I noticed that on the Commonapp it’s required to list how many hour per week/weeks per year I spend practicing a certain activity. Now, I’ve so far listed foreign language courses as activities and I’ve mentioned the hours I spend per week having classes. However, I spend a great deal of time studying and simply using the languages on my own. Besides, I regularly spend time drawing and taking photographs, although I don’t have those as part of my school program, nor do I attend any extracurricular courses. Should I list those since I’m an amateur and also, as far as the languages go, do I list hours spent in class only or should I add the time I spend on my own with the language? Thank you!
I would list your drawing and photography.
As for language, I’d say it depends on what you do outside of class. If I were you, I’d put down the amount of hours that are in no way related to your coursework for the language. Are you studying for class when you use the languages outside of school? Conversing with native speakers? Reading books/news articles in the language that you aren’t assigned to read? What?
Thank you for the response! As far as the art/photography go, I’ll have to list the time I spend on average, I suppose? Like, I don’t think it could be totally accurate since I don’t practice every day, at times I draw 6h per day for a month, and then there are times when I don’t touch a pencil at all, you know?
I am attending private lessons in English and French that are in no way related to my school work. Their main purpose is preparing students for proficiency exams but apart from that I use both languages on a daily basis. I do converse with native speakers on social networking sites, I also watch movies/TV, read the press/books, it’s pretty much a 24/7 work. I do the same thing with Italian and German, though I don’t attend any lessons, I’m studying on my own, so would that count as an activity that should be listed too?
Taking the average time per day/week spent drawing makes sense, and is probably to the reasonable thing to do.
Are you preparing for these proficiency exams, and if so, for what reason? If you are taking the proficiency exams, and are doing so to be able to prepare to go to a college/university in a Francophone or Anglophone country, then I would not list the time spent in lessons. I think that would count as in some way “curricular”. However, if you are taking the lessons but not to take the test to go to college, or are not planning on taking the proficiency test, then I think it would be okay to list those hours spent.
As for the other time spent, I’d tentatively say to put it down, except for maybe the social media time, unless that time is expressly put to use to study the language. I imagine colleges wouldn’t consider social media use as an EC.
Also, I think that, when you write about what you do for language study, you should make clear on the app exactly what you do, just to avoid confusion amongst the admissions people, which might be taken against you.
Remember, these are just my opinions. Please take other peoples’ into account when actually deciding what to do.
My personal reason for attending lessons is to ameliorate my knowledge of the language in a shorter period of time. As far as the exams go, I’m not in fact obligated to pass them if I don’t choose to. The proficiency certificate in English (given by Cambridge) could be listed in one’s resume when applying for work but it’s not mandatory, I guess it could make the application more appealing in some cases. Anyhow, my goal isn’t really obtaining certificates. I just want to pass the exams since I see it as a challenge and the results could be somewhat realistic in evaluating whether I did a good job during the courses or not.
I’ll do as you suggested! However, where should I describe what I do for language study, as you say? Should I add that to the writing/other supplement because in the activity section there’s a pretty low limit of symbols to use to describe the activity as well as achievements/honors.
I don’t know if I would think of studying languages as an extra-curricular, but if you feel it is an important part of you, go ahead and include it. If you already have 10 other more meaningful extracurriculars,you could list the languages you are studding under the “languages” section under profile and then use the “additional information” section of the common app to explain your classes, study habits, and the amount of time you spend each week on learning them. It might also help to take SAT II subject tests in those languages.
As for drawing/photography, you can definitely list that as it takes up your time and shows your creativity. Just estimate the average amount of time you spend each week. I’m sure admissions officers can figure out that people don’t always spend exactly x hours per week on any activity. It could also help if you submitted your art into local/regional/national competitions or galleries if you want the activity to have more “weight.”
Good luck!
Thank you, sophie9999! The thing is that I’m an international student and I haven’t really thought of picking up language courses for the sake of practicing extracurricular activities that could aid my application. It’s just that school here doesn’t really make you fluent in foreign languages, besides I just enjoy learning them so that’s why I attend such lessons. The only other extracurricular activity I could list is being the head of a small company as part of a school project.
I will, in that case, add some clarifying info in the “Aditional info” section, as you suggested!
@Vintagey I don’t really know for sure where you would/could write about your language study, but back when I was applying, the Common App had one section to write shortly about one EC; you could use that space to talk about languages. Some other applications (maybe Stanford’s?) ask you to write a bit about some of your ECs. If there’s nowhere else to write about them but the place you list them, you could push the character limit to the end there.
With many of these question there really is no one answer. For example my oldest spent a lot of time teaching himself computer programming and learning about the Linux operating system. He put things where they seemed to make the most sense and wrote about his activities in his main essay because they were so central to who he was. My younger son wrote about a volunteer activity he was doing, but about how that activity made him feel more like a historian than anything he’d done at school. You could list your language classes as an EC, as extra coursework, in the “anything else you want to tell us section” or you might talk about them in an essay. Think about how you want to be remembered as an applicant. My oldest son was “the computer nerd”, my youngest was “the would-be historian who wrote about what he learned from origami”. I know someone whose daughter was “the ballet dancer who lived in Russia for a year”. Think about who you are and how you want to be thought of and the best way to organize your activities will come out of that. My youngest had a lot of music activities, but they weren’t that important to who he was so he bundled a lot of that into one or two lines in the EC part of the forms.
Thank you all for the help! Thank you for the advice, mathmom, I’ll keep in mind to emphasize whatever it is that makes me stand out as an applicant, as you said.
Ok I have yet another question - there’s a section about each activity where I should state “Position/Leadership description and organization name, if applicable” and it’s mandatory to fill in. What should I write about art, for instance, since I am self-taught and haven’t really attended courses in an organization? Thank you!
You could say something along the lines of “Artist - Self-taught” or “artist” or “Independent Artist”. Get creative.
I would definitely include studying languages on my own!! It shows an interest in learning.
Artist, self taught. Media includes oils and pastels.
Can you turn art into a bigger EC? Can you exhibit at a local community center/library/art guild? Can you get involved in art therapy volunteering?
Thank you for your help!
As for the exhibits - unfortunately, my country has forgotten all about its cultural development and it’s a rare thing to see exhibitions of artists, much more so for students. Sadly, most high schools, including mine, don’t offer any artistic clubs (they’re somewhat common for kids in primary and secondary school only), therefore I can’t get involved in any such activity. I’ve tried selling my stuff online though, I did some fanart for people by fulfilling requests in the summer, it was relatively successful, I suppose.
P.S. - Another thing that I noticed is that there’s a separate section to upload a portfolio on the college’s website that I can access through the CommonApp. At the same time, there’s a My space page that serves the same purpose. Should I upload my portfolio both on that specific page and in the My space section? Or is that something that I should perhaps discuss with the university?