Staff excited about first early enrollees; mindful of its limits

They're here. Stanford's first ever early enrollees are on The Farm and at this time last year that is not something any Stanford football fan would have bet on happening.

Ari Patu and Jaden Slocum are at Stanford because of decisions made by what amounted to a small committee of university leadership: President Marc Tessier-Lavigne, Provost Press Drell, Dean of Admissions Richard Shaw, head coach David Shaw and a number of other people had a hand in coming up with a plan and then giving it the green light.

Back in January, Shaw gave his first comments about the then just announced decision by the university to allow Slocum and Patu to begin their education in the spring quarter (which begins Monday), rather than during summer school.

They will participate in spring football, which has been pushed back to the end of April. (It's not clear if that is a permanent schedule change from its usual end of February start.)

"(I'm) grateful for our administration," Shaw said in that January press conference. "We've been talking about this for years: can we do it, should we do it."

While Patu and Slocum "test the waters", as Shaw described it, "there will be a lot of people watching to see if this is a smart thing."

There were many hurdles to clear to get this chance. So-called early enrollment is commonplace almost everywhere else but Stanford University's top officials have been against it for a variety of reasons.

The one most often repeated to Cardinal Sports Report is that the university wanted the entire freshmen class (including non student-athletes) to begin their academic career at the same time and go through orientation together. They also were very concerned about having recruits prematurely end their high school senior year and try jump into Stanford University mid-year.

"Can we develop a process that works for the student-athletes to start their education, as well as start in athletics, and can this process be repeated?" Shaw said. "We're going to be systematic. We've been systematic getting here.

"This was not a football program decision. This had to come from the top. Our president and provost looked at what was going on around the nation and we're not followers here at Stanford. If we're going to do something we want it done the Stanford way.

"Rick Shaw with the admissions department wanted to make sure these guys are finishing their high school education and not short-changing themselves. Once they get here, what can we give them as an opportunity?"

According to David Shaw, it was important to show the university that more and more high school athletes plan their academic roadmap before their freshman year with the intent to graduate early. They're not cutting their education short; they've accelerated it.

But just because a young man commits to Stanford, and is admitted, doesn't mean they can enroll in the spring.

"This is not going to be for everybody," Shaw said. "There will be some people our admissions looks at and thinks they need to finish the second semester of that AP course. I don't ever envision an entire class coming in early and we're not going to be able to pick and choose."

How prevalent was this practice in the 2021 class?

Oregon had 13 recruits arrive this spring; ASU six, Washington State 6, USC five, Utah five, Oregon State three, UCLA three and Washington two. Cal and Colorado did not have early enrollees but both schools dipped into the transfer portal — something else that is much harder for Stanford to do.

Stanford coaches aren't sure how much it will help Patu and Slocum to participate in spring practices. How can they? They've never done it before.

But they are confident about the impact on recruiting. For years the staff has fielded questions about how Stanford was handling the rapid expansion of early enrollment across the country during Shaw's time as a head coach.

And time and again the coaches and recruiting staff were steadfast with their answers that Stanford does things their own way and they actually believed it was in the best interest of the student-athlete to finish his high school career. Their other go-to counter argument was that Stanford plays a lot of true freshmen and that they were not behind in their development compared to freshmen who had spring practices.

There isn't a concrete way to determine how much better a freshman plays if they enrolled early or how many more freshmen were ready to play by the start of the season. But the staff can talk about numbers in recruiting.

"It has affected our recruiting for years, Shaw said in January. "It's not set in stone how we're going to do it going forward, but now that possibility being there is very, very exciting."

In separate phone calls with Cardinal Sports Report, defensive coordinator Lance Anderson and Tavita Pritchard did not shy away from how they felt about early enrollment and its effect in recruiting.

"I'm really excited," Pritchard said. "We've obviously been at a competitive disadvantage. Frankly, we've been taken out of the process for a lot guys because we didn't allow early enrollment, so I think it's exciting we can level the playing field a little bit."

Anderson guessed that Stanford loses a "handful" of recruits every year who move on when they find out they can't enroll early.

Shaw, Pritchard, Anderson and recruiting director Mike Eubanks have all made the same hopeful comparison between Patu and Slocum and Richard Sherman.

Sherman was the first freshman to be allowed to come to Stanford to take summer courses and participate in the strength and conditioning program. He was picked from the 2006 recruiting class because of his outstanding academic record.

His success wasn't defined by doing anything remarkable. Instead, it was the fact that Sherman made the transition look routine that helped pave the way for the approval by the university to allow entire future classes to do the same.

Fourteen later the same criteria was used again to make a selection.

"They're both conscientious kids, high achievers," Anderson said of Patu and Slocum. "We're not guaranteed when we will get to do this again or how many guys will get to do it. We hope it's like summer school but we never expect to have everyone enroll early."