Hoe well do you have to acheive in extracurriculars to have a good chance in elite college admissions. You see, I’m heavily involved in music, public speaking, and religious extracurriculars, but I haven’t acheived any thing amazing in any of them. I get lots of 6th through 8th places in public speaking competitions. I get into the lower level honor choirs, but not All-state. If I have good grades, a difficult courseload, great test scores, and good teacher reccomendations, will this make up for extracurriculars that don’t really shine? Also, if say I qualified for national forensic league first semester of my senior year, would this have much of an influence on admissions?
<p>Well, plenty of applicants have perfect GPA's and perfect SAT's and amazing recs and yada yada yada. You need a hook. Find one or two EC's that you love and do well in. Pursue those actively and try to do something extraordinary with them, such as winning national awards. I know it sounds cliche, but it's true: follow your passions and the rest will (hopefully) fall into place.</p>