Hello all,
I recently obtained a summer job working as an SAT tutor for a popular Prep company. I wanted this job because I do love teaching and want to share my experience with the SAT with other students; but I also wanted to have a meaningful activity to put on my resume that I did over the summer. I was wondering how much this job would contribute (if at all) to demonstrating to admission officers my caliber as a student. Would it add to my application?
I’m not really doing the job for the money; an option I was considering is donating my salary to a volunteer organization I joined a couple years ago and am currently have a leadership position in.
Thanks for your help!
Admissions officers typically value a job as an equivalent to an EC. It is a good that you will be doing something productive with your summer. (FWIW Unless you are independently wealthy, I’d save the money you earn and put it towards spending money in college)
The particular summer job you indicated will reveal mostly your academic abilities, given the nature of the job. Test prep companies usually select tutors based on their test scores. So this particular job will reveal little about your initiative, leadership, entrepreneurship, service for disadvantaged, etc.
How much value your particular summer job will create for your college admissions will depend on how selective the college is.
The most highly selective schools will have applicants who have founded non-profits, authored published books, invented consumer products, worked the legal/political process to create new laws at local or state level, created political campaigns, alleviated poverty, secured US utility patents, won international STEM competitions, won national/international music/sports/arts competitions, etc.
I used to interview applicants for an Ivy League school and was astounded by the substance of the ECs the applicants presented. While some engaged in short term activities that seemed perfunctorily performed to bolster their resumes (e.g. flying to a developing country during the summer to build a school, latrine, etc.), many engaged for 3 + years in a particular activity in which they achieved remarkable impact on society.
Recently, I met high school juniors/sophomores who: repurposed an anti-parasite drug to combat brain tumors, invented an anti-diabetes pill that used layers of micro-cellulose to survive gastric juices, created an app to turn a smartphone into a low cost flow cytometer, raised money to fight human trafficking, invented finlets for commercial jet planes that outperformed exiting winglets (wind-tunnel tested), changed state law regarding recycling e-waste. Despite these students having these remarkable EC’s and earning ACT scores of 32 - 34, most did not gain admission to the colleges of their choice (their reach schools).
i would take the money and have fun with it…no matter how much you save during summer it is nothing compared to tuition so might as well enjoy it…
and yet while all those ECs are amazing i see very few of those “inventions” being used in real life - so yea it is all great on paper but building an actual business around any of these things including having successful non-profit is very difficult…hence colleges see that and prefer to have many really good kids who just did well in school
I think that having a job is incredibly important, whether or not it pumps up your college application.
It teaches you responsibility in a way that school simply can’t.