Do these ECs have much weight?

mathmom
Tue, 09 Oct 2012 16:01:45 +0000

I’ll take the contrary point of view. Many colleges are looking for a well-rounded class even more than they are looking for a well-rounded student. At least within reason. They probably aren’t looking for troglodyte math nerds, unless they truly are brilliant, but an applicant who is truly excited about one thing I think has a bit of an edge over one who has a harder time defining themselves.

My computer nerd made relatively little effort to be well-rounded. He had two in school ECs: Science Olympiad and Academic Team. In his spare time he contributed to Linux boards, wrote a program for a chemist that was acknowledge in a paper, and worked two summers and part time during the year doing programming. He did enough to prove that he could play with others, but other than good grades in non-science courses and APs, he did not do sports, music or theater. He was accepted by Harvard (admittedly with a legacy bump) and to what is one of the best CS programs in the country. He might have done even better in terms of acceptances if he’d stayed in band, but it would have taken time from doing what he really liked. And given that the schools that rejected him all have admissions rates under 15% one really can’t know. At least his school ECs proved he could play with others. (And my son did spend a summer teaching seniors how to use computers.)

If your daughter plays on two teams, and has done some summer activities outside of community service I don’t see any problem at all with her activities. You don’t have to have measurable accolades, though obviously it helps. What really helps though is to pursue an activity at a level where you really do make a difference. The Common Application has an essay about your favorite EC, my younger son wrote about some work he did for the neighborhood association creating an archive of their papers. What made his essay interesting was that he was able to talk about how he was able to make connections that showed him thinking like an historian. I think it was his best essay. It was a nice little project, but it was the growth he found in it that made it significant, not that our little association couldn’t have lived without his help.

Crossposted with Lorem…