I’m a high school sophomore and am trying to figure out what to do in terms of volunteering/ extracurriculars between now and Nov 2016 to make me an extremely competitive candidate. I’m not aiming unrealistically high - UCSB is a school I’d love to go to. I am a resident of California, am not a 1st gen, and go to a pretty good public school.
I’ve had a 4.0 throughout high school (unweighted and weighted - no APs for sophs at my school) and am taking 3 APs next year. I’m a good test taker and have gotten over 2000 and 31 on Kaplan practice SAT/ACT tests so I’m not worrying about that right now.
I’ve played basketball for 5 years so far. JV as a freshman, Var as a sophomore. Will be on Var for the next two years, but I doubt I will be captain at any point.
Extracurriculars: Member of my school’s chapter of Amnesty International for the past two years, will be vice president for the next two years. I volunteer at a middle school basketball camp for 4 hrs every week. Occasionally babysit and volunteer at a preschool.
I’m mostly just wondering what I can do now to get a head start. How many clubs and volunteer hours will be ideal? What else can I do to improve my chances?
I think that what you have right now is really good. You have the depth with basketball and working with kids (one way colleges measure “passion”), the leadership, the commitment to your activities, etc., etc. I would also recommend doing an activity or two related to what you want to do in college / your career interests. It’s also nice to show that you do productive things with your summers. Or if there’s any way for high schoolers to interact with the UCSB campus (visiting, summer program, etc.), some schools like to see that you’re generally interested in the school. But there’s no minimum number of clubs or volunteer hours needed to make you competitive. Keep doing what you’re doing!
@OnMyWay2013 Thanks for your helpful response !! I actually visited UCSB a few days ago and fell in love with it. I’ll look into summer programs! As for career/major related activities, I would like to major in English and eventually become a journalist (long shot, I know). I’m a girl; do you think the fact that journalism is a male-dominated field will help my chances if I list many journalism-related activities on my application? I might intern at a local newspaper sometime soon.
Keep all the EC’s you have now if you like them. Don’t worry so much about having leadership. It’s nice to have but it’s not absolutely necessary. Your EC’s now look fine. You don’t have to acquire boatloads of journalism-related activities just to boost your app, but it would be nice to have one or two writing-related EC’s.
If you’re Asian, I know there are some private scholarships for Asian women going into journalism.
It would be cool to intern at a local newspaper, but I think that doing journalism-related ECs is more for your own benefit (seeing what the environment’s like, learning what you’re interested in, building the skills) than increasing your chances of getting into college. I guess it could help in that it would provide “support” for your claims that you’re passionate about / interested in journalism, should you ever mention it in an essay or interview. But you definitely don’t need more than 1-2 activities for that, especially if you’re part of them for a long time.
As far as I know, UCSB does not have a journalism program. They have a communications major, but that is not journalism. English is also not necessarily very good prep for a journalism career; they generally teach very academic writing. Journalism is male dominated? When I got my degree in journalism, most of the students were female.
EC idea: start a blog, grow a following, learn how to write stuff that gets clicks.
@Ynotgo Nope, UCSB doesn’t have a journalism program. However, the school newspaper is one of the best college newspapers in the nation: if I can’t take journalism-specific classes at least there’s that opportunity. Not sure I’d want to major in journalism anyway as I think it’d limit me later in life if I changed my mind. I know college journalism is extremely popular with both men and women but as far as I know, gender disparities are more evident in professional journalism. I think there’s a Washington Post article about it.
Thanks for your blog idea! I’ve been considering that for a while and might start. That’d make me stand out a bit. Now, what to write about…
Didactic is correct - U R Fine. I have S & D get into NU with varsity sports careers and top grades & tests. No “offical” leadership. They played their sport and did clubs and other stuff if they had time - which I am sure you realize is not EZ - Most varsity sports are year-round activities. What I told my kids - I pass on to you - ONLY DO ECS THAT YOU WANT TO DO - NEVER DO THEM BECAUSE YOU THINK SOME ADCOM WANTS YOU TO. Good Luck – and have some fun!
Thanks for your comments! maddyg, that thread is really helpful.
One last question: I’m really interested in spending the summer of 2016 volunteering abroad in a Spanish speaking country (not for college reasons; I just love helping people. It’s something I’m really passionate about). It would be a bonus if colleges could look at that as a plus though. Are there programs that are better than others in terms of volunteering overseas? For example, I’m looking at a company called GLA (Global Leadership Adventures) which is super reliable but I’m not sure if that would be seen on apps as a more “selfish” experience. I know admissions officers like to see truly altruistic ventures and I think even the word “adventures” in the name of the company takes some of that aspect away and makes it more about the volunteer’s gain rather than the gain of the community they are aiding. Not sure if how I explained that makes any sense but would like to hear your thoughts! If you have had any experience with this/ can recommend alternate companies that would be helpful also.
What if you didn’t go with a company at all? What if you went “outside the system” to create your own unique experience? The thread I referenced has some resources with details on this.
DON’T go with GLA because they’re programs are so expensive haha. That to colleges seem portrays a bad image of a rich kid.
I agree with @maddyg I can help you finding local oppurtunity especially since I’m doing this as well! Messaged you
Wrong approach. Kids like this are termed “a mile wide and an inch deep.” You want to focus on a handful of things and stand out in them.
At a “pretty good public school” your GC ought to have a robust understanding of what kids from your school that got accepted the past few years have done. Have you been talking with her/him?
Adcoms laugh at this. If you “love helping people” then help out in your local community. If its the Spanish-speaking community you have an affinity for, there are plenty of 1st-gen kids and families right here in CA that need help. Communities abroad are not sitting around hoping some affluent HS kid will come in and fix their lives for them, and adcoms know that a brief committment as sold by the companies packaging these to well-to-do parents is a shallow replacement for devoting effort over a span of time in their local community to truly make a difference.
But, hey, up to you. Those folks at Global Leadership Adventures need to earn a living too.
Should have added in my initial volunteering abroad interest statement thing that I’d love to be completely immersed in a different culture. I’m already investigating volunteer opportunities close to home. It’s not in my family’s budget to take a trip to a place that only I would want to go to (we’re from England and it’s already very expensive to travel back there to see family) so I was drawn to programs like GLA where you don’t have to go with family and fundraising for the $$$ is commonplace