<p>All this heavy stress on extracurricular activities seems a little bizarre to me. Aren't colleges supposed to be recruiting intelligent academics? What difference does it make if you're the president of a club (a position that for several of my friends is only a title, nothing more) or you do a lot of community service for the sole purpose of building a resume? Before I joined this board, I always thought that extracurricular activities were a college's way of seeing that you're involved - not necessarily fully accomplished or juggling 10 plus activities, but just a way to see that there's a person behind your grades, scores, and essays, the things that really matter. Thoughts?</p>
<p>i agree, basically - a university must look for someone who will make a difference and be active, not just someone who is intelligent or who will study constantly to crank out A's like a robot.</p>
<p>aaaaand not all people do their extracurricular activities and community service to build up their resumes.</p>
<p>it's only one piece of the equation. </p>
<p>some of the people on CC, I don't know how they have time to sleep. I have two leadership positions and I often have to spend as much time on them as I do doing homework.</p>
<p>What the OP brought up is exactly the problem; people can't just do ECs to pad a resume. </p>
<p>IMO, ECs really give insight on who a person is. If someone doesn't do anything but get good grades, it can show that they might not be proactive or do anything important in the real world.</p>
<p>This is tough for me because I came from an abusive household and couldn't have those EC's and gave up a lot because of that. My grades are high and I graduated #7 but they're stunted by my average SAT scores. Although I haven't done much in high school because of that, I want to rectify myself in college, and at a very selective college. What about the student like me who has had hardships and is affected by them and motivated to succeed yet doesn't look good on paper?</p>