Basically the title.
Basically, they don’t. Although if it’s a key part of your application, they would be surprised if one of your recs did not mention it.
Additionally, AOs will not conflate leadership with leadership positions, and they will expect to see some thread of leadership woven into your essays.
Having said that, it is not unheard of for an AO to ask a GC for additional clarification if something seems off.
They don’t super care about that anyway… I think applicants think those position titles matter more than they really do. As ski just said, they don’t conflate actual leadership with leadership positions.
Leadership qualities.
Since the question was whether positions are legit, I assume he’s thinking of faking. And he’s got another thread asking similar.
How about we just say, adcoms read thousands of apps. They have their ways of suspecting issues and sometimes expectations that a GC will mention your truer picture. At UCs, they still verify a proportion of the apps.
Don’t do it.
In addition to cross referencing to LoR’s and essays, another checkpoint is the interview if one is conducted. It is a rare interview that doesn’t touch on extracurricular interests. If an interviewee talks about being the “president” of this or the “captain” of that, I (and most interviewers) will ask about specific accomplishments. If there are no accomplishments to speak of, or the narrative doesn’t ring true, that will be noted in my report, which I suspect may lead in many cases to the AO reader asking the GC or discounting the EC.