PWO tracking

I am ABSOLUTELY trying to do this. If I can confirm PWO, then I am listing that. Also, at this point, if you see the 'signed' verbage after the player's name, then I have verified the player signed an official NLI or financial aid scholarship agreement. I am not putting 'signed' after the names of the PWO players, many of whom still do signing day activities at their schools, complete with official-looking documents from a school that simply say PWO on them.

Whenever I add a name, I do my best to discover what the 'offer' is or what the 'commitment' means. To be honest, the parents and the players are a small part of the issue. You may see a kid put out on his Twitter feed that he now has an 'offer' without specifying what type of offer it is (scholly, PWO). This is not too hard to track down otherwise with the big FBS schools (as they will usually have a media outlet that reports on the offer), but it can be maddeningly difficult to figure out for the lower division schools.

Are you saying that if there is a NLI there is always a scholarship attached?

That's correct. An NLI is for a scholarship player only, although, of course, beyond FBS level, that dollar amount can vary wildly.

Hey, didn't a kicker sign a NLI letter to Penn state and was a PWO with NO $$$$$, Reno too

Whatever that kicker at Penn State signed, it wasn't an NLI (they had multiple PWOs this year). Quite often, schools will create their own "Preferred Walk-On Agreements" for the PWOs to sign to make things look and feel official. Fact is, a walk-on is not bound to anything and can still change his mind all the way until school starts. You will sometimes see PWOs commit in Feburary and then not enroll in August/September because they've rethought things or decided to go JUCO to pursue a scholarship again through that route.

Here is the language from the National Letter of Intent website about walk-ons and NLIs:

An institution is strictly prohibited from allowing you to sign an NLI if you are a non-scholarship walk-on. In order for an NLI to be considered valid, it must be accompanied by an athletics financial aid award letter, which lists the terms and conditions of the award, including the amount of the financial aid. The athletics financial aid offer must be signed by both the prospective student-athlete and his or her parent or legal guardian. Simply put, there must be an athletics scholarship for an NLI to be valid.