<p>I have pretty strong extra-curriculars in the sense that I have a few passions that I have focused on and improved on throughout my high school career both in school and in my community (such as art and music). I also have a few experiences that I think are pretty unique and might help me (a paid internship thing focused on the arts as a career/learning to overcome racial stereotypes, and I started my own small-scale business). However, unlike a lot of people here, I was never in any nationally recognized competition (I have one award from a state-wide art competition but that’s it).
Also, I’ve done a bit of volunteering but I don’t have hundreds of hours under my belt like many people seem to have.
Are my EC’s too mediocre for Brown?</p>
<p>Your ECs do not seem mediocre since they are genuine interests. The advantage of "official" extracurriculars such as club presidencies, sports, and honor society membership, is that they are easy to document and quantify - but your experience can be documented as well, by submitting a portfolio of your work with the application. (a note on this: pay the $200-300 it costs for professional slides of your work; it's a worthwhile investment and you can use the extra copies for scholarships and art show entries)</p>
<p>Alternately, if you are looking to rack up a few awards and have time before you graduate, you should look into the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards. National winners receive a cash payment and can include on their resume that they've had work shown at the Corcoran in DC as well as regional institutions (in my area the Milwaukee Arts Center). You might also consider applying to various art shows rather just those targeted at high schoolers - even if the shows with submission deadlines still available will not be actually hung until after the college application is due, you can at least write on there that you were accepted into these galleries.</p>
<p>I think I was sort of like you in that I did a lot of things but they were mostly in my school/ community and were not on a national or state level. I got in. I think a lot of people think that you need to be really strong in one area to get in, but that isn't the case. Brown (or some similar school, I don't remember which) said something like this: "we want to have a well-rounded class. This means that we admit two types of students: those who are very strong in one area and those who have well-rounded backgrounds."</p>