Need help deciding which ECs to put down

Applying to College Common and Coalition Application
1

Hello,

As I am filling out my common app, I am confused on which ECs to put down. I have a list of 9 activities and here they are (in order of importance)

  1. Intern at Research Institute (drug research and also trained by professional on writing research reports). - 2 years
  2. Founder of Science Explorers Club (recently started, offered students the oppourtunity to compete in Science competitions- also trained them on research reports)
  3. PATH Club ( VP, 3 years and raised $700 for AIDS walk and each feb led a group to the Georgia Capitol to loby for human trafficking) 4.Science National Honors Society (Inductee, 2 years, tutored students basically weekly and performed at Science night at elementary schools)
  4. MD Junior (VP, 3 years and this is a community service club where I also went to a mission trip in Honduras) 6.Model UN (3 years, delegate 3 countries at 3 conferences and drafted resolutions were put into action by committee. Received honorable mention last year) 7.FBLA (basically competitions (relating to several topics - mainly business oriented). I have only received regional awards and competed at state. No national award, 3 years) 8.Cricket (I basically played for fun all 4 years and with some other schools we established a league called "HSPL" where we organize a tournament every summer) 9.Temple (I was a substitute teacher at a temple and led group based teaching and sometimes also Hindi language classes)

Thank You so much for your insights and help!

2

You can put all of these on your application.

3

@sophie9999 Thank you for your insight. The question occured in my mind because I saw some people saying how adcoms like to see some ECs (4-5) that one is more involved in compared to like 10 ECs that are not “too important”. Is this something I should be concerned about?

4

You’re right, the general rule is “quality over quantity,” but in general this is told to posters who are thinking about joining new activities for the sole purpose of bolstering their resume. If you did all your activities because you genuinely enjoyed them or gained valuable experiences, you shouldn’t have anything to worry about.

You didn’t include in your post how much time you spent doing each activity. If you want, you can eliminate activities that you maybe only did once a month or didn’t require a lot of work per week. Or, the common app asks you to indicate if you want to continue something similar in college. If the answer is no, you may want to consider not including that activity.

I filled up 8 or 9 slots (can’t remember) and it worked out fine for me. It’s really up to you and how you want to represent yourself. I wouldn’t stress a whole lot about this. Kids who fill up all 10 slots get accepted to their dream schools, as do kids who only fill in 2-4.