Incoming Freshmen

Initial Eligibility

All freshmen fall under NCAA Initial Eligibility Rules during their first year of attendance. Simply, in order to compete during your first year of college you must be certified as "eligible" by the NCAA's Eligibility Center. This is a division of the NCAA designated to process your high school transcript and test scores to determine whether you meet minimum standards.

What they look for: The minimum standards for initial eligibility are met easily by most graduates of public high schools throughout the country. For Division 2 sports (all sports at UMass Lowell except Ice Hockey) the NCAA requires that you have earned a "C" average in a core course curriculum with a minimum combined SAT score of 820 or ACT aggregate score of 68. Division 1 (Ice Hockey) standards are a bit more complicated. ALL the details are found in the NCAA publication "Guide for the College Bound Student-Athlete" available on line from the NCAA at www.NCAA.org.

How you establish eligibility: All incoming freshmen should, during their junior year or early in their senior year of high school, register with the Eligibility Center. U.S. students should use the "Domestic Student Release Form" link and foreign students should use the "Foreign Student Release form" link. This will cost (as of 2006) $60 for domestic students, $85 for foreign students, which can be paid by credit card. It is CRITICALLY important that you read ALL material presented on the registration website. You will be provided a form that must be brought to your high school guidance office, which will function as an order form requesting your guidance office to send your preliminary transcript and test scores to the Clearinghouse. After graduation, you MUST remind your guidance office to send your FINAL transcript, completely graded and credited, with proof and date of graduation, to the Eligibility Center as well.

Test score advice: Beginning in 2007, it is required that all prospects request that the College Board or ACT testing services send their test scores directly to the Eligibility Center. This can be done while registering for your exam by including college code "9999" as one of your choices for receiving test results. The NCAA Eligibility Center does NOT accept Student Score reports or Test Score results that are downloaded from the web. Your college admissions office or high school guidance office may find these sufficient but the Eligibility Center requires direct test agency reports. If you must create an additional score report to send to the Eligibility Center this may cost an extra $10 at your test service web site.

Address and Phone numbers for the Eligibility Center are available at their website.

It is STRONGLY advised that you register with the Eligibility Center DURING your senior year; the earlier, the better. If fall sport athletes are not registered and transcripts and test scores received prior to your graduation, you may not have eligibility for your team's first contests!

Special Circumstances: There are special rules for students who were home schooled. Please note the specific instructions at the Eligibility Center website:

  • Students with learning disabilities, who may have had either specialized courses in high school or who may have taken non-standard SAT or ACT exams should register their circumstances with the NCAA Eligibility Center. When the learning disability check box on the Student Release registration form is checked, the student will receive information from the NCAA as to the additional material required. Then the NCAA Eligibility Center will automatically process the specific NCAA accommodations for your certification. Further information is available at the NCAA website by clicking on NCAA News and searching for "Learning Disability." It is strongly advised that students with learning disabilities begin the process as early during their senior year as possible. The documentation required takes considerably longer for you to assemble and them to process.
  • Students who attended more than one high school, must present to the Eligibility Center an ORIGINAL transcript from each high school attended. Again, this may take a while to obtain and it is advised that you begin the process early! Most high schools discard your previous high school's transcript after they have posted the information on your current transcript. This information is not usable by the Eligibility Center. They must receive an original transcript, sealed, directly from each high school you attended (9th grade on).

If you wish to hurry information to the Eligibility Center and arrange to mail it yourself, please read the following carefully. All material acceptable to the Eligibility Center must arrive there in a sealed envelope on high school stationery. Please have your guidance office prepare such information, seal it in their own envelope, and address it to the Eligibility Center. This SEALED envelope may then be inserted in your OWN overnight mailer and sent to the address on the Eligibility Center website. PLEASE use a mailing service that provides you with a tracking number, but do NOT use Registered or Certified mail as this actually delays the process. Provide our Compliance office (978-934-2329) with this tracking number and the compliance office will chase your records through the process.

FINALLY, it is important that YOU, the prospective student-athlete, carry out these steps yourself. YOU should register with the Eligibility Center, create YOUR own PIN (one that YOU can remember) on their site, follow up with YOUR guidance office after graduation, and visit the Eligibility Center website often to follow your progress. The NCAA and this institution insist that, as a young adult, YOU are responsible for establishing your eligibility, not your parents, not us!
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