 45:25
  Natalie Mack: Right.
• 45:26
  Christy-Faith: Right. I just got pissed off about something and made TikTok. So And it and if I were to
• 45:31
  Natalie Mack: go out.
• 45:31
  Christy-Faith: Right? And then now I've reached the pinnacle, which is having Natalie back on my show.
• 45:36
  Natalie Mack: Aw. Thank you.
• 45:37
  Christy-Faith: Thank you. Yeah. But no. And I just love I just love your approach because this these are real things to think about. And, you know, we gotta be careful that we don't the pendulum doesn't swing in the other direction, and we just reject athlete, you know, being an athlete.
• 45:54
  Just like I had a I had a bad experience where, when where they I'm on social media and they I was in an environment where they reject social media like altogether. I'm like, well Right. Social media is how moms find me in social Right. Some a mom finds me on social media, and I'm told every day that she found me on social media. She bought my book, and now she's homeschooling.
• 46:17
  So tell me that that this is bad. No. Right. Just like how this is relating is just like athletics. Mhmm.
• 46:24
  They're not inherently bad, but we can make any we can worship anything.
• 46:27
  Natalie Mack: We can worship anything. It could be something else. Right? I mean, it could be quite honestly, you're right. Totally right.
• 46:33
  It could be, and this is maybe I'll step on some toes, but I know you like you. Oh girl.
• 46:38
  Christy-Faith: Yeah. She's like, I
• 46:40
  Natalie Mack: think Christy's gonna step on some toes. But think about this, how is this different than the parent who is living vicariously through their child? Who says like, okay, everybody in the family was a doctor, so you're gonna be a doctor. And this is what they're worshiping. It's like becoming a doctor, right?
• 46:55
  So I mean, come on now. So in homeschooling, you can say, okay, this is where we see you going and this fits you and this is what you've expressed interest in and we can help prepare and make sure the door stays open for you. But let's talk about the other things in life because ultimately we are more than our profession or more than our interests. Right? You know?
• 47:17
  And, you know, as as a person of faith, you know, there's there's there's eternal things that we, you know, also wanna look at too.
• 47:25
  Christy-Faith: Hey, shout out to Summit HealthShare for sponsoring this episode today. I love Summit HealthShare partially because it's my husband's company. What I think they're doing over there is absolutely incredible and life changing for many families. What is Summit HealthShare? Well, first, let me start with one of my rants about health Need I say anything?
• 47:45
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• 48:19
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• 48:33
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• 48:49
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• 49:05
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• 49:33
  This podcast is also brought to you by The Christy-Faith List. Now hold up because I want you to know what this is. I'm really proud of what The Christy-Faith list has become. It started really scrappy just compiling recommendations because I was fed up with guessing which businesses and providers and doctors weren't gonna give me a hard time when I walked through those doors. And I had tons of friends and family members with nightmare situations where they felt like they were walking into an ambush situation just when they were trying to get help for their families.
• 50:03
  And I was sick and tired of the discrimination that homeschool families were getting. But since then, it has grown into massive directory of colleges, businesses, doctor's offices, reading specialists, occupational therapists, homeschool graduates that are in business themselves now. You name it all in one place. Because why wouldn't we wanna do business with the people who share our values and actually want to work with homeschool families and not give us a hard time? It is completely free for homeschool families to search.
• 50:31
  And if you are a business owner or part of an organization that loves homes chool families and wants to reach more homeschool families and grow your business in that way, please sign yourself up. We wanna know who you are. It's the place where homeschool families support the people who support us. Go to the christyfaithlist.com today. Our society is really good at making young athletes incredibly fragile.
• 50:55
  Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And I and it's Yeah. I think it has to do with money.
• 51:00
  Yeah. You know, getting these you know, you have these gymnastics competitions when your kid's six.
• 51:06
  Natalie Mack: And Right.
• 51:07
  Christy-Faith: Yeah. Whether it's dance, gymnastics, cheer
• 51:09
  Natalie Mack: Yeah.
• 51:10
  Christy-Faith: Doesn't matter what it is. Yeah. And I don't think parents and I talked to a friend recently who kinda got off the club sports train because Yeah. It financially really straining on them. Mhmm.
• 51:24
  She said the reason why she stayed so long well, one, her daughter was good Mhmm. And enjoyed it. But she knew that if they they were so far in.
• 51:33
  Natalie Mack: Right.
• 51:33
  Christy-Faith: So deep. Right. That they knew that they're in they would have to rebuild socially entirely. Brand new friendship groups. Yeah.
• 51:40
  Mom too.
• 51:41
  Natalie Mack: I can't
• 51:41
  Christy-Faith: And so that's the other thing too that I would encourage.
• 51:45
  Natalie Mack: Mhmm.
• 51:45
  Christy-Faith: I have made this mistake. I know other people have too. Don't be so all into one thing that if that is taken away, you have nothing. Right. Diversify your friendships.
• 51:58
  You know, this is why we want kids to be volunteering and at youth group and at this on the field and doing this so that if one thing goes away, they don't crumble.
• 52:10
  Natalie Mack: Exactly. Yes. And And and it's really providing, like you said, more opportunities for your students so that they have different communities as well. The student, as well as you, the family, because if you've put all of your efforts and time into this, things change. Things can change so overnight in so many ways.
• 52:32
  And so where do you pivot? What are your pivot options? And that's important that your student can say, okay, I love this sport, but I also love this and I'm interested in this and I've been exposed to this. So I think it's really important to do that for our athletes and for our kids, specifically for our daughter who wanted to play Division you know, we made sure that there were other things in her life and and encouraged her to have other interests and she did. And so, you know, we were building that foundation.
• 53:04
  Christy-Faith: That's right.
• 53:05
  Natalie Mack: Yeah. Build the foundation. Right? Like, we've been
• 53:08
  Christy-Faith: talking it's lot harder to do if it's if they're at school all day and then
• 53:13
  Natalie Mack: Oh, yeah. Yeah. Our the math does the math. Like No. The hours No.
• 53:18
  Do the math on that. Right? Yeah. You don't have you don't who has the bulk of influence? It's based on hours.
• 53:24
  It's not you,
• 53:25
  Christy-Faith: the parent, when you're working it. I just love that we did an episode on this because there are a lot of really gifted athletes who can make a huge impact Yes. In that world. I have a friend whose son is now involved in, like, youth Christian athletic stuff that is really, really cool because of his giftedness in this. So I love that we this is just one avenue that we can see kids are gifted in, and this is how we just ensure it.
• 53:53
  Again, I think the theme for the these four episodes is no doors closed.
• 53:57
  Natalie Mack: Right. I like that. I like that
• 53:59
  Christy-Faith: theme. Doors closed, whatever they you know, no pressure to on them. Exactly. Let's just make sure that if that is something that you could possibly see happening, these are what to be aware of. Our next episodes are going to be you just listened to episode two, which was on athletes.
• 54:16
  Natalie Mack: Right.
• 54:16
  Christy-Faith: Episode three is we're gonna be talking all about being college bound, and that's gonna include community college, dual enrollment
• 54:23
  Natalie Mack: Yeah.
• 54:23
  Christy-Faith: All of that. Yeah. And then the last episode is going to be from homeschool to military service, where we're gonna talk about enlistment, ROTC, service academies and more.
• 54:32
  Natalie Mack: Right.
• 54:33
  Christy-Faith: But in case someone is only listening to this one because they have an athlete and they're not gonna listen to the others, which is totally cool by the We're happy you're here.
• 54:41
  Natalie Mack: Yeah.
• 54:41
  Christy-Faith: We will put everything in the show notes, but I also just wanna hear from you. How can parents find you and what resources do you have?
• 54:48
  Natalie Mack: Yeah. So you can find me on my website, natalie, natalie-mac, mack.com. And I do specifically offer homeschool consultations from, you know, the whole piece of it. But since we're talking about NCAA, I do have several opportunities if you need one on one assistance from just understanding the process specifically for you and your family. And then another opportunity for reviewing those core course worksheets.
• 55:19
  Oh, nice. Yeah, definitely. So you can reach out to me that way.
• 55:23
  Christy-Faith: Oh, yeah. I would definitely be doing that if I was you know, if it was like my first child and I hadn't gone through this. Right. Yeah.
• 55:29
  Natalie Mack: Right. Yeah.
• 55:30
  Christy-Faith: Yeah. Totally worth the probably very small investment because
• 55:34
  Natalie Mack: I know you
• 55:35
  Christy-Faith: don't charge. I know you don't charge enough.
• 55:37
  Natalie Mack: Yeah. I do. Yeah. I know. I know.
• 55:39
  Okay, Christy.
• 55:40
  Christy-Faith: She's always in trouble for this. So, like but, if it means anything, it means log, get in, and book your appointment now to talk about athletics for your homeschooler. Even if your kiddo is in sixth, seventh grade, not a bad idea, honestly. Just to know what's ahead of you. And even if you don't do anything for two years, it's just it's kinda nice knowing and it'll lower anxiety.
• 56:03
  Natalie Mack: Yes. And, Christy, I'll tell you, that just made me laugh because there is a family. There's a family, a dad that has several little boys, and he has a baby daughter, and he's the sweetest dad. His wife comes. And it seems like whenever I'm at the local Maryland homeschool conference here, MACHY, Maryland Association of Christian Home Educators, I'll shout out Lannister James and her crew.
• 56:26
  And then Oh, Lannister. Or at HEAV, right, in Richmond, Virginia with Anne Miller and her crew. I've had the same family. They just pop up, and he's like, every time you speak on on NC, I'm gonna be there. And his kids are little, like, little.
• 56:43
  And he's this tall guy and but he's the sweetest guy. He's not like a pressure cook guy. He just is like he loves sports. He sees his sons potentially playing, and he just wants the info. But he's just this amazing guy that's sweet.
• 56:58
  So I laugh when you said about starting early because, like, it doesn't hurt to get the information, and he makes me feel good when I look out and see him. I'm like, there he is.
• 57:05
  Christy-Faith: Oh, yeah. Like, you have a good cheerleader. You know, it's so funny because in Thrive Homeschool Community, which you have been invited and you have taught a master class in there, and it was a phenomenal master class.
• 57:17
  Natalie Mack: Thank you.
• 57:17
  Christy-Faith: Great. But we tell the ladies in there, even if you have a preschooler and an elementary kid, come to teen office hours at least a couple of times a year. Yeah. Because you're welcome to come to all of them. Mhmm.
• 57:30
  And I used to stress over how I was gonna do high school. Right. Lincoln was five years old. Yeah. Because You don't know what you hear.
• 57:37
  Yeah. Just to hear how people do it, it it helps a lot. So I agree that sometimes just a meeting just to know what's ahead of you is a smart thing to do. That's adorable about that dad who's
• 57:48
  Natalie Mack: Yeah. Stuff.
• 57:50
  Christy-Faith: I love it. Yeah. Well, we'll put a link for everything in the show notes. Natalie didn't even mention everything that she offers. Yeah.
• 57:56
  But don't worry. And, if you wanna listen to this whole series, you will be able to. Or if you just wanna listen to a piece that's gonna pertain to your particular student, that's okay too. We are glad that you came, and we'll see you on the next show. Thanks coming, Natalie.
• 58:10
  Natalie Mack: Yes. Thank you so much, Christy.