I would call my self an avid biker, I spend about an hour a day biking if I can and I really enjoy it. However, I know this isn’t really an EC. Do you guys have any ideas on how I could turn my love of biking into some sort of EC that I could put on college apps? Thanks
Any kind of sport including bicycling is an extracurricular. However, if you are trying to impress a highly selective college, it is best if you have noteworthy achievement in it (e.g. winning a high level competition, completing a double century ride or hilly century ride, etc.).
You could attend some biking competitions, make a biking club at your school stuff like that. One guy at my school taught kids how to bike in support of avoiding child obesity and improving health awareness.
I was in a similar position when applying to colleges. I wanted to put things I really liked doing on my application, but they felt “unworthy” because I didn’t have any achievements in them and thought they wouldn’t impress anybody. But I took a risk and put biking (no clubs, no teams, no achievements, no competitions) and skiing (again, no competitions or anything) as extracurriculars on my applications because, like you, I simply love do those things! I got into 4 Ivy Leagues and other “highly selective” colleges, so it didn’t hurt me putting them down in the end! I can’t tell you whether or not to put biking on your application (be judicious), but I think colleges like to see you are a person who likes to do things outside of just your achievements and clubs. If you do put it as an EC, don’t make it something it is not; say it is what you do and love! Just my anecdotal advice. Best of luck to you!
Agree with bsb4389. EC is what you like to do in your free time that tells adcoms who you are. Biking is fine. And no you don’t have to ‘pump up the volume’ by starting a club or raising money for free bikes or winning a competition. Just keep it honest about what you love and why.
By the way, friend’s son wrote a lovely essay on biking at night into and around the city from the burbs - got lots of adcom comments on his acceptance letters about how interesting it (and by implication, he) was. No awards or clubs - just something he liked to do. (Friend was a bit upset though - had no idea he was biking alone at night…)
The EC shows how you use your time outside of the school and also may indicate if you have a passion on something. If you do dedicate your time consistently on something, you should mention it on the list. However, the perception of the adcom on different EC items are different, so you really want to rank your activity and put the more important, more relevant for college application, and more interesting items on top of the list.
Since biking is something you obviously care about, you could do one of your essays (perhaps the short EC essay on the Common App) about it. In addition to having a topic that you can write passionately about, you’d have a chance to elucidate to admissions folks exactly what you do with biking.
PS yay biking!