No interest in ECs

Parents Forum
1

This journey with my D24 is so different than the one with my D20…I’m eager for advice, so let me have it. The question is…how hard do you push for a kid to “get involved” and in your opinion, how important are ECs?

Background: My D20 had a hard time academically in her younger years and ended up being very goal-oriented with a lot of grit in high school. As such, in addition to earning good grades, she participated in a number of ECs and in spite of a sub-1200 SAT score, she presented well as an applicant with great merit offers from all of the schools where she applied. I truly think it must have been in part due to her activity-heavy resume.

My D24 is a completely different kid/story. She’s very bright and has never had to work hard for anything, academically. The downside is she’s never had to work hard for anything.
She has gotten off to a good start academically in HS. She’s taking a mix of advanced and honors level courses and is holding steady with an A average. She has always tested well, and I imagine she’s going to do significantly better than her sister on the SATs.

The issue is she has little to no interest in being involved with EC activities. At my urging, she was on the freshman tennis team this year. She wasn’t very good, only made the practice team. As I mentioned above, she’s never had to work hard to be good at something and I think it was a surprise to her that she wasn’t just good at it naturally. Absent any improvement, I can’t imagine she’ll make the team next year. I’ve offered to pay for private lessons and she’s not interested. I’ve encouraged her to get involved in any of the many other clubs and organizations at school and she’s resisted. I haven’t pressed too hard this year as she was fully-remote until this week, so there didn’t seem to be a ton of covid-safe participation opportunities beyond outdoor athletics. But I’m worried about next year (and beyond), when lack of ECs can’t be as readily justified.

I don’t want to be “that mom” pushing and pressuring constantly, and I certainly don’t want her to get involved with things she’s not interested in just to check a box on a college app, but…I want her to have the same types of options and choices her sister had when it comes time to choose a college, and the reality is, without generous merit she’s going to be limited to our state universities or the institution I work at (which is practically in our backyard and seems to be an extended high school experience for the local kids who go there). I’m not looking for her to attend a top tier school - our strategy with D20 was for her to apply to “sure thing” schools in order to get merit. I don’t want D24 to realize senior year that she missed opportunities to join in and find things she likes and not have college choices she wants.

I’m leaning toward insisting that she find two clubs/activities to get involved with and stick with each year. If she doesn’t enjoy them, she can find two new ones for the following year. Thoughts? Am I worrying too much about this? Not enough? For a good student with (presumably) strong SAT scores looking to get merit from (middle tier) schools, how important are ECs?

2

We had a rule in our house even before high school - NOSOYA (no sitting on your …). So D always had to have at least one activity, and it was entirely up to her. As that had long been the rule, when she no longer enjoyed something, she would figure out something else. Her choices in high school surprised me, as they are not what I would have chosen for her or recommended. But that’s what made them work.

I recommend laying it out for your DD like that.

2 Likes
3

ECs are definitely important as they can really show admissions who you are as a person and can demonstrate personal characteristics like perseverance, motivation and dedication. That being said, I think forcing your D to participate in something she doesn’t care about won’t help her. As silly as it sounds, I think AOs can get a sense of who is sincere in their presentation and those that are doing something because it looks good or someone else said they had to. There are so many things that cause a “fight” with a teen D, I think it might not be worth creating the drama at home. Not to mention we spend time trying to encourage our children to be their own person and not follow the crowd when it doesn’t suit them. My mom has a motto: Life is a series of choices and learning to live with the consequences.

My D is finishing her first year at a T20 LAC. When she interviewed there, they talked about her ECs (an instrument and assorted musical honors and a sport she enjoyed but was never terribly good at). Her interviewer asked her if she was open to trying new things in college and she was very enthusiastic. She left her instrument and sport equipment at home and has joined MUN, participates in cross-cultural events, is on her housing commons council, and is on a club dance team (having only taken a handful of lessons when she was 4). It is their journey and they find their own path that works for them…choices and managing consequences. Good luck :slightly_smiling_face:

4

We were in this situation with S21. He didn’t do anything his freshman year except play tennis. He didn’t want to join any clubs at school, isn’t a community service or leadership role type of kid, etc. But he was/is a top student and had very ambitious goals for college. Our well-intentioned efforts to explain to him that he would likely need more ECs to reach his goals fell on deaf ears.

It’s a fine line to walk between nagging/pressuring and encouraging. I didn’t always do a good job of it! What helped was when we stopped saying “you need to pick a couple of activities” and started suggesting things that were already related to stuff he enjoyed doing. So instead of adding additional new clubs, he coached tennis and managed the girls’ tennis team. Then he did some light community service when a friend asked him to join in on a project he was already working on. Friends are way more persuasive than parents!

In the end, his ECs were fine but not spectacular and it stopped being a flashpoint. He at least showed a lot of depth in one area - yeah, it was a sport, but it was what he loved to do. I came to hate the idea of forcing him to tick boxes to be seen by AOs! He’s gotten into plenty of great schools with some wonderful merit.

If I could do it again, I’d have pressured less and let him have his own journey. And if he ended up not getting into "the"school, it would have certainly been a learning moment for him! Good luck!! :slight_smile:

2 Likes
5

First, the state university is probably a fine choice if affordable.

In-school clubs and activities are sometimes not as helpful as activities outside of school, for admissions purposes. I don’t know what your school is like but ours had pretty mediocre offerings. Finding interests outside of school to explore made more sense for my kids.

Does she have any interests? Is she a quiet homebody who likes to read? Is she very social with friends outside of school? Or is she depressed? It really depends on why she is not participating. It doesn’t sound like the rigors of academics are a factor.

If she were my kid, I guess I would first say, it’s fine if you don’t do anything besides schoolwork. But let’s make a list of any interests you might want to explore in or out of school, and I will help you find ways to do it. Dance? Music? Art? Tai Chi or yoga? Volunteering at the local cable tv station? Volunteering at the hospital? Working with kids? An obscure sport? Etc. Make a list and then help her find a way to do it.

Again, if she doesn’t want to do anything, and has friends, and is relatively happy, that’s fine and I think she will still end up at a school that fits her.

1 Like
6

I do not think that I would push it all that hard.

Our two daughters were very different. One naturally just gets involved in many things and had a long list of ECs. She graduated university nearly 3 years ago, has done well, and is starting at a very good graduate program in September.

Our other daughter is very smart and very thoughtful. However she is not as naturally inclined to get involved in things. She had no ECs until her senior year of high school unless a semester abroad counts as an EC. She still got into every university that she applied to, with merit aid at most of them (one she said no to before hearing back about merit aid). She still has very few ECs but she has a very responsible and good boyfriend and has done solid research as an undergraduate student, and will be graduating university quite close to the top of her class.

I think that each child finds their own way. As parents we help, but we do not select their life for them.

5 Likes
7

This!

The key is that they are not, as @itsgettingreal21 put it, SOYA. What does she like to do with her time? one of the Collegekids had 0 interest in school-based ECs, but had a serious outside interest.

One more thing- your concern about developing muscles for getting through work when it’s actually hard is on the money. I have seen what happens when a kid who has skated through actually hits challenging material, and it’s not pretty. One thing that can happen is that they get scared that they aren’t as smart as everybody thinks they are, b/c suddenly it’s Calculus and you can’t just phone it in. Do they tell you they are scared? of course not. They self sabotage, act out, etc. Do they actually try harder when they don’t do something new well? no- b/c they don’t want to take the risk that they might actually try and fail.

Obvs I don’t know what is right for your student but look for people who can help you with finding ways to help her develop those muscles. That might be an outside program that puts her with other very strong students. It might be looking into resilience or confidence programs (eg https://www.amightygirl.com/blog?p=27408 or Resources for Gifted Children & their Families | Davidson Institute). It might be setting her the challenge of picking something that she doesn’t know how to do and achieve a target (esp an external certification) in that thing: sign language translator? junior firefighter? think waaayyyy outside the usual boxes! really anything that can be quantified because the trickiest part of this sort of kid is that their actual self-confidence can be surprisingly low. Decent odds that she knows how (comparatively) little she has worked to get the marks she is getting, and that she sees it as luck more than cleverness. The fear of being ‘found out’ can be profound. The best confidence builder is competence, which comes from mastering something that seemed daunting at the beginning.

Good luck…to both of you!

3 Likes
8

I told both kids as soon as they began high school that they had to do at least one activity after school and I didn’t care what is was. They also had to volunteer in the community.

Son played a sport, but had to choose an activity when it was not sports season. He did so reluctantly. Daughter played no sport but did play an instrument, and was involved in a few things. Both got involved in volunteering for school/sports related activities, but really, they did those things because their friends did them too.

Neither particularly wanted to volunteer in the community (sorry, they aren’t very altruistic), but that was non-optional. I gave suggestions and they chose.

Both had jobs in summer from sophomore year on: babysitting, life guarding, yard work for neighbors, etc…

My kids grew up without struggles that others who might be less fortunate face. I told them what the expectations were and they did them. The option they couldn’t choose was sitting around doing nothing. Homework and studying came first, so whatever they did wasn’t at the expense of grades.

I see nothing wrong with telling your kid “hey, doing nothing isn’t an option.” I’m very much the mom whose common retort was “Tough!”

8 Likes
9

If the targets are moderately selective colleges, then ECs are typically much less important compared to academic credentials. If she is fine going to your state universities or the one you work at, or other colleges with big-merit-for-academic-stats-that-she-is-likely-to-get, then ECs may not be all that important for her.

Also, ECs are most likely to make a difference for college admission when considered if she shows commitment and achievement, which is only likely if she has a strong enough interest in them. In other words, ECs that are useful for college admission must come from her interest, not parental nagging, although parents can certainly help enable opportunities for the student to develop ECs that the student is interested in.

That said, there may be some value in getting the student to do something other than nothing in spare time, but “something” in this context need not be some parent-selected-EC-for-college-admission-purposes.

2 Likes
10

I am of an opposite viewpoint. It’s not my job to tell my kid what she/he should do or how many EC’s need to be done. I shouldn’t have to search and entertain my kids’ likes and dislikes by asking them what they would like to participate in for an EC.

(I had to put a limit on the kids activities because I just couldn’t keep up.) Their friends usually got them involved in some clubs or part-time jobs.

Inform you daughter that her Senior year expenses are coming and should come out of her pocket; part-time jobs are viewed well as EC’s. Right now, these aren’t readily available, but she needs to start her resume. Don’t do it for her MOM!

These jobs teach discipline, punctuality, balance and commitment. If she doesn’t already have a savings/checking account, she needs to start one and contribute to it. Tell her you are preparing her for her future banking when she’s at her university.

If the tennis thing didn’t work out, then the reality is that she is expecting for things to fall into her lap. She’s never had to work or fight for something that she believes in.
She’s supposed to be developing into an adult. If she’s not ready for college, she needs a GAP year and put that year into working. She’ll figure out quickly how old that will get.

As parents, we protect them, shelter them and feed them but at some point, they need to take the reins. We shouldn’t have to tell our kids, “Okay, we need you to find 2 things that you should get involved in or you wont get into a college with merit”.

Senior Prom activities, pictures, yearbook, ditch days, grad night, all need to be funded by her. Why? She’s going to be 18 and needs to have some “buy in” for all of that. It’s expensive, so if she’s not involved in her community, then she needs to pay.

Edited to add: My middle daughter volunteered to walk dogs for my HS classmate, a veterinarian.
That led to a job, which led to lab work, and experience with working in a lab.
That lab work experience led to a competitive job at the university labs and clinics.
That experience led to work in a diabetic clinic during her undergrad, which got her into her medical school program. I had nothing to do with any of it (She looked up Liz the Vet’s #) They find their roles on their own.

3 Likes
11

Luckily we didn’t have a tv or IPhones during my kids’ high school years and we got a computer when my oldest was 14, one computer shared by everyone.

So if they stayed home and “did nothing” it was usually something good. And also I think that the lack of screens probably motivated them to do stuff outside the home too :slight_smile:

Not sure if screen time is an issue for this daughter but I know during COVID I have gotten lazy spending all this time online!

12

I think exposing a kid to lots of different things is a great way for them to hone in something beyond academics by HS.

What is your D already interested in? That’s the start. No point faking an interest in soccer- those soccer kids have been in love with the game (or at least been forced into it) since they could walk.

Art, photography, dance, visiting Colonial era cemeteries, baking, playing mah jong with grandma, model airplanes?

It doesn’t need to be a school club for it to be important to her (and something to highlight on her applications) and it doesn’t need to be “official”. Who is she when she’s not at school? Start there.

6 Likes
13

Thank you all for your words of wisdom! You’ve each given me things to think about. Overall takeaway is that I don’t need to overthink this. Had a conversation with her over dinner about how she might like to occupy some of her time outside of schoolwork and the things she seems most interested in are getting a job and joining a gym with a couple of her friends. So, we’re going to focus on those for now.

Love this site for the years of parenting experience that can be found here. It is an invaluable resource!

9 Likes
14

I not only had to push my DS when he started HS, I also had to do it when he started college. Regardless of the impact on college admissions, being involved in something outside of class is important for the HS experience. Thankfully his HS English teacher conned him into joining yearbook. He finished his senior year as editor-in-chief. Now my pushing is to find something for the summer. I don’t do much of the legwork, I just pester him about what he has done. When he starts to complain, I tell him if he does it I will shut up. We also agree on deadlines. If he doesn’t do something by x date, I can bug him all I want after that but will be quite until that time.

2 Likes
15

Job and gym sound great! You sound like a great parent.

Being true to oneself is more important than racking up EC’s, for sure, and so is your relationship :slight_smile: It sounds like you have all the right priorities!

2 Likes
16

My senior D is like your D 20 and then I have junior identical D’s who are very much like your D24 - not interested in EC’s at all because they are very shy. They do participate in Marching Band, Wind Ensemble, Art Club, ASL Club and Astronomy Club. They were recently invited to apply for NHS but I think they will be turned down because the do not have very many ECs.

However, I do not have that same fear when it comes to applying to college. While touring various colleges and interacting via zoom tours with my senior D, I have found that many colleges prefer quality over quantity with leadership roles in fewer clubs being more important than the number of clubs she participated in as a student.

17

I wonder about this with my S22. His main interest has been basketball – he made varsity as a junior this year, though he tore his meniscus in practice and missed the Covid-shortened season. He’s played for years and has taken it seriously, playing on club teams when we lived overseas and doing summer programs.

However, he has no other ECs at all. He has no interest in school clubs or student government. Tried to get a job last summer, but not very hard. He has expressed interest in starting a homelessness charity, but he hasn’t done anything about it. I learned of a virtual conference on the topic and suggested that he attend, which he said he would, but he forgot on the day and has declined to seek out the recording of it. He’s interested in architecture and is signed up for a virtual academy at an architectural college this summer, so that’s something.

He’s a good though not spectacular student – probably around a 3.7 average, and practice scores on the SAT (which he took last weekend) in the high 1300s to low 1400s. We’re Black, so that may be something of a leg up. He doesn’t have Ivy-level college ambitions, and I know he’ll get in somewhere good. The rafts of ECs that kids and parents tout here on CC disquiet me somewhat, but I’m not overly stressed (and he’s not stressed at all, thankfully). Just hoping this doesn’t make the difference at some school he’d really like to attend.

1 Like
18

The job sounds great - early work experience helps a student gain momentum. The gym with friends idea is healthy and social, so also great for her general mental/physical well-being.

She is young, so she should also pursue authentic volunteering. Meaning not looking to impress readers of a college application, but being a civic-minded person contributing to a functional society. She - perhaps in conjunction with friends to make things, again, social - should see what services in town could use some youthful assistance. It might be surprisingly challenging with current circumstances, but perhaps there is remote work or some sort of help she can provide to others. An important part of mental health is not being 100% preoccupied with one’s self, but having meaningful engagement with others.

Also, who is interesting to her? (Can be someone famous, or in your family’s own circle). Do they do something that might be of interest to your daughter? (“So and so does this… that might be something cool to check out.”) Interesting people are interesting because they do things and are knowledgeable about things.

She can also start learning practical skills that will stand her in good stead as an adult. The teenage years are a great time to learn and make mistakes. Cooking is always important - she can become a bit of an expert in a type of cuisine, or baking. Learn basic sewing, repairs, how to do things once she’s out on her own. There are courses available. Not only will she be able to be functional at 18, but these are not “for grades” and have no impact on college applications. It simply will make her a better individual all-around.

19

Good enough to be a recruiting target at colleges that he is interested in?

If not, sports would be mostly just another EC, but demonstrating a high level of commitment and achievement means something. However, obviously, the injury and COVID-19 issues made it difficult to continue showing commitment and achievement in actual game situations (versus individual shooting around trying to make half-court heaves or whatever).

It is at least theoretically possible that small colleges with a strong sports tradition (i.e. need a large percentage of students to join the sports teams) may look favorably at sports ECs even among non-recruits so that there is a ready pool of potential walk-ons with good baseline fitness and interest.

For architecture, would he be looking at a 5-year NAAB-accredited BArch program, or something more along the lines of a BA/BS in architectural studies program (that may allow for an MArch in fewer than the usual 3 years at some schools)?

1 Like
20

Conversely, I see nothing wrong with telling you kid “you can do nothing if you like. Hang out with your friends as much as you want/can because you’re only young once and soon enough you won’t have the ability to just do nothing. No need to jump into adulthood when you’re 16”.

4 Likes