Extracurriculars

Applying to College
1

I’m a current sophomore who’s graduating in 2021.
I’ve been looking at Ivy League and T20 applicants, and they all seem to have insane extracurriculars with a spike towards their intended major/passion.
I’ve been attempting to get more involved in the programs offered at my school and outside of my school; however, I reside in a pretty quiet place with not many opportunities. Starting programs and clubs at our school almost never works out due to the lack of interest from other students.
I’m very interested in biology. Most applicants going into biology have extracurriculars such as volunteering at the hospital, doing research under a professor at a certain university, etc., but I can’t seem to find opportunities like those.
Any advice on choosing effective extracurriculars pertaining to my interests?

  • Interested in biology and neuroscience
  • I would love to attend a T20/Ivy League school
2

Have you called your local hospital and asked about volunteering? Perhaps call your police or fire non-emergency number and ask if they know of EMT certification classes in your area.

Edited to add: Those in themselves won’t be the tip for the T20s. However, simply getting started on a path can open the doors to more opportunities with more responsibilities.

Also, talk to some upper classmen who are doing those things you would like to do and ask how they got into those jobs or volunteer spots.

3

@Aheryn Why? These are schools that receive 40K+ applications for 2-3K incoming freshmen. The chosen would succeed no matter which of 500 colleges they attended, and some with no college at all. Does that describe you?

4

@Groundwork2022 The local hospital offers volunteering programs for ages 18+, so that’s out. Yes, I just need a baseline to discover more opportunities.

@damon30 I understand, and I believe I have the potential to succeed regardless of where I am placed. I am of course applying to in-state schools, but I have always loved the Ivies and T20. Nothing like giving it a shot.

5

@Aheryn Exactly how have you “always loved the Ivies and T20”? There is simply no way that you can have enough knowledge of these schools to even have an informed opinion of the them, much less “love” them.

Do you know anything about the Ivies except that they are one of the colleges that are called “Ivies”? Can you articulate as to why you would love to attend each and every one of the T-20? Do you even have an idea what T-20 you mean? The top 20 of USANews of 2019? What about Princeton Review’s list? What about that of Niche? Does that include only universities or also liberal arts colleges? If a colleges in on the 2019 list of USANews but not on the list in 2020, will that mean that you will no longer love it?

So, first decide what you want out of a college, than decide what type of college you want, then look for colleges that meet those criteria. Of those, see which will accept you, and which you can afford. Then, divide that list by their acceptance rates into reaches, matches, and safeties. Remove all but 10 or 15, with no more than 4 or 5 being reaches, and apply. If a T-20 or an Ivy is on that list as a reach, apply, otherwise, ignore.

Since there is a higher than 90% chance that you will not be accepted to any of your reaches, and a higher than 50% chance that you will attend a safety or a low match, those are where you should focus your energy and time.

You do not “love the Ivies and T20”, you love your perception of how you believe being accepted to one of them will increase your personal status. Aside from the fact that it isn’t really true, it’s also one of the worst ways that I can think of to choose a college.

6

As @MWolf has suggested, the Ivy League and top 20 universities are not all the same. If you want a good chance at getting into any of them, then you should spend some time figuring out what you want in a university, and you should also spend some time finding out what the differences are between the top schools.

One good place to start is to do a few university visits. You should be able to get a guided tour, and also at many schools you may be able to sit in on classes and talk to professors.

One thing to think about is whether you would prefer a large school or a small school. There are some pluses and minuses each way. There are also many very good small schools (which in the US are frequently called Liberal Arts Colleges). I have a daughter currently studying biology at a small university and she is doing very well with relatively small classes taught by full professors (which gives an opportunity to get to know the professor) and she has found a great research opportunity over the summer. Large universities will have a wider range of majors and will have some resources that the smaller school don’t.

Also, do not stress yourself out over trying to do whatever a top 20 university might or might not want you to do. There are a great many very good universities. Many students do very well with degrees from their in-state public university or from very good small schools that many of us have not heard of. If you look at the graduate programs in top 20 schools, a lot of the students there will have done undergrad at their in-state public school.

In terms of ECs, I have consistently felt that students should do what they find interesting. If you participate in ECs that you like, you are more likely to do well. I literally spent no time whatsoever in high school thinking about what ECs a university would have wanted me to do. I just did what I wanted. I still got accepted into a “top 3” university, and doing well in my ECs probably helped.

7

Astute advice above. You’re a soph and may be dreaming a little. That doesn’t get you admitted. You need to know what these colleges are really about (not just the vision of them) AND what they want to see in applicants. Columbia is different than Dart and Swat. Etc.

The chance threads don’t show their actual apps, the essay, all the things they wrote in supplements, how they described their activities. Also, we tend to see who got in, not all the others who looked good n chance threads, make it ‘sound’ like they cured cancer or wrote an important paper, but didn’t hit the mark in their apps/supps.

Right now, you need to spend time reading what those colleges say and show, get an idea what they look for, the traits (not just high falutin’ accomplishments.) You will need more ECs, because they like kids who see opportunities, challenge themselves.- and do good in their communities.

Get a Fiske Guide to Colleges, so you can see what’s out there.

And whatever your major is, they need to see depth AND breadth- that you engage in your interest area (stem,) as well as are willing to try new things, are open minded. The competition is fierce and getting more so.

8

One common thing about these colleges is they are all top 20. Isn’t it good enough reason to dream about them?

9

@hzhao2004
It betrays a mismatch between what the student believes and reality. Us CC regulars exist to scoff at such dreams. For example: What do Brown and UChicago have in common? Answer: Not much, except that they are both “top 20” schools. A student that would a great fit at one would likely be less happy at the other. Just saying “Ivy” or “T20” is a giveaway that due diligence has not been achieved. The CC FAQ puts it best: http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/1525399-if-you-are-asking-for-your-chances-to-ivies-and-other-top-schools.html

10

I guess it’s more about me wanting my stats to be up to par with the common T20 applicants. I definitely want a school adjusted to my liking and major. Will take that advice. Thank you.

11

“they are all top 20. Isn’t it good enough reason to dream about them?”

There are two things that bug me a bit about this question.

One thing is that rankings are arbitrary. Rankings change. Small schools (LACs) that provide a great undergraduate education are typically not included. Some schools are highly ranked in the overall rankings even though they are bad at some specific majors. The rankings mean very little.

The other problem is that high school students, and most adults, really do not understand what it means to attend a highly ranked university. Attending for example MIT or Caltech does not mean that wonderful professors provide you with thrilling lectures every day. It does not mean that you walk home with a smile from classes. It does not mean that people love you. It means a lot of hard work. It means spending Saturdays and Sundays doing homework. It means having very competitive students in your classes who are determined to do better than you so that they will get into the top graduate schools or medical schools. It does mean having some great professors (I remember five or six), but there are a few bad professors at these schools also (I remember two very well, but I don’t remember their names and would not give their names if I did remember). Once you graduate, it also means learning not to mention where you attended university because it sounds too much like bragging (which does not go over well).

MIT, Harvard, Stanford, and similar schools are great matches for some very strong students. They are not great matches for all strong students. They are probably not a match for any average or slightly-above-average student. There are many universities in the US and more elsewhere that provide a great education for a strong student.

There are students for which Columbia would be a great match and Dartmouth College would not. There are other students for which Dartmouth College would be a great match and Columbia would not. The same is true of MIT and Harvard.

I think that it is okay to dream about attending a highly ranked university. But you then need to wake up and find out what it really means to attend a highly ranked university, and to figure out what you want in a university.

12

Do not think 'Every point I get off of a homework or test is a point away from going to Harvard."
Think: “I need to do my best, and there will be a college that is right for me when I graduate.”

Do not think “If I don’t go to an Ivy League School/Top20, I am doomed forever.”
Think: “No matter where I go, I can bloom where I am planted. I can get involved and shine.”

Do not think: “My life is over…the kid in my math class is taking 20 APs and I am taking 5. I will never succeed.”
Think: “I need to challenge myself, but only to the point where I can still do well.”

Do not think: "I must do ECs I don’t want at a crazy level "
Think: “I should do things I enjoy and spend the amount of time i enjoy and there will be a college for me.”

13

OK, now, based on this and on your request, my advice would be:

To work at a university, you will need to reach out and contact professors. Find a few who are doing research which interests you, and reach out to them. Most colleges are set up to allow high school students lab experience in active research labs. My wife works with a couple every year, she just met with two the other day, and will likely be adding one to her lab. To do this, you need to be proactive. You also will need to ask your bio teacher to write you a letter of recommendation for this, if needed.

Speak with your bio teacher about independent research.

Aside from these focused, field-related ECs, find something else that you like doing. Volunteer in a pet shelter or with homeless, try your hand at acting, art, dance, etc. Life is not only about what you are going to do in college. Find ways to make your high school years interesting and meaningful.

Good luck!

14

Check if you have a volunteer ambulance corps with a youth program in your neighborhood. Mine is once a week but it is the best decision I’ve ever made. I got a EMT certification, 1st place in multiple Paramedic “tournaments”, leadership role in the youth corps and a connection with a paramedic that allowed me to do an engineering internship.

15

@DadTwoGirls

Yeah, reading CC, I feel that students don’t appreciate how hard it is. I went Stanford and obviously was a top student in HS. I thought I worked hard in HS. Ha. Yeah, right. You go from top of the pack to middle and the workload is so heavy.

And the part about not mentioning where you went to school. Yep. I went to school in the “'Bay Area” all through my 20s and 30s. Sometime in my late 40s, I got old enough and far enough removed from my 20s, that I started saying where I went to school. For a research project at work, I was looking up the educational background of scientists by looking up their CVs. It was not usual for a scientist to not list their undergraduate institution on their CV, but if it was dropped, it was always the case that they went to Harvard or Princeton. I’d dig into the acknowledgements in their PhD thesis or look up papers they wrote as an undergrad to figure out their undergrad if they left it off.

16

@liska21 Huh, I have never seen an academic CV without the undergraduate. It is usually irrelevant, but there is an expectation that you provide your entire academic education on your CV.

It’s relevant in two situations. A, if you are applying for a teaching position at a LAC, they really prefer people who did their undergraduate degree at a LAC, and B. if you are applying for a humanities job at an Ivy, you must have at least one Ivy degree, otherwise, you’re not One Of Them, and your application will be disposed of. It is best if your undergrad was at the university which is hiring*. Some will consider Stanford or UChicago as Almost As Good, but that’s as far as they’ll go.

  • The teaching philosophies of LACs and research universities/comprehensives differs and LACs prefer faculty who are familiar with the LAC teaching philosophy. They will also consider applicants who are able to demonstrate familiarity with this philosophy in their application, or who have taught at another LAC prior to the application.

** That’s only in Humanities, STEM departments at Ivies are willing to look at applicants with a wide list of universities.

17

@MWolf I have no idea if LACs only hire people who attended LACs, and I’m not going to look it up, but I do know that humanities degrees from UVA, Berkeley, MIT and Cambridge should be added to your list of “almost as good”. Another way in, of course, is to be a professor somewhere else first.

Harvard
Jonathan Bobaljik - (linguistics) undergrad McGill, grad MIT
Ambrogio Camozzi Pistoja (Romance languages) - BA U of Milan, grad Cambridge
Anna Wilson (English) - undergrad Cambrige, grad U of Toronto

Yale
Jennifer Allen (History) - BA UVA, grad UC Berkeley

18

@mathmom I knew about MIT and Cambridge (Oxford as well), but that UCB + UVA is a surprise. She may have done something really amazing for them to ignore her public university background…

Of course, most departments in most Ivies deny tenure to their assistant professors (the tenured positions are kept for poaching people who have become famous elsewhere). However, since this is well known across academia, it is not a stigma, and faculty who are denied tenure at Ivies are snapped up almost immediately, usually with tenure or a very shortened tenure track.

19

There can be different reasons for not getting tenure- inlcuding an issue with productivity outside the classroom. Or not teacching a subject the college feels is among its main academic paths they plan to keep indefinitely.

It’s not always that your UG degree needs to be specifically par, but can be that some colleges prefer an elite degree- that goes beyond Ivy for Ivy or LAC for LAC. That includes where the grad degree is from.

20

@lookingforward At Ivies, the classroom performance of their TT professors is the least important part of their tenure portfolio. It is all about number of publications, and dollar amounts of grants. As long as you are not to totally messing up in the classroom, you’re good. Also, most faculty can teach 100, 200, and 300 level courses in wide swaths of their field, so there is rarely a case in which a faculty member cannot teach courses that the university requires. However, TT faculty generally have lighter teaching loads and are rarely required to teach service courses in most Ivies. That is for adjuncts and VAPs.

Tenure denial is, therefore, almost never about classroom performance.

When tenure denial is the norm, however, it no longer is because of the faculty going up for tenure, but because of departmental or college policy. I most recently checked out Yale’s Math department, and only one of their full professors was hired as an assistant professor, every single other was hired after being tenured elsewhere. They also only had one associate professor. They did, however, have a bunch of assistant professors, This is not especially uncommon.

So, in 2010, Harvard’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences announced that it is finally changing this policy, and that it would start actually filling its ranks of tenured professors from within. It has only done this to a limited extent so far, perhaps since it is full of full professors, and will only hire TT faculty as these retire or die. However, the fact that they had to officially change this policy indicates that this was the prevailing policy at Harvard until then. I do not know whether other Ivies have started making these changes. I know that the department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Princeton has been promoting from within for a long time, as Yale’s School of Forestry has as well. But these are still relatively rare, and despite Faculty/College/School level policy changes, it will be a while until this change spreads across all departments, if it ever will.

Thing is, if you want to maintain a mass of faculty with many of achievements, it is always less risky to hire them after they have most of those achievements under their belts. Not only are TT faculty a risk, but TT faculty who are under a lot of pressure to succeed will be risk averse. Why try for something that is big and innovative? It will likely not be funded, since funding agencies are notoriously risk averse, as are journal editors and reviewers, which also makes it difficult to publish truly innovative research. So with innovative research it is almost impossible to procure enough funding and to publish enough to satisfy a tenure committee in an “elite” university. It is usually at least 3 publications a year, and a at least $1,000,000 in grant money to be granted tenure on STEM departments in “top” schools (not Ivies).