<p>i have been noticing that a lot of "leadership" positions that kids have in here are fake. a lot of them are "presidents" of clubs that don't do anything and make change. i am sure not all clubs are like this but from knowing my high school and other high schools, a lot of clubs and organizations such as CSF and NHS don't do crap.</p>
<p>Whoa, whoa, whoa - before you make any generalizations, please remember that not all schools are the same. In my old high school in CA, CSF was the biggest student organization, and one of its most effective programs was the Tutoring Program, which set up qualified CSF members with kids from low income families for free tutoring. I'm not sure what your definition of "make change" is, but at the end of the year, my tutor's mom cried because I helped raise her daughter's grades, and I cried as well, because she had treated me like family and taught me a lot as well. </p>
<p>Colleges will know whether leadership positions are "fake" or not, because if a student was really dedicated and active in their position, it will be made obvious on the college application, whether they write a passionate essay about it, or showed how many hours a week they put into it. If they are just listing that they were president of four clubs, I'm sure this will set off a "suspicious" alarm. So don't worry about them!</p>
<p>normally applications give you extra space to expand on ur passion for that specific club ( i mean if you're a leader, u definitely have some kind of passion right ?)
if it's really important to you, then just write the essay on it, or something.
i don't know about the common application, but the MIT application lets (requires) you to expand on 1 or 2 of your extracurriculars</p>
<p>From clubs, they really want to see that you're social, and able to get yourself involved with the community. Colleges will ask in interviews, and might ask in the application about them. Typically, when you have 4+ significant leadership positions, and alot of other things going on, colleges will get suspicious, and if the clubs don't match up with your real interests, they also get suspicious. </p>
<p>Also, colleges really don't like "fake" clubs. Some kid made "games" club at our school, just so he'd have a leadership position. Sure, it looks unique, and it sure looks like he can contribute to the community with his knowlege of games. However, they can clearly tell he didn't make much of an impact in his interview, and also all he listed was him being president, and it conflicted with his other ECs.</p>
<p>ECs do not count that much for acceptance as long as there is something down there. Unless you are at a national or celebrity level, or do something that is really eye catching, those laundry lists of activities are not going to be scrutinized because the threshold for amazing and sub par are very high and low. Which is a pragmatic reason for not exaggerating or lying about them. If found out, THAT would be held against you. The world of college admissions is smaller than many of you would think.</p>
<p>It just depends on what school you're at. At my school, NHS was the biggest club and we were the most active in community service. Do not make assumptions just because yours sucked</p>
<p>as i said before, not all so dont get offended. anyways CSF in my school does nothing as well as NHS. the "volunteers" just check in without actually tutoring and i once saw a live session of "tutoring" between some csf member and a kid who actually needed help; the "tutor" couldnt do anything.</p>
<p>no, they can't really tell. but being a president of a club is overrated, unless you stress it well in your essays.</p>
<p>NHS doesn't do crap, but it's really hard to get into at my school... it's weird now that I think about it. They require a certain amount of volunteer hours over summer and school year, but it's like 5 hours.</p>