I applied to Harvard as a shot-in-the-dark chance, as it should be, and as such I probably didn’t take as much time as I should’ve when filling out the Harvard specific questions. When the application asked for which activities I would be interested in, I put orchestra, lit mag, and drama. I’m interested in pursuing these activities in college, so I just quickly put these down. However, I have never done any of these aforementioned activities in high school! I thought (stupidly) that the readers wouldn’t care about the answer, and thought that by putting new stuff down that I’m interested in, the adcoms might even like that I wanted to try new things (but I mostly thought that these answers didn’t matter). The more I think about it, the more I believe that this question is supposed to reaffirm what you did and loved in high school. So how badly did I screw up?
I think you are overthinking this. It is easy to find things you could have done slightly differently on your application. Be satisfied with your work, hope for an acceptance, prepare for rejection. Good luck to you!
Suffice it to say that if you don’t get into Harvard, that will not be the reason.
Please find better things to worry about. Agree with happy1 above. Not to be unkind, but if you think you are a shot in the dark and this question is your main concern, you have a close to zero chance. Even the most qualified kids have a close to zero chance. Focus on keeping your grades up, and what school to attend when you get your acceptances.
Don’t understand this “shot in the dark” approach. Harvard is not a Willy Wonka golden ticket; it is a school with strengths and weaknesses, and is right for some students and absolutely not for others. If you felt that H was a solid fit then your application, and care for it, should have reflected this. But an “oh well why not” approach does not make sense and will not work.
There’s practically no way for them to verify your answers to those questions. I wouldn’t worry about it.