Hi all, this is my first thread, so hopefully I’m not messing this up.
I was just wondering what I could do to strengthen my ECs, and perhaps have them evaluated to know how “good” they are.
As an African American applicant, I often hear from people that I have a good shot at elite institutions, but I feel as though the people who feed me this aren’t aware of the competition. I’d appreciate any feedback. Just a note, I’m genuinely trying to make my school a better place, and I feel as though my teachers can speak to that in their rec letters. I was just wondering if my “chances” are as good as people make them out to be. I’m also curious as to if my ECs show a “spike” at all.
“Accolades”-
5th Place State- Future Problem Solvers (10)
Regional Champion- Future Problem Solvers (10)
Kukkiwon- Black Belt in Taekwondo (10)
Boys State Representative
CMU SAMS
Other Stuff-
Class President (12)
School Board Member (12)
Student Council Representative (11-12)
Work to address student concerns with administration
Represent minority interests within district
Yearbook Editor in Chief (12)
Varsity Alpine Ski (10-11)
*My academics are in the neighborhood of the average Yale admit
My intended major is African American Studies, and I hope to go on to law school after, if that’s relevant
Thanks for your thoughts, and I appreciate your consideration.
Many student’s misunderstand the role extracurricular’s play when an Admissions Officer looks over an applicant’s file. Yale (and HPSM) are not extracurricular camps, they are academic institutions – so Admissions Officers are MORE concerned with a student’s performance in the classroom rather than EC’s.
Admissions looks at a student’s extracurricular activities to gauge their level of COMMITMENT they have made to something beyond the classroom. And they look for student’s who have spent years (not months) participating in an activity – and it doesn’t matter what activity you have participated in. The idea is that a student’s energy, drive, determination, and commitment is a transferable skill, something that could be transferred to another activity in college, or something later on in life.
A student’s SPECIFIC extracurricular activity is probably one of the last items considered when Admissions builds a freshman class, as they want to make sure they are NOT admitting 50 tuba players when only 4 are needed for an institution’s orchestra. Ditto with being class president, school board member, year book editor-in-chief etc. Without knowing how many other students are being considered for admission who have similar interests as you, it’s impossible to say how your EC’s look by comparison.
@gibby is right on point. Too many applicants view EC’s in isolation as an exercise in creating a “wow” list. Some even, in my mind, delude themselves into thinking that their list (which is probably not as impressive as they think) will trump less than stellar academic stats. Some people consider being an athletic recruit or nationally recognized with some special talent in science, literature, music, art, etc… as a form of EC. To me, those are outside the world of EC’s and are a special super hook based on a rare desired talent/achievement.
Gibby also routinely posts a “mathematics” of your chances piece which illustrates how competitive the spots are for highly selective institutions, and how low the probabilities are for even the best students with perfect to almost perfect objective stat’s. So the question is how do the ones who get admitted stand out from all the other equally qualified academic candidates. To me the strongest applications are the ones where the essays and LoR’s paint a consistent picture of someone who will bring special strengths to the college community to make the community itself better. The EC’s are used as examples illustrating and bringing to life the qualities you and your recommenders are trying to highlight. It is worth reading this piece from the AO. There is no reason for them not to be sincere about this. https://admissions.yale.edu/what-yale-looks-for
I note your comment that your academic stats “are in the neighborhood of the average Yale admit”. For you to be in the ball game, you need to be in the 25th to 75th percentile of admitted students. To be truly competitive, you need to be in the top half. So for ACT’s, the range is 32-35, Yale’s published SAT range is provided by component using the 2400 scale, but it is roughly 1500 -1600 in the 1600 scale. 95% of the class of 2020 were in the top 10% of their class. https://admissions.yale.edu/sites/default/files/files/class_profile_2020_8-29.pdf I suspect a large majority were in the top 5%. While being a URM will give you a boost, it is unclear how much you will get. Being a member of the varsity alpine ski team suggests some affluency/privilege. I suspect URM’s are viewed differently based on family affluence. “To whom much is given, much is required,” is undoubtedly true in admissions.