I am currently a junior in high school. I have done soccer my whole high school career, and plan on continuing to play. I also do track, but I really do not enjoy it at all. It stresses me out and is intense to the point where it is not fun. I am thinking about quitting for the upcoming outdoor season (I am in the middle of indoor season right now). I guess my main concern is that it will look bad when I go to apply to colleges. A lot of my time is dedicated to sports, so I do not have an overwhelming amount of EC’s outside of that. I participate in the Math Team, Community Service Club, and Ski Club, but besides that, I just do sports. Will quitting track make an impact on my application? Or will it look alright if I take that time I would have used for track and got a job, volunteered, etc? Thanks so much!
It doesn’t matter if you quit track. For college apps, sports are only important if you’re a recruited athlete, or at least on a very high level. Reason is that colleges try to get a well rounded pool of students every year. They want some musicians, some debaters, etc… But when it comes to athletes, they have already recruited the track athletes they want, so why would they need more people that aren’t as good? For other ECs though, they don’t recruit volunteers beforehand, so it has more weight in applications. This means that if you drop track and do volunteer work (for example) instead, it would likely help your application.
To repeat, for the nth time, it’s not about the number of ECs you do - it’s about doing what you love. You only need one or two things that you care about enough to invest your time in. You don’t need a sport at all for any college (unless you are trying to get admitted as a recruited athlete). Otherwise, its just another EC like any other. Not enjoying track? Drop it. If you are doing Math Team, Community Service and Ski Club on top of that, you already have way more than you need.
Want to stand out? Pick one EC besides soccer, and expend some time and effort and creativity to take your level of engagement to another level. Do the rest only if you really enjoy them.
If you’re not enjoying track, find something you do like. ECs help show colleges who you are, so you want to pick things that you enjoy.
I think it will be fine, especially if you do something else like you suggested with that time.
Unless you are on a level where you will be a recruited athlete, you will be fine, especially if you pick up an other EC with the time.