<p>What has been your experience with resumes listing ECs that your child feels could not be fully expressed in the lines provided on the common application? Do you feel that submitting a resume is an advantage/disadvantage?</p>
<p>I think submitting a resume is an advantage if it is professionally formatted, succinct, and can fit on one page.</p>
<p>for the private schools I think it definitely makes a difference...If you PM me I will be happy to email you my son's so you can see an example....I think he did a good job on his ...although it took 2 pages...</p>
<p>While it has been often advised to keep resume's to one page (and I strongly advise having one if there is information that can't be fully expressed on the application), both my kids had resume's of three pages, and got into their first choice ivy schools. The thing to remember is to have it be extremely organized and easy to follow, and definitely be succinct. However, if the number of important awards/activities/accomplishments exceed one page, they should be included nevertheless.</p>
<p>I chime in similarly to Donemom. My two kids also included an Activity/Award List and theirs was three pages long and was annotated. It was highly organized. They both had done a lot outside of academics for years and it never would have been able to have been shown on the two inch charts for activities on an application. I don't think it needs to be one page. It depends on what you have done. Brief annotations add to the document. Both my kids got into the majority of schools to which they applied. One is at an Ivy and one is at a top degree program in her field. I recommend including such a document though it is not needed at a large state U that is more numbers driven.</p>
<p>I don't think it will hurt you, but skimming through The Gatekeepers last night I came across a description of the counselor just passing over a five page resume with a line something like "he was so sick of seeing resumes that just reiterated everything that was already on the list of activities".</p>
<p>Right so don't do that. Put stuff on there that is not on the list of activities. For instance, my son won a Governors Award for a GPS project done through a class in school. No place on the app for it but you can note it on the resume. Succinct and only stuff from HS...</p>
<p>If I were an adcom the last thing I'd want to read on top of everything else is an annotation explaining what my Christian Fellowship for Service award was for, or a footnote explaining that honor roll only goes to the top 10% of the class.</p>
<p>The adcom we met at Stanford told us, "the thicker the app, the thicker the candidate and we like students who know how to edit."</p>
<p>Jeez. colleges put a lot of thought into their applications... fill it out, edit tightly so you only have the most important activities or awards; live with the fact that not every single thing you have won is noteworthy. If something isn't important enough to fit on the page or be mentioned in an essay, leave it out or ask your GC to include it in the school's summary, or have a teacher mention it in their rec.</p>
<p>I feel sorry the adcom's who have to plow through the commentary in order to get to the facts. How could an 18 year old not be able to fit everything on a one page resume when accomplished and successful adults in corporate life manage?</p>
<p>Blossom, we simply disagree which is fine, of course! The little chart on the application for activities doesn't allow many kids to truly depict what they have done. Often names of activities don't truly demonstrate what the activity is or what it entailed, or contributions made to the activity. Many awards/achievement titles also don't mean much if nobody has ever heard of them and need a context. The length of the resume isn't because one must list every single thing they have done or won but it is to demonstrate more fully what the things ARE and what the contribution or involvement consisted of. So, we're not talking of listing more things than what is on the app so much as showing it better than the little chart allows. It isn't like they listed activities or awards that didn't fit on the chart as much as how it was shown/explained. The annotations are all brief. However, having helped many clients to create these Activity Lists, I can tell you that by reading them (as well as my own kids' ones), I got a MUCH better sense of who they were and what they had done and achieved than the little chart could ever show. I also interview prospective students for my alma mater (a selective university) and occasionally a student has brought a resume along and it helps. Few do. My kids did so at all interviews.</p>
<p>I am sure one can be admitted to college without this document. However, I am also sure that such a document doesn't hurt an application and if done well, can be an asset to showing who the candidate is....my own kids had successful admissions outcomes as have clients who have all created such a document. </p>
<p>I agree with the "thicker the app...." quote....and do not recommend additional essays, and a bunch of other stuff. However, I believe an application, plus activity resume, along with recs and supplemental recs, are NOT overkill. It is when one goes much beyond this, when it becomes too thick of a file. An activity/award resume is common and very acceptable at most schools but it is always good to check on with each school. Every school my kids applied to got one. A few apps required the student to still fill in the little chart even if attaching a resume. Others allowed one to write "see resume" instead.</p>
<p>By the way, my own work resume is annotated as well.</p>
<p>The on-line common app simply does not allow enough space to fully describe one's accomplishments; at least in many cases.</p>
<p>Let's take kid #7 for me (we number them instead of name them in our family. It's just easier that way.)</p>
<p>There was simply not room on the common app to say that #7 was an athlete who was a two-time junior Olympian, nationally ranked in his sport, winner of several national competitions, and alternate for the US national team.</p>
<p>There was also not enough room to write that he has 18 professional theater productions under his belt, six high school leads (in six shows), voice overs for National Public Radio, three national commercials, and 12 industrial films for Fortune 500 companies.</p>
<p>There was also not enough room to write down his four-state-regional first-place win in a foreign language competition, leading his team to the national finals in the Federal Reserve Challenge, being one of two members of a Model UN delegation named best delegation twice in state and once in the MUN competition in NYC, being nominated for and winning the NCTE national essay contest, winning three statewide competitions in debate, earning an adult black belt at the age of 12, winning several national and state writing contests other than the NCTE, and being nominated for volunteer of the year at a local charity.</p>
<p>So, since there wasn't room, and since #7 goes out of his way to hide that stuff, we didn't include most of it.</p>
<p>That was a mistake. Oh, he got into a number of extremely selective schools, but he was also rejected at a few. His GC got incensed and called a few admissions personnel to find out why. When she told them about his accomplishments, the general response was "Well, if we had KNOWN that ..."</p>
<p>So, I think it depends. An exhaustive recounting of modest accomplishments will probably not get you very far, but I've discovered that failing to draw attention to more eyebrow-raising accomplishments appears to be flat dumb.</p>
<p>Tarhunt, you sort of prove my point. Why wasn't the GC recc's focused on what an accomplished kid #7 was (let's say theater, state writing contests, and sports) and the two teacher's rec's focused on what an outstanding student he was, including the Federal Reserve Challenge (which in my kids school was a very big deal, and the teachers would have for sure mentioned it), foreign language competitions, and debate? That would have left plenty of room for an essay on being volunteer of the year at a local charity with room on the actual activity chart for everything else.</p>
<p>I'm not quibbling with the actual format.... just noting that for kids as accomplished as yours, surely the GC's and teachers can be your allies in rounding out the picture.... which sort of means that you don't need a two page activity resume to rehash what they've already said. Since most teachers rec's end up being two paragraphs of platitudes "best kid I ever taught in my 29 years of teaching high school chemistry" sort of things, I think a focused, accomplishment oriented rec with really specific examples from a teacher would stand out more than a student generated list.</p>
<p>And to Soozie.... how long is your resume? The CEO of my company (a Fortune 500 public company with billions in revenue and thousands of employees) manages to make do with one page....</p>
<p>
[quote]
Let's take kid #7 for me (we number them instead of name them in our family. It's just easier that way.)
[/quote]
Well that's your problem right there. Only very large universities admit based on numbers. :D</p>
<p>--
Seriously, I think that a resume should be used to highlight an area of strength - but it's best that the resume is focused. So the 18 professional theater productions, 6 high school leads, NPR voice overs, 3 commercials and 12 industrial films would certainly belong an a resume highlighting dramatic talent. </p>
<p>But the black belt in karate at age 12 falls into the category of eyes-starting to glaze over. </p>
<p>I think that the college admission process logically is best handled by highlighting 2 or 3 areas of strength, and the resume is a way of expanding on those areas. My daughter submitted a dance resume detailing her training and experience, and also provided a DVD to the 2 schools who would accept it (both high reaches to which she was accepted, though only one of them actually had a dance department). Your son #7 could probably have fit most of his accomplishments under 3 headings: speech & drama; athletics; leadership -- and gotten most of the details in that way. </p>
<p>But your long list illustrates the perils of trying to include everything - more is not necessarily better, and accomplishment that just don't "fit" probably should be left off, simply because too much detail can dilute the impact of a strong presentation. There is a reason that the colleges ask students to list activities in order of their importance to them, and often to write a brief essay focusing on whatever ec they feel is most meaningful.</p>
<p>--
One more thing: we managed to get my d's dance resume, which included a photo and covered 14 years' worth of training and performances, down to one page. I say "we" because in this case I did help her, as I took the info from two pages and reformatted it with MS Word onto one page. (My d. had not yet mastered the MS Word "text box" function, which is handy for moving things around in a 2 column format).</p>
<p>Blossom, I don't think Tarhunt proves your point AT ALL. Quite the opposite. I think it is foolhardy to depend on anyone but yourself to highlight your accomplishments. It's great if the gc or teacher recs do, but it is the student's job to make sure the schools get the FULL picture. Especially when in Tarhunt's son's case, the school may not have been aware of all his amazing outside accomplishments.</p>
<p>I also do not agree with Calmom to strictly highlight specific areas and leave out others where there were important accomplishments. Because you never know what a particular school is looking for in a given year. Some kids may be seen as desireable by a school because of a particular talent or achievement, eg. my son was a published Intel finalist. But other's may not put much stock in this...not every finalist gets in everywhere. So, it was very important to us that the schools also knew about not only my son's achievements in other areas, but the longevity of his involvement, and the kind's of recognition --ie. while not a nationally ranked tennis player, my son was ranked in the Eastern section of USTA all four years, as well as receiving tennis leadership and sportsmanship awards from his school and community. Now, this says a lot about him beyond athletic ability--in terms of personal qualitites and dedication. That could be a tipping factor for some schools. Or, if we had not detailed his accomplishments in debate, eg. tournament wins since freshman year, national recognition, and also leadership positions throughout highschool culminating in captain, that would have left out a huge part of who he is and again showed more than a talent, but also a huge dedication of time and effort. And same with his involvement in music, etc. etc. So, what I'm saying is, some schools might have focused more on a particular talent that would contribute something to the class they were building, while others might have been more impressed with his overall well-roundedness or other personal qualities. But you never know in advance, so it is important to include everything of significance (we did clump some things together, such as high school academic awards that repeated themselves year after year, or honor societies, and omitted things that were relatively insignifcant.)</p>
<p>Finally, I don't think that a professional resume is comparable to one for college. In the former, one includes primarily those things that indicate one's qualifications for the particular job. College aps are much more about the whole individual. And by the way, my husband's resume is also more than one page, as he has a great number of accomplishments relating to his field.</p>
<p>Back in the Dark Ages, I realised (maybe too late for my EA app) that I should put down things like my track times and various EC awards.</p>
<p>My "brag sheet" was about a page and a half long. It was, however, very well-spaced. I put my main activities (about four) in bold, then listed stuff underneath in dashes. If you are any good at what you do and that can be described succinctly, there isn't enough room in those little spaces on the app. I think my "brag sheet" looked something like:</p>
<p>**Winter & Spring Track<a href="insert%20seasons%20participated%20&%20varsity">/b</a></p>
<p>Best times:
-Mile: 5:46 indoors; 5:51 outdoors
-800 meters: 2:35
-Two mile: 13:10</p>
<p>Awards:
-(insert here) Relay Record, 1996
-(insert here) League 2d place mile, 1998
-etc
-etc</p>
<p>For the lit magazine, I know I mentioned some of what I did and what I tried to improve about the previous year. For the club that I founded, I just put little blurbs about what we did for it and starting it up. </p>
<p>I think that the 1 page limit is much more applicable to jobs than to college. Make it readable before you make it one page. Make it organised and easy on the eyes. Yes, cut down unnecessary stuff, but you should know before you touch your keyboard what you want to be on there. Awards, tiimes, & description of accomplishments are good. Add only things that could not be presumed from the little snippet on the app. Obviously, a newspaper EIC has certain responsibilities - no need to go over those in painstaking detail, or any detail. Just add in things that you've done that go above & beyond. The length will take care of itself if you so limit.</p>
<p>Donemom, if a kid's strategy is to include everything in the hopes that something in that laundry list will catch an adcom's eye, may the gods of admissions smile upon him or her.</p>
<p>In the real world, your kids laundry list looks just like the last 50 applications the adcom ploughed through.... which is sort of why people on CC refer to admissions as a crap-shoot. all those activities... all those award.... so many hours of community service and recognition... complete with annotations for the truly stupid adcom....it all just blurs together in one big McMansion.</p>
<p>If mom and dad are hoping that all those years of car-pooling jr. to cello lessons and coaching youth soccer are going to pay off by attaching a brag sheet of these activities to an already complete application... well, keep hoping.</p>
<p>I have a hunch that if Harvard and Yale really felt that their applicants were so special that a small box was inadequate to express their accomplishments, they would have added several questions and expanded the application years ago.</p>
<p>I just find this conversation ironic in light of all the threads we have here on what information to leave off an application... even when it's asked for explicitly (so presumably the adcoms care....) Bad score on an AP? leave it off. Did better on the ACT than the SAT? How to just submit the ACT without schools knowing you took the SAT also if they prefer the SAT's. Been suspended from school? Doesn't count as long as it's not on the transcript. Didn't take math senior year? How to fake that too.</p>
<p>My belief (but hey, what do I know) is that colleges put a lot of thought into figuring out what info they want and need. Marilee Jones of MIT made headlines last year when she announced that they were reducing the number of lines on the applications... she wanted students to know that they didn't want them spending HS racking up hours and hours of stuff just to pad a college application. My guess is that she knows what she's doing.</p>
<p>Here's my take:</p>
<p>Activity lists or if you prefer to call them r</p>
<p>Isn't Donemom's S at Harvard? Maybe the laundry list strategy worked!</p>
<p>My S included a one-page resume. The Harvard app did not have space to list all the college courses he'd taken, among other things.</p>
<p>Marite, one student who roamed this board in the prehistoric times submitted essays that exceeded the maximum limits by ... several pages. She was accepted at many prestigious schools and now attends Harvard. If the OP's question had been about the acceptable length of essays, one may reach a conclusion that lengthy essays DO work. However, the information needs a couple of footnotes to be complete and accurate: the student was an exceptionally talented writer -you may have read her essays,- spoke five languages, was an accomplished artist, was valedictorian of her class, and had perfect tests scores. </p>
<p>Since the admissions are holistic in nature, it is dangerous to segregate specific elements. In the example I cite, only the adcoms know if this South American candidate was accepted because of her exceptional yet unresponsive essays, or in spite of them. Again, commoners like us -or at least like me- can only speculate about what truly happens in the ivory towers of Byerly Hall. :)</p>
<p>Xiggi:</p>
<p>Very true.</p>
<p>Some students can break the rules because they are so outstanding. </p>
<p>But I also know a graphic designer who was employed to redo some forms for some branch of the UK government. It was unbelievable how badly designed the form was. Since then, I've noted that many forms have lots of space for your birth date, phone number, SS number (whose space requirement can easily be predicted) but not much for names or street addresses, etc... So it can be extremely annoying to try to conform to the space provided in a form.</p>
<p>Marite, I agree and I am not opposed to use additional sheets when the format of the application is not adequate. My opinion is that it should be used as a complement to the space offered as opposed to simply write "see attached" for almost every question.</p>