Do students care about ECs?

Applying to College
1

<p>After viewing so many "What are my chances?" topics, and seeing the credentials of many people, I was quite astounded.
These students have been in like, every single club or insitution or any charity their school offers.
Anything ranging from all kinds of honor societies to fundraising money for plastic surgery for 3rd world children.</p>

<p>Seriously, do any of them actually enjoy what they are doing, or are they doing it just so they can get into college?</p>

<p>I saw a credential with over 20 ECs. He's like, done everything there is to do in school. Anything from International Relations to Rugby to Latin clubs, to having Literature Articles about anything posted in newspapers, to whatnot.</p>

<p>Do any of these students actually do these things because they want to, or because it's just gonna give them a better shot at college?</p>

2

<p>I think they are too desperate. Colleges want to see a focus weather it's a sport or a language. I would stick with what I am interested in, you don't want to seem too hungry.</p>

3

<p>Sad thing is, many of these kids don't realize that 1) most of it won't fit on the application, and 2) the college does not allow supplementary papers (listing your ECs).</p>

4

<p>The key is to put PASSION into what you do.</p>

<p>My freshmen year I joined like...every club. I then realized, hmmm, Key Club was the club for me. So i virtually dropped out of all the other clubs and focused on that to be LTG.</p>

<p>And it's not just about clubs, internships are great experiences. We have to realize about extracurricular activities that there supposed to be fun and something that interests you. When that happens, you find yourself amazed at how much time you spend at it. And don't let it consume your life because academics and SATs are first and foremost. Unless you are stupid and incapable of learning conventionally despite having for tutors like me. Ha ha Ha</p>

<p>Here's an example of my ECs
<a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=336247%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=336247&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

5

<p>There are students who DO enjoy the extracurricular activities that they do. At least, I do.</p>

<p>Perhaps my first and foremost passion is theater. I love it so much. All the festivals are fun, and I love putting on plays and keeping the art of theater alive. Our school's drama club is extremely well regarded because our coach is remarkable. He is the friendliest person you'll ever meet. Because of his awesomeness, we were good enough to participate in the New England Drama festival and even the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in Scotland. </p>

<p>But I don't like theater only because we are really prestigious. As, I also love it because you make so many friends. Almost everyone in our theater group loves each other! We are just one big, happy family. We get gather ourselves into a writhing heap of bodies, immodestly strip ourselves of all our clothing -- save for underwear, and sing the Divinyl's "I Touch Myself" song (badly and obnoxiously) after shows. We have so many inside jokes, and we always go out for sushi before performances as tradition. We are so crazy. Everyone thinks that drama people are "nerdy" and reserved. Not ours. We are so open with one another, and I've established friendships that I know will last a lifetime. The people I've met in the program have helped me mature and grow. Honestly, if it were not for my drama program, I'd still be an awkward Asian doing nothing but homework and crying on weekends. I know if you took away our school's drama program, you'd be taking away my life supply.</p>

<p>Being so passionate about drama has landed me various lead roles, school-wide and state-wide awards. Those are an added bonus; I don't do drama because of the awards at all. I know coming from a small town, I won't have as many chances to do "huge" things like appear in movies or commercials, but honestly, I am fine with just performing on our school's dinky (albeit AMAZING) stage.</p>

<p>Our theater coach also heads our speech team, which has been the state champions for eight years in a row. Speech team is just as fun as drama, in my opinion --- except with much more downtime! I've won two individual state championships in speech because I've gotten good at it. I've gotten good at it because I enjoy it so much. I simply love practicing my speech in my spare time. Additionally, almost all of the drama kids at our school also do speech team. </p>

<p>To be frank, I scorn anyone in my school who does speech or drama for the college application. I know that sounds severely harsh, but I start fuming silently whenever I see people who complain about not wanting to be at rehearsals or speech meets. I get mad whenever I notice the unenthusiastic person who sits around on stage with a distant look on his face just so he can list just one more thing on his resume.</p>

<p>I ask everyone to find a passion so later on people won't be posting topics like "I just wasted four years of my life" when they get rejected from top colleges. I know I won't be posting topics like that anytime soon because I've had so much fun these past four years. Whether I get into a top college or not, I know I'll graduate happy (and probably tearful) because of the speech and drama experience I was so fortunate to be a part of.</p>

<p>That was long, I know. And parts of it might not make sense because I typed too quickly. But there you have it. I am a kid who enjoys my ECs.</p>

6

<p>NO, if I had my choice I would sit on my ass all day and stare at my computer screen while listening to music, and that would be my EC. The only reason I even joined clubs is to look good to colleges.</p>

<p>Scratch some of that. The only EC I would do would be Taekwondo, because thats the only thing Ive ever loved doing instead of just sitting on my ass, but it cost too much money so I had to drop out. </p>

<p>I hate being poor. :mad:</p>

7

<p>Went from 6 freshman yr to 3 sophomore and junior yr and hopefully 3 next yr too :)... dropped 2 service clubs and acadeca b/c they weren't, well, my passion.</p>

8

<p>I joined a bunch of clubs in school sophomore year, because I needed something for college applications. I found one I truly enjoyed, one I despised (which I left asap).</p>

<p>Actually, some colleges do actually have room for all of your ECs. If they accept additional forms, which some of mine did.</p>

<p>But to be honest, I enjoyed Peer Leadership alot. Not to mention Blue Key Club (School Tours, Admissions stuff, etc.) and Barbershop (Men's Choir). And I love Track, which I run year round. I would have done Robotics Club, but it just started and I wouldn't be around long enough to actually do it.</p>

<p>So, some people do actually do ECs because they enjoy the actual activities... you just need to find the right people and stop making vast generalizations...</p>