Now would be a great time, nationally, to invest in junior colleges, and athletics programs that can serve as a place for HS kids to go, play 1-2 years, and given the ruling on JC guys likely getting 4 years when they enter NCAA competition, it has the potential to allow them to keep playing, getting college credits, then going the NCAA route, and actually putting themselves on pace to possibly graduate on time...that's the main reason we're gonna get 5 years, graduation rates in the portal era are plummeting because guys are not having credits transfer over, or made up their mind they're going in the portal the second semester, so they get incompletes on their transcript. Add in that those who could graduate won't and will go play their final year somewhere else, taking like 2 online classes and only end up with an undergrad degree if they actually put the work toward it, when they ought to at least come away with a basic master's or a few post-grad certificates. This is happening at all levels.
Anyway, in the northeast in an ideal society, we'd have lawmakers recognizing the broader need for affordable public education in higher ed, combined with the fact we're seeing HS aged kids getting shut out at a higher rate from direct participation in NCAA sports, especially at the D1 level, and they'd turn some of these shuttered small private schools into community colleges that have athletics, and could create a competitive environment for these players to compete in, while also offering a core curriculum that would transfer just about anywhere, and maybe even have a few of these CCs provide more of a standard university setting with regard to what a typical underclassman might experience to offer an option for those seeking greater academic rigor.
Outside the general psycosis that has captured parents and their drive to spend six figures or more on getting their kid good enough to play a sport at a scholarship level in college, I gotta think the post-grad and prep year are losing their luster. That, and speaking to the money that is willing to be spent, society is facing a real issue of making sports only reserved for rich people. That's not a good thing, so with the expansion of eligibility at the NCAA level, it would be real great to see overall education expansion and the creation of more athletic opportunity at the junior and community college level, but sadly, we're not even a society that values providing affordable access to public education at any level, so I won't hold my breath.
I'm calling it now, we're going to stop seeing the fake prep schools, and start seeing the fake junior colleges of those national Christian conference colleges where some schools only play in that league that some opportunist will use to claim they can get kids NCAA scholarships.
