For the students we know it was gymnastics and swimming. Especially for the gymnast, it was a tremendous amount of time. It’s hard to maintain great grades, do that, and then also get involved in the community or pursue an academic passion at the level UCs would appreciate. My son played JV football and it was a huge time commitment, even in summer. After he was injured he was able to explore some cool true interests.
As far as club fillers go, yep totally agree.
My son used a free “College Esssy guy” workshop to avoid boring essays. I bet good AOs can sniff out essays that are not authentic or written by others most of the time. I’ve seen them talk about it on my Twitter surveillance.
The level of writing top schools are looking for is way above a traditional HS student and even a reach for the typical “average excellent”. Sure they could spot you or I writing for our kids, but I think a professional could write the essays with out getting detected.
Since I have one more HS student I hope colleges don’t start relying more on the essays. People will just take their SAT prep money and use it for essay coaching, and the end result won’t authentic.
I am trying to raise resilient kids not kids who have the best shot at an elite school. Sports and other activities teach great life lessons if you stick with them and get involved!
My take on sports is this - at highly selective schools, they are making a class. The athletes are the recruited ones or maybe the ones who can walk on. Then they need theater kids, and music kids, and newspaper kids. Etc. etc. So, if your student spent almost all of their time doing a sport and not much else, where do they fit if not on a team? This is probably more important at the smallest schools but I bet it matters at most top 30.
Agree with being concerned about outsized importance of essays at some schools, especially in the absence of an interview or other “live” contact. I mean, college entrance is not a creative writing contest ! I have read quite a few over the years and can usually spot some with inauthentic tone. This year D had her final, main essay reviewed by head of Eng Dept at school and recd it back with extremely technical & stylistic edits that D said “no way” to implementing. One was a word choice that she would never have made and another some obscure punctuation she barely knew existed - let alone would use ! She kept it as is because it was truly her voice.
Indeed they do. One doesn’t preclude the other. You can be resilient and not do sports. You can also choose to focus more on activities and grades and use your sport for mental and physical health rather than making it a focus. Or, you can change your focus as you progress on your high school path and you grow, learn and change. That’s resilience. It’s OK for kids to want to go to elite schools and it’s OK for kids to want to do sports. It’s also OK for kids to have zero desire to go to college and just want to do vocational school.
Indeed ! Had that a-ha moment years ago after I read “How Children Succeed” by Sociologist Paul Tough. THE #1 book I recommend. It’s an absolute must read to put things in perspective when considering elements that actually contribute to success in life long term. Grit, ability to handle set backs and positive attitude far outweigh stats or school rank in eventual determination of success.
UCs had a 13% jump in unique freshman applicants, in-state freshman went up 7%, OOS up 47%.
I wonder how many were gap year students and if they received any priority, or if it was just kids who added on some UCs this year due to the test-blind policy.
My kid had to drop sports due to injuries. She was able to have time for the extreme time commitment, related to major EC where she was very deeply involved, including 3 years of leadership. She spent months on the essays following advice found online and I thought they were very relevant and personal, showing many different qualities of community service, leadership, and unique self-driven activities and hobbies. She didn’t have much luck at the UCs, 2 rejections and a WL.
I apologize if I’ve hit a nerve with anyone. In no way did I mean to suggest that sports do not have value or that kids need to go to an elite school to find success. Just pondering what happened in UC round.
The ballerinas we know who spent 30 plus hours at the studio and performing had a hard time in admissions even if they had top scores and GPAs over the last few years. Everyone knows this type of dance takes all kinds of commitment but having one EC, unless you’re going to major in dance, is an issue. When D stopped ballet, she was able to add three pretty intense ECs at school, two in leadership roles, and she still didn’t spend as much time on ECs as she did when she was at ballet. I’m hoping it helps, though, since now they can see other sides of her and see multiple ways she can contribute on a campus. We didn’t plan for this to happen. We assumed she would stay at ballet all through high school but I think it’s worked out for her.
With S19, he spent a TON of time on XC and track. Year round. Practice six days a week for maybe three hours a day and then exhausted trying to do homework etc. Running 50-60 miles a week. But he also went to art class on weekends and produced a portfolio. Won some art contests including a Scholastic Gold Key. He volunteered locally and was on the junior board of our town’s community house. Was a winner of a state wide writing contest. My point is that he didn’t just do his sport even though it was very time consuming. Kids who get into tippy top schools, especially in RD, have a lot going on.
What’s great about going to college in LA is that you are minutes from the beach, 1.5 hours to snow skiing in the mountains, 2 hours from the desert (Palm Springs), the weather is generally fantastic year round (and zero humidity), very culturally diverse, with great food, and a laid back lifestyle. Not a bad place for a 18-21 year old to live for 4 years…
Whatever happened to college being a time to explore and develop new interest? Why are schools expecting kids to be so specialized?
S read to me a blurb about kid’s admitted to JHU and they sound more accomplished than adults working. Some kid did underwater robotic archaeology? What, how’s that possible? How does a kid even get that opportunity?
I’m not sure they want the kids to be specialized but they want them to be involved in stuff that matters to them and then carries over to how they will contribute on campus. It’s really only the very top schools that can care about this. And I’m sure they don’t want kids planning their ECs around colleges’ wishes. Schools are looking for kids who are authentically interested in their ECs. Those kids do exist and excel. And many of them still have time to hang with parents and play cards.
