Extracurricular Advice: conflict

I told my more that I was doing ASL club this year because I like learning it, I am hard of hearing, and there is a deaf disparity in patients in the healthcare system due to inability to properly communicate; I want to become a doctor (particularly an endovascular neurosurgeon or cardiologist). She told me that she does not think that it will be a good club for me because she thinks “its not important and that ASL is useless”. She think that my time would be better spend in Black student union and speech bc they will apparently be transferable skills that’ll help me in my career. and while I understand that, I really dont want to d speech because its very time consuming and just not something I am interested in and I dont not want to force myself to do something I dont want to do. Along those same lines, I am very hesitant on joining Black Student Union because while I am black, I have never had a black friend and I live in a predominantly white neighborhood, so being around so many black people will make me uncomfortable because of my extreme social anxiety. Do you think I will be hindered by not joining BSU and Speech? Do you think I will be hindered by joining ASL Club? What are your opinions or ideas on this?

EC activities should be activities you enjoy and that you hopefully can make a long term impact with the organization. It is fine to do ASL if that is where your interests lie.

Neither ASL nor BSU related ECs will hinder you - both are great ECs.

Colleges don’t really have lists of ECs, specifically ranked by how much they “help” with admissions.

The reason that colleges with holistic admissions like to see ECs, is because they want to see that you have other interests outside of school, and that you liked spending your time doing something. Some colleges like seeing social action, but both ASL and DSU are that type of EC.

Choose whichever one will give you a deeper sense of fulfillment, since that is the one in which you will do, and achieve, a lot more.

Your ECs may or may not be the “deciding factor” for admission to a specific college. However, what is certain is that, at the end of high school, you will feel much better, and have a much bigger sense of pride and satisfaction, if you engage in ECs which are more meaningful to you.

Your high school years are about you becoming you, not about being accepted to this or that college. So use them for that purpose. A better sense of who you are will also make it easier to find a college which fits you.

Here is a metaphor - if you know that at the end of the year, you will get a new suit, will you choose a suit of a specific size and type, and spend the year trying to change your body to fit that suit, or will you, at the end of the year, go looking for a suit of a style and size which fits you as you will be at that time?