Personal Statement
My name is Camden Alexander-James Francis. I recently graduated from Concord Academy, an independent preparatory school in Concord, Massachusetts. I’m a scholar-athlete playing varsity soccer and lacrosse. I am currently involved in many advanced courses including two concurrent languages, German and Mandarin. I’ve been informed that I’d make a very strong collegiate soccer player. I’ve played soccer since the age of three. I have played for the top club teams in NEFC and Revolution Academy. At twelve years old, I competed against elite soccer teams across the United Kingdom. A region invitational hosted by the New England Revolution rated my footwork, speed, and agility as elite when compared to the top soccer players in the East Coast.
During my sophomore year, my coaches wanted to put me with kids in my grade, so they started me off on JV. This motivated me to work every day to make varsity. After every soccer practice, I went straight to the gym. After the gym, I ran several miles. Eventually, this conditioned my body to outperform the competition. I quickly began scoring multiple goals per game. To challenge myself during games, I began to put a time limit on my scoring. I told myself that I needed to score in the first five minutes of the game. By the middle of the season, I limited myself to having to score a goal in the first minute of play. Given my high goal rate, my coach was forced to pull me from games to show sportsmanship and not exceed the mercy rule.
I ended up scoring over ten goals and over fifteen assists with very limited minutes. The same season, I was moved up to participate in our varsity’s playoff season. In my first varsity playoff game, I caused a turnover and nearly managed to pull off a full field goal within my first one minutes of play. That year, I played a contributing role to help the varsity team win its first state championship. After this victory, my coach mentioned that he wanted me to be the centerpiece of the offense next year.
Due to the pandemic, my junior year soccer season was canceled. Hence, we were unable to obtain any game film. I instead turned my skills and passion for the game off of the field. During the pandemic, I started a nonprofit endeavor called, "Cam's Camps", a program that allows kids with mental and physical disabilities to get exercise during quarantine, leveraging simple soccer drills and low impact fitness techniques. We partnered with the Special Olympics to run several sessions during the spring and summer months.
When things began to reopen and the quarantine was lifted, I attended several collegiate soccer invitationals, the largest being Harvard's. At this invitational I saw my former New England Revs Academy coach, "Tumi Gugushe" who is currently the coach of a competitive division 2 soccer program. I was told that the primary qualities that helped me to stand out during these invitationals were my speed, agility, high work rate, and ball movement.
My senior year I had a strong start to the season but could not complete the season due to a personal injury, which required time to heal. I took a gap year, in order to fully heal and recover. I've recently begun to get back to my previous conditioning levels, which include lifting and running multiple miles per day. I'm also using my gap year to take additional courses at a local college. During this time, I'm also training with Juventus Academy IFA (MLS Next). Later this year, I'm looking into a travel gap year program. As I studied German, I'd love to try to play in Germany or outside the U.S. if possible while I have the opportunity during the gap year.
I previously applied to and been accepted to multiple Tier I liberal arts programs including (Middlebury, Colegate, Wesleyan, Connecticut College, etc.), via regular decision. I'm not under obligation to attend those schools as they were all via the non-binding regular decision process. I am hoping to play soccer in college after my gap year. I intend on going to an academically rigorous school that also has competitive athletics. Please contact me via email at [email protected] or via phone at (978) 460-4071 if you have any questions or are interested in hearing more.
Thanks,
Camden
