<p>How important are ECs when applying for Carnegie Mellon? My first choice is Stanford, but they are REALLY heavy on ECs…</p>
<p>Every top-tier college, CMU included, is EC heavy. If you don’t have many ECs, you may want to check out a second-tier or state flagship school and then transfer into a first-tier later on.</p>
<p>I mean I have a good amount of ECs done, but reading out Stanford hopefuls’ profile, I feel like I shouldn’t even bother trying…are there any top tier (science/math/tech) schools that are obsessed with ECs?</p>
<p>I was never EC heavy. I did the average 3 a year, and did stuff in them but never enough to write in my application. I guess I supplemented them with my essay, by outlining what I’m like, most importantly my passions that aren’t reflected on my transcript.</p>
<p>BlizzBlazer, and you got in? Is the essay make or break then, if your ECs aren’t AMAZING?</p>
<p>Yes I did for ECE, class of 2015. My EC’s were nothing amazing. I literally just joined 3 clubs every year to get on my school’s honor societies, and I didn’t do anything much of anything extra when I was part of said clubs. (no leadership roles for example)</p>
<p>My essay on the other hand, with all the humility I can muster up, was great in my opinion. I’m a horrible writer, and essays are my weak spot, but when you write about something that interests you/your passions, the words come to you. I remember during Orientation the President was saying how numerous valedictorians were turned away, 2400 SAT scores were turned away, and he heavily implied that what CMU was looking for were students that were passionate about something. I wrote about marching band which has nothing to do with my major, and has no distinction on my transcript besides “Band” as a course, but I wrote my heart out for that essay because I do love my marching band season =) , and I believe that’s what slipped me in. My grades weren’t 4.0 caliber either if you were wondering.</p>
<p>BlizzBlazer, you’ve made my day/night/week just about every time interval you can imagine! Could you PM me your stats, I have a feeling mine are similar to yours!</p>
<p>Not to rain on this parade, but you shouldn’t be putting too much stock into Blizz’s rather fortunate case.</p>
<p>Without EC’s, how are you going to separate yourself from other applicants who have competitive test scores and GPAs that are similar, if not better, than yours? Essays and EC’s fundamentally make and break applications just as hard as a bad GPA or SAT can, if not moreso.</p>
<p>Valid point, I’ve got the GPA/SAT/ACT/AP scores set to get into most schools, and I think I can write a great essay, no mean to brag, but I can’t shake off the “bad” ECs I have. Compared to most students my ECs are pretty good, its just most Ivy and Top Univ. hopefuls have ridiculous amounts of ECs.</p>
<p>You mention Ivy hopefuls have “ridiculous amounts” of ECs. No adcom in the world cares about this. They care about demonstrated passions–whether through compeition, creating something, a job, an organization, a hobby, or whatever.</p>
<p>In my highschool yearbook, people had the chance to list all of their ECs. Some listed a whole paragraph of activities. But if I were to plot a graph of “number of clubs vs USNWR ranking”, you would see that there is no correlation at all.</p>