What has your experience been with your kids’ EC’s and how much difference they made? Did you notice any big differences among your kids in terms of where they got in with similar grades? Or, beyond acceptances, did you notice differences in amount of merit aid offered?
I’ve been saying for years that my younger D was going to be the test case for whether EC’s really matter. Hers are extremely skimpy: one dance class that meets during the school day, one club that meets during lunch, and drawing in her spare time. Absolutely nothing after school, no leadership, no job. One week of community service from last summer.
I told her when she worried about it that the only reason schools are interested in EC’s is because they want to see that you’re an interesting person, not just a mindless academic robot. I told her she needed to show through her essays that she was an interesting person. And I will say that she did that.
She was accepted at all UC’s she applied to (Cal, UCLA, UCSD, UCD, UCSB, UCSC) as well as Scripps and Lewis & Clark. Her only rejection was Pitzer. (One thing to bear in mind with regard to her UC acceptances is that she applied for sociology – if she had applied for an impacted major I’m sure things would have been different.)
Her stats are: 4.33 GPA (3.978 UW), 34 ACT. She is at an IB school and she took all IB classes, but she did not do the IB diploma.
Literally the only explanation I have for her being accepted at Cal and UCLA is that her essays made her sound like an unusual person who thinks differently than other teenagers. Unless her teacher LORs praised her to the skies, I guess.
Extracurriculars matter a lot for admission to top 30 private colleges. The higher you go, the more they matter. However, for most colleges, they really don’t matter much for admissions unless you have a hard hook. They are good for personal development, but that is about it.
I am always surprised to hear parents of students with 3.0 high school gpa’s and 23 ACT scores who say their kid is focussed on developing their EC’s. I don’t understand that, but I just smile and nod.
Your daughter had. 34 ACT and a 4.33 weighted GPA. I’m guessing that is why she got accepted to Cal and UCLA.
But people with those stats get rejected from those schools all the time.
A LOT of people with those stats get accepted…especially instate students. They are excellent.
And as you noted, she did NOT apply to an impacted major.
Well in any case, it certainly wasn’t her EC’s that made the difference. I do agree that without the stats she wouldn’t have gotten in.
They didn’t matter a bit for my oldest daughter. She applied to state flagships, most of which didn’t even have essays, so there was no need for her to write about an EC or leadership. She did have some ECs, but nothing special - your basic mix of sports where she wasn’t a star and a couple clubs where she had no leadership position. The school she attended had automatic merit awards, so again the ECs didn’t matter; she would have gotten the full tuition scholarship with or without them. My youngest daughter will likely start at a CC. They don’t care at all about ECs, which is good, because she didn’t do any.
I am pretty sure that my older son’s EC both in and out of school were the main thing that tipped him into the accept pile. He had state level awards for Science Olympiad and his Academic Team went to Nationals and had a whole array of computer related experiences that made it clear that he had taught himself way, way, way beyond the level of anything offered at any high school.
My younger son’s EC’s were less impressive, but were sort of interesting for being all over the map. Science Olympiad (state level - 5th place maybe?), in two orchestras at the high school all four years, made and sold origami earrings, and did a history related project that was the topic of one of his essays. The origami stuff was the other main essay. His ECs were important because of the way he wrote about them - not that he was actually so terribly accomplished.
Younger son’s grades and scores weren’t as stellar as the older son’s and on the whole he did better than we expected, and older son a little worse. (But he still had two great choices, so no complaints there!)
I don’t think either kid, who applied to schools in the top 25 range mostly, would have had the results they did without their ECs.
I think Cal and now UCLA are holistic but don’t a lot of the UC’s go mostly off of GPA, class rank, essay, and may test scores (on the theory that many EC’s cost money so emphasizing them is unfair to low-SES kids) for in-state kids?
They didn’t even accept recs, right?
You’re right @PurpleTitan – I forgot about that. D was requested by Cal to submit LORs and she did, but the others don’t accept them.
Her school doesn’t do class rank.
ECs matter only when applying to the tippy top private colleges that do “holistic” evaluations of applicants. And generally they are not your typical ECs that you do within your HS alone. They are often “outside” ECs which are striking. So kids shouldn’t stress out and try to find a “leadership” EC within their HS, unless they are truly interested in it.
For tippy top schools, a student’s stats will give him/her a seat at the table, and after that it is ECs and LORs.
ECs matter when applying for big merit scholarships or Ivies.
I do not agree that they only matter for tippy top schools. There are a lot of schools in the middle that care about ECs. Is Mt Holyoke a tippy top? I don’t think so. Last year my friend’s daughter got accepted there with both gpa and SAT in the bottom 25% but she had extensive and very focused ECs. In the orientation she was mentioned in the presentation as a notable new student. What about RPI? Same story there and that is a tech school. My personal anecdote :My son was involved in a school EC and the college that he is attending called and asked if he was planning to continue with it in college which of course he did. That college has acceptance rate in the 40% so not a tippy top and it is a public school. My son had good sat but not so good gpa. I do believe that good focused ECs will help in a variety of colleges. If a student makes a good list with match schools ECs can strengthen the application and pull them up. In the case of my son he was truly passionate about his ECs. If I demanded for him to stay home and study more just for his grades he would just get the same grades and be depressed (yes I tried it). Through his ECs he learned a lot of technical plus people’s skills. In college now he has a part time job based on those skills that pays quiet well. So it is was not just for enjoyment.
The most important thing I learnt from reading CC is that the abundant, invaluable advice has no value to a particular kid unless the kid’s specifics are taken into account. For example, a 70 point difference in SAT scores made a huge difference between one poster’s twin kids’ merit awards, but I bet it’d make no difference in the tippy top few schools. Another example is the acceptance rate at a given school. It could be a lot smaller for an Asian boy at one school and a lot smaller for a white girl at another. I’d start with the question what kind of kid one has and the sooner than the beginning of high school senior year the better.
And before this thread goes too far into strategizing. My kids did their ECs because it’s what kept them sane, not with any idea of college in mind. Some they did to be with friends, others they did because they felt compelled to get good at that thing.
I agree. In our case my son would have had better college selection if his gpa was higher and his ECs a little less impressive. It was not a strategy but reflected who he was. In the end I am glad it ended up being somehow helpful and that he continues with them in college.
As above- kids do EC’s for their interest/enjoyment, NOT for the resume. They matter for the student’s life. Everyone is multifaceted and academics is just one side of a person. A lot of learning occurs outside the classroom as well. It could be social or organizational skills or indulging in something not offered as a class. An informal/not graded activity is an excellent way to explore interests.
Most top kids need more to do than just schoolwork. Schools likely want to know about EC’s because they show a student can handle more than just homework with the time outside of the classroom and homework. If a student gets stellar grades but needs to be spending all of the time just keeping up with it that means they could struggle with college. Students who do EC’s but then struggle with getting good grades also show they can’t do both. EC’s help round out the student’s education and develop more facets.
I think for the UC’s your essays matter, she probably had some rockin essays!