Extra Curriculars?

Pre-College Issues High School Life
1

<p>Ever since 6th grade -- i'm in 11th now -- I have been an on/off participant in my local church's youth group. I attended more in middle school, as in HS I have APs and a job, and volunteering at school.</p>

<p>But recently I went through a real hard time in my life, and i realized that being involved in the youth group totally changes me for the better. I'm starting to attend youth group weekly, and am considering becoming a leader for the middle schoolers (which is a pretty big deal; it requires extra meetings so that we can be qualified enough to help out and help them, especially because of the topics we discuss (in addition to religion)). Also, I plan on attending next summer's mission trip and the church retreat next fall.</p>

<p>One of my friends (who doesn't attend the youth group/church; she isn't really sure about it) mentioned that even if I put this on college applications, it won't look that good, because much of the work with the church that i'll be doing will be in junior year and on, and it'll look like I was just trying to boost my app. Is this true?? That makes me really sad to think that college admins will just disregard all of the good work I/we do because of when it occurs...</p>

<p>P.S. I plan on writing my personal essay about the tough time I mentioned above and how my youth group/friends there/faith helped me through it, and how I am doing better than ever. Will that help with what I asked above?</p>

<p>Thanks! (Sorry it was so long! lol)</p>

2

<p>No do mention it, it’s not like a 2 month coup just to butter up your app, you’ve been doing this long enough, and to dedicate your essay to it shows you really care and have passion.</p>

<p>Way to go!! be warned however of religious biases and or views, such as masturbating, abortion sex, and gay rights, those are hot topics and you dont want to get rejected for mere views. </p>

<p>Best of luck!</p>

3

<p>Thanks :slight_smile: And yeah, I’ll watch out for that. It’s not like the church is one of those “out there” churches, it’s well known and respected, and I won’t mention stuff like that, but I may mention self harm in passing (it’s a big topic at our youth group :confused: ).</p>

4

<p>no do it. write your essay about religion if it really impacted you and write down that you spent a lot of time at church. my family friend is a really strong christian and wrote his essay about it and got into duke. he could’ve gotten into harvard or something but he applied duke ED because he really wanted to go there at the time.</p>

<p>hope this helps!</p>

5

<p>Yeah, on other hand if a college wouldn’t accept you for whatever religious views you have, I doubt you’d want to go to that college in the first place, so Berkeley is out, xD</p>

6

<p>If you have any personal history with self harm, I think that it’s important you don’t mention the history. To more conservative admissions officers, that would almost certainly seem like TMI. You say you’re just going to mention it in passing but I just felt like just in case…</p>

7

<p>I agree with the majority, it’s an extracurricular which plays quite a part in your life, thus IMO it should be mentioned. It’s nice to see who the applicant is, right? Good for you :)</p>