A family receives two scholarship offers. School A offers a 50% athletic scholarship. School B offers a 25% athletic scholarship. Most families choose School A without doing the math. Here's the math: School A costs $58,000 per year. A 50% scholarship leaves $29,000 to pay. School B costs $32,000 per year. A 25% scholarship leaves $24,000 to pay. The "worse" offer is $5,000 cheaper every year — $20,000 cheaper over four years.
This is the most expensive mistake families make in the recruiting process, and it happens because no one teaches them to compare offers in dollar terms instead of percentages. The coach presenting the scholarship knows exactly what the numbers mean. The family sitting across the table usually doesn't.
This article gives you the framework for comparing two or more athletic scholarship offers side by side — accounting for everything that actually determines what you'll pay.
Why you can't compare scholarship percentages
A scholarship percentage is meaningless without the number it's applied to. This sounds obvious stated plainly, but in the emotional context of receiving an offer, families consistently focus on the percentage and ignore the base.
The problem compounds because schools present costs differently. Some quote "tuition and fees" as the scholarship basis — but that excludes room, board, books, and personal expenses, which can add $15,000 to $20,000 per year. Others use "cost of attendance," which includes everything. A 40% scholarship applied to tuition-only looks very different from 40% applied to full cost of attendance.
Before comparing anything, establish the same number for every school: total cost of attendance. This includes tuition, mandatory fees, room, board, books, and estimated personal expenses. Every school publishes this figure — it's required by federal law. Use the school's net price calculator (also federally required) as a starting point, then refine with the actual offer.
The only number that matters for comparison is net annual cost — total cost of attendance minus all forms of financial aid. Everything else is presentation.
What's included in a scholarship offer — and what's not
Athletic scholarship offers vary in what they cover, and coaches don't always spell this out clearly.
What most partial athletic scholarships cover:
A portion of tuition and fees. In equivalency sports (most sports outside of D1 football and basketball), the offer is expressed as a percentage of the full-scholarship value. A 30% equivalency covers 30% of tuition, fees, room, and board — or sometimes just tuition and fees, depending on the school's scholarship structure. Ask specifically what the percentage applies to.
What athletic scholarships typically don't cover:
- Summer housing and summer courses
- Personal travel (flights home for breaks, family travel to away games)
- Gear and equipment not provided by the program
- Insurance gaps between what the school covers and what your family needs
- The difference between the school's "cost of attendance" estimate and actual living costs in that city
What full-ride scholarships cover:
In headcount sports (D1 football, D1 basketball, and a few others), full scholarships cover tuition, fees, room, board, and books. Some also include a cost-of-attendance stipend. But even a "full ride" doesn't cover everything — personal expenses, summer costs, and travel home add up to several thousand dollars per year that the scholarship doesn't touch.
Academic aid stacking: where the real math happens
The single most important question to ask about any scholarship offer is: Can athletic aid be stacked with academic or need-based aid at this school?
Many schools allow athletic scholarships to be combined with academic merit scholarships and need-based grants. When they stack, the total package can dramatically change the net cost picture:
- Athletic scholarship: 30% of cost of attendance ($12,000)
- Academic merit award: $8,000 per year
- Need-based grant: $5,000 per year
- Total aid: $25,000 per year
- Cost of attendance: $45,000
- Net annual cost: $20,000
Without the stacking, the net cost would be $33,000. The academic and need-based aid cut the bill by $13,000 per year — $52,000 over four years. That's life-changing money.
But some schools have policies that cap total aid at cost of attendance. If total cost is $45,000 and the school caps aid at that amount, additional merit money doesn't increase the total package beyond full cost — it just replaces one aid source with another. Ask directly: does additional academic aid reduce my out-of-pocket cost, or does it replace athletic aid?
Get this answer from the financial aid office, not the coach. Coaches know their athletic aid numbers. They often don't know (or don't accurately represent) how institutional financial aid policies interact with athletic awards. Call the financial aid office separately and ask how athletic and academic aid combine at their institution.
The hidden costs families miss
Two offers that look identical on paper can differ by $5,000 to $10,000 per year when you account for costs that don't appear on the financial aid letter.
Travel costs. A school 2,000 miles from home means 4 to 6 round-trip flights per year (Thanksgiving, winter break, spring break, summer). At $300 to $500 per flight, that's $1,200 to $3,000 annually. A school 200 miles away means $50 in gas. This difference alone can outweigh a scholarship percentage gap.
Cost of living. Room and board estimates vary, but the real question is whether the estimate matches reality in that city. A school in rural Iowa and a school in Boston may quote similar room and board figures, but the athlete's actual spending on food, transportation, and daily life will differ significantly.
Summer costs. Many athletes are expected (or required) to stay near campus for summer training. On-campus housing for summer isn't always covered by the scholarship. Summer courses to stay on track for graduation cost extra. A program that expects year-round presence costs more than one that doesn't.
Gear and incidentals. Some programs provide all equipment. Others expect athletes to purchase their own shoes, practice gear, or sport-specific equipment. Ask.
Insurance. Athletic injuries happen. Does the school's athletic insurance cover all sports-related medical costs, or are there copays, deductibles, and gaps the family absorbs? A torn ACL at a school with strong athletic insurance costs the family nothing. The same injury at a school with minimal coverage can generate $10,000-plus in out-of-pocket medical costs.
How to evaluate whether a scholarship will renew
NCAA athletic scholarships are awarded one year at a time. They must be renewed annually. Most are renewed — but "most" is not a guarantee.
Ask specifically: Under what conditions can the scholarship be reduced or not renewed? The answers vary:
- Academic standing. Nearly all scholarships require a minimum GPA (often 2.0) to renew. Falling below this threshold can trigger a reduction or loss of athletic aid.
- Athletic performance. Some coaches reduce scholarships for athletes who aren't contributing. This is less common than families fear — NCAA rules require schools to notify athletes by July 1 if aid will not be renewed — but it happens, especially after coaching changes.
- Coaching changes. A new head coach inherits existing scholarship commitments but not the recruiting relationships behind them. A scholarship technically survives a coaching change, but the athlete's role and experience may shift significantly. Some athletes transfer after a coaching change not because the scholarship was pulled but because the new staff made their situation untenable.
- Medical non-counter rules. If your athlete suffers a career-ending injury, NCAA rules require the school to continue the scholarship. Ask the specific policy: what qualifies as career-ending, who makes that determination, and does it cover a fifth year if the athlete needs additional time to graduate?
The most protective question: "Of the athletes who were on scholarship when they were freshmen, how many were still on scholarship as seniors?" A coach who answers this honestly gives you the single most useful data point about scholarship stability at that program.
A step-by-step framework for comparing two offers
When your family has offers from two or more schools, run through this framework before making a decision:
1. Establish net annual cost for each school.
Total cost of attendance minus all aid (athletic + academic + need-based). Use the same format for every school. If one school includes room and board in the scholarship and another doesn't, adjust until the comparison is apples-to-apples.
2. Add realistic hidden costs.
Travel (flights or driving distance), summer housing, gear not provided, cost-of-living differences. Add these to the net annual cost for an honest total.
3. Multiply by four (or five).
Most athletic careers span four years, but some athletes take five years to graduate — especially if they redshirt. If a fifth year is likely, account for whether the scholarship extends. A school that costs $3,000 less per year saves $12,000 to $15,000 over a full career.
4. Evaluate renewal risk.
A larger scholarship at a program with coaching instability or a history of not renewing aid is worth less than a smaller scholarship at a program with a stable staff and strong renewal track record.
5. Compare the non-financial factors.
Academic program strength, playing time opportunity, coaching quality, campus environment, geographic preference. These don't have dollar signs, but they determine whether your athlete thrives for four years or transfers after two — and a transfer resets the entire financial equation.
The bottom line
The family that makes the best commitment decision is the one that compares net annual cost — not scholarship percentages, not the presentation a coach delivers during an official visit, not the emotional high of hearing "we want your athlete." The dollars remaining after all aid are the only numbers that predict what the next four years will actually cost.
Run the math. Call the financial aid office separately from the coach. Account for travel, summer costs, and insurance. Ask about renewal conditions. Multiply by four. Then make the decision with real numbers on paper, not percentages in a sales pitch.
If you're still building the foundational understanding of how athletic scholarships work — headcount vs. equivalency, what each division offers, why most scholarships are partial — our college athletic scholarships guide covers the full framework. For families weighing D3 offers against D1 or D2 athletic scholarships, our guide to D3 athletic scholarships explains how D3 financial aid works and why the comparison is less straightforward than it appears. And for the broader set of questions to ask before committing to any program — playing time, coaching stability, team culture — our guide to the questions to ask before committing covers what the financial analysis alone doesn't capture. For families comparing NAIA offers against NCAA packages, our NAIA athletic scholarships guide explains how NAIA stacking works and why the net-cost comparison often favors NAIA schools.