Extra Curriculars list too long= bad?

masha · October 23, 2004, 1:50am

I have heard that if your activities are too long that it shows a lack of commitment and colleges, specifically selective ones will frown upon that. I realize that extra curricular actives are nto the deciding factor when it comes to college admissions, however they are important nonetheless. So I was wondering, is what I heard true?

Also, most of my EC's I started either at the end of sophomore year or at the very beginning of Junior year. Not because I suddenly realized "oh god, I need clubs to put on my college application," but because of several reasons; Firstly, I've been lazy and truthfully it took me this long to find organizations worthy enough for me to want to devote a great deal of my time to. Secondly, most of what I'm involved in now at school are activites/positions only available to upperclassman (committee involvement on school board etc..). So anyway, back to my point ... is it BAD to have all my EC's started at the begging of junior year/end of soph? I don't want it to seem like I just all of a sudden did it to put this stuff on college apps. I'm really involved.

athenaNY · October 23, 2004, 3:02pm

Put your most important ones on top. Write a little bit in an essay (or a supplemental essay) about anything meaninful you've derived from it. But do not dwell on every single one of them, it looks insincere.

I'm glad to help in any way I can! It's been about 3 yrs since my application process (shudder.)

bettina · October 23, 2004, 3:18pm

"is it BAD to have all my EC's started at the begging of junior year/end of soph?"

I wouldn't worry about this at all a) because you can't go back in time to change it and b) that is plenty early enough. "Padded" EC's are usually spotted as Senior activities.

If you have a very, very long list try to group them in like groups, or just drop minor ones like membership in school clubs when you are not too involved.

Basically you want to highlight things you have leadership positions in and activities where you have gone out of your way to be more involved in--they certainly look for depth of involvement over a laundry list of random things.