<p>codesun,</p>
<p>Curiously, your kid does NOT increase her chances by “taking … piano lessons, dance, etc etc.” </p>
<p>Some ECs are “golden”. Some are not. Some will even work against you if they signal things that are not sought by the elite college as they form their entering class. For example, there is much suggestive evidence that ECs such as orchestral music (i.e. certain instruments found in orchestras as opposed to marching bands) are not a plus factor and may even be a negative. Some (not I, of course 
) even think this is deliberate on the part of some elite colleges in order to minimize the number of asian kids without resorting to the way they dealt with Jewish students until the 1960s - with quotas and a distancing from high schools that had a lot of jewish students. Not that they would do anything remotely like that today…but it it curious to compare the asian enrollment at Berkeley to HYP.</p>