<p>As a junior in high school, I'm not sure on what ECs I want to take to prepare for film school or even beyond that when I actually have a job in the industry. My ultimate goal is to become a director, like everyone else. Can anyone give suggestions on what ECs I should take part in?</p>
<p>Make a film. There are a million film festivals that accept student shorts. Take a look at <a href=“http://www.withoutabox.com%5B/url%5D”>www.withoutabox.com</a>.</p>
<p>My high school has a video production team that makes “morning shows” for the whole school. It’s like all the tech people get together couple of periods a day to make short clips about school announcement, weather, holiday, school events, etc. - really cool. It would be perfect for you. You should petition to start one at your school:)</p>
<p>I have indulged myself in making films. I mean like other than making films. </p>
<p>Calico, that sounds like a good idea. I’m wondering, how does your school broadcast these morning shows? Are they once a week?</p>
<p>The “morning show” comes on the tv in each classroom during homeroom every morning. I think contributing to the morning show is a requirement for the advanced video production class, so there’re people who are given class time to devote to the show. It’s usually around 3 to 5 minutes, almost like a mini news broadcast, with boring school announcements (club meetings, after school extra help, school events, etc.) in the beginning and then, once in a while, some kind of special feature in the end. The special feature can be a cartoon clip by the computer animation class, a promotional video for a club, something from a school sports event, random footage taken in the school cafeteria… you get the idea.</p>
<p>What kind of extracurriculars does your school offer anyway?</p>
<p>I guess theater will help, if you get into stage management and such it’ll teach you about the craziness that is involved in putting on a show (here’s a hint: it’s more than a-bunch-of-monkey-high-on-nitrous-oxide levels of crazy). As a director you’ll need to learn to deal with obnoxious teen actors and you could film it and make a little movie later.</p>
<p>I mean, you’ll likely start as a techie but if you’re good it’ll be easy to move up to stage manager. It teaches leadership, you basically do everything the director can’t be bothered to do, and when crap hits the fan you’ll be blamed! Basically what producers do in movies but unless students can direct a play in your school it’s the closest you’ll get to the real thing. Trust me, I was a stage manager, it’s a lot of work dealing with people, props, technical stuff, lighting, sound, organization, etc. and colleges really liked to hear about it if they know anything about stage managers.</p>
<p>It also made a great title to an essay “How Everything Wrong Was My Fault”.</p>
<p>also I feel you should suffer the pain I had 
but at the end of it you’ll feel like you basically created the thing (and you kinda did) and it’s a nice accomplishing feeling.</p>
<p>^That’s a great way to get involved in school, and making shorts on your own time for competitions/festivals is a great way to get involved out of school.</p>
<p>Summer camps may be of interest also. I know Interlochen has a pretty innovative MPA program, besides which it’s an awesome camp (PM me for info–I wasn’t a film major but I loved my time at Interlochen).</p>
<p>The extracurriculars we have at our school are the everyday ones. Clubs, sports, and music. Although we have an after school program that runs from Monday - Thursday. There aren’t any clubs I’m interested in, perhaps I shall make my own club? Also there aren’t any classes in the after school program I’m interested in either. </p>
<p>Summer camps I’m definitely considering, the only thing is convincing my mom and brother to pay for it. </p>
<p>Thanks for the suggestions guys! keep em comin!</p>
<p>Any others wanna help me out?</p>
<p>Basic clubs does not help me at all. My school has a small limit but try outside of school. In my city they had this film making club for students in the area regardless of school. It was really nice, they mostly made documentaries and such and meeting were held at the library our this place called “casa garcia” which is just a studio deal. I joined it for a while but making movies isn’t really my thing. Check outside school, look at libraries, look in the paper, search the internet with “movie students making CITYNAME”.</p>
<p>Really I think what you’d need to work on is gaining experience and a portfolio of some kind. Some kind of thing you worked on that’s really clean to send to schools.</p>