<p>The overwhelming majority of colleges in the U.S. --including most flagship public schools -- base admissions mainly on grades, curriculum, scores, and possibly class rank. They also accept the majority of students who apply to them. Students who are rejected are likely to be rejected due to inadequate stats.</p>
<p>The relatively few schools that ECs can be a major factor in admission have such an overabundance of students with sky high stats that the colleges can afford to pick and choose among those applicants in order to create a well rounded, active campus. The schools that I'm referring to are places like HPYS.</p>
<p>Ok so here's a list of extracurriculars could you guys sort them out as most important to least? </p>
<ul>
<li>Varsity, captain of cross country/track</li>
<li>CSF all 4 years</li>
<li>Key club all 4 years</li>
<li>Math club President, all 4 years joined, numerous math contests, love math</li>
<li>Volunteering 300 hours</li>
<li>Orchestra 5th grade-10th grade</li>
<li>Science Club
Also does the AMC and other math competitions count as "Extracurriculars" or not? Thanks!</li>
</ul>
<p>When it wants you to list extracurriculars from most important to least, it means most important and relatively less important TO YOU. Those can be in any order depending on how you view them yourself.</p>
<p>My d is amassing some ECs in her senior year. Before that, very little. </p>
<p>I have suggested repeatedly that she use her Unleash</a> Your Imagination - FanFiction.Net work as an EC, because she did that intensely for 6 months in the summer and fall after 10th grade, but she demurs, saying she doesn't want anyone knowing what all she wrote. I don't think ad comms want screen names, do they? </p>
<p>That several months of writing came in handy for the SAT. She went up 80 points in writing from one SAT taken pre-writing to one taken a few montsh after she started all the fun writing. That seems to be the way to improve, which I guess is obvious.</p>
<p>Don't know if schools see non-competitive weightlifting as less important than say, taekwondo or a team sport. </p>
<p>"Working out" may seem self-indulgent, but on the other hand, think of the example of Teddy Roosevelt, who when he was young was an 85 pound weakling. He didn't like himself that way, so he took up boxing and learned to defend himself, building strength and dexterity. Now he is remembered as a "Rough Rider."</p>
<p>That sort of determination is a good thing and can be the basis for an essay.</p>
<p>AMC only counts as an EC if you study for it outside of school. I would just cite your score if you were an aime qualificant on your honors section, and not repeat it as an EC. </p>
<p>Everyone does the same amount of ECs. You have after you get home from school, until you sleep. So just say what you do in that time and justify it. If all you do is play video games, literally all, then just say it, talk about your love for it, just go all out. You MIGHT get into a top school. If you hide your video gaming, and put that you do... ahem.... this and that.... ahem... chances are you won't get in or even be close. If one person has read a ton of complicated classical literature, then I would put more faith in you to excel in college than a person who plays football all afternoon. Of course, you cant just say, "I read books all day," you have to further detail it and infuse it with passion.</p>
<p>Whatever the EC cited, it should have a purpose and show you have goals and interests. If you spent all summer reading the complete works of Jane Austen because you fell in love with her and think maybe you want to major in English, esp. Brit Lit, that's great. </p>
<p>Spending the summer doing graphics or writing code to create video games, similarly laudable.</p>
<p>But only being able to say you, um, played video games or um, read a lot...not so great, if you can't fit it into your story line for the adcoms.</p>
<p>pensive123: I'm not sure how colleges would respond to fanfic (not the least because it's legality is dubious). However, there’s nothing wrong with your daughter putting down that she wrote a lot – I forget where exactly I put it, but I definitely mentioned independent writing on my app, and that writing did happen to include fanfic. Of course, like anything, it would also be helpful to have a more structured activity to go along with that independent writing (I took summer classes and wrote for the school newspaper). What kind of activities is she doing now? Are any of them writing related?</p>
<p>lol, you can tweak the name of anything to make it sound like a valid EC - fanfiction can be rewritten as Independent Creative Writing or something</p>
<p>Would it be alright if I said that "math" was my passion and demonstrate that by talking about the math summer programs I went to, the college math classes I took, the contests/competitions I did, the club, and maybe research? I don't know what to put on my extracurriculars though..</p>
<p>I did an independent study over the summer. can I write about that in the comm app ec short answer? or are they looking for something that is more non-academic?</p>
<p>The amount of years I have spent in various clubs will probably be only 2 years at max and I'm not in a lot of clubs. Should I be concern, mainly because I am also involve with karate, played varsity tennis for a year, etc. Will the club thing be a problem?</p>
<p>Northstarmom has some good points (#61). For the most competitive colleges they need something beyond academics to differentiate among stellar students. Quality, not quantity, matters also. A student with top grades and test scores could need all of their free time to study whereas the better students will need more activities to fill their time (along with still having free/down time). Stellar stats plus good EC's does not guarantee admission to the top schools, btw. Expectations are not as high for the typical college student as they are for those entering elite schools. The importance of EC's is relative to the competitiveness of the school being applied to.</p>
<p>Some of you are saying that I can mention particular hobbies of mine. Would I be able to say that I make Java programs as an EC?! That would be great, because it really is something I enjoy. I make programs for the school from time to time...</p>
<p>I have about two which I am really counting on. If I wanted to , like the hundreds of thousands of other applicants, I could list every hour I spent volunteering.. why?</p>
<p>Here are my premier ones:
1. Varsity Tennis (top player since 9th grade, 10th grade all county, 11th grade Assistant Captain/all county, 12th grade Team Captain and favored for all state singles)
2. Since business is my passion, I'm listing the successful non-profit organization that I started as my major EC. I'm shoving this one down their throats lol. definitely my biggest plus
3. Also going to note my significant involvement with this Russian school my mom runs. This will help establish the fact that I have not abondoned my Russian/Ukranian roots, and will basically allow me to write my self as a minority.</p>