Reading some of the posts on CC and seeing everything that people are doing, I just can’t help but wonder howww in the world people can do a thousand different things in such a small time? Hundreds of hours of volunteering, a plethora of leadership positions, captains of various varsity sports, straight A’s in all AP classes and oh not to mention prestigious awards from multiple competitions. Might as well throw in founder of a company or a non profit organization as well. I get that these people are exceptional Ivy students…but excellence and great time management has its limits. Sometimes these resumes are so packed it veers close to impossible- at least to me it seems like it. They all sound legit and impressive but I just want to know if a lot of these resumes are just overinflated. It may just be me, but as a student I start getting a little skeptical when I see such dense and packed resumes. How much REALLY does this kid spend on maintaining the “non profit organization” he founded when he’s juggling 3 sports, all APs, 7 clubs, orchestra, etc.
Am I wrong to be skeptical? Is this all inflated bulls*** or a reality that is tough for plebs like me to grasp?
I just want to be able to have a sound perspective and a better awareness of things.
A lot of it is puffery if not outright lies. A summer job becomes an internship, working the drive through window at Burger King Is a customer relations job etc. In other cases wealthy parents will finance EC’s, for example poverty tourism where mom and dad pay for the kid to travel to India to help the poor there. Top colleges are wise to this. Look at the 95% of applicants to Harvard who get rejected.
@TomSrOfBoston is right, but I do know a few kids that actually accomplish all that if not more. They’re part of that 5% that DID get into Harvard.
Don’t worry I felt the same way when I look at some people like… How? But then I got accepted to my #1 and I feel good now.
Just do what you can through HS and remember to have fun!
You don’t have to do quantity, just do quality ec’s
“Reading some of the posts on CC and seeing everything that people are doing, I just can’t help but wonder howww in the world people can do a thousand different things in such a small time?”
This is a very good question.
Personally I think that the focus on AP classes and ECs puts way too much pressure on US high school students. Google just now quickly found me one article that states: “About 8 percent of today’s U.S. teens suffer from some type of diagnosed anxiety disorder, according to the National Institute of Mental Health”. This is compatible with what I have seen at a suburban US high school, and is obviously many times larger than the number of students who end up attending any of these “big name” universities that are requiring such inflated resumes.
Just to put things in perspective, 8% of all US high school students right now is 1.2 million teenagers. This of course does not include students who are under stress but have not been officially diagnosed with any illness (probably a larger number).
I think that students and parents need to “Just say no”. In fact, it has just occurred to me that if I was in high school right now (I am not, I am WAY beyond this point), then my EC would be to try to organize a high-school wide or even nation-wide effort to tell universities “not way, we are not going to do this anymore”. I am very curious what our “big name” prestigious/pretentious universities would think of this as my main EC! 
“I just want to be able to have a sound perspective”
I think that you have a very sound perspective. Keep your grades up. Do what you want to do. Find a university that values what you have done. There are a lot of very good universities to choose from.
Some kids are just very driven and want to succeed, nothing wrong with that.
“Some kids are just very driven and want to succeed, nothing wrong with that.”
If a kid wants to do it, then there is nothing wrong with that. However, there is something VERY wrong about 1.2 million US high school students having been diagnosed with stress related illnesses.
It’s not going to be easy for everybody.
I think the point is one person can’t do all the things OP listed and do them well. I would surely think colleges are wise to this, particularly the “I started a nonprofit, NGO, etc. while taking 6 APs and captain of the varsity football team.” That’s quite different from 15 hours per week on student government while taking full AP load and one sport. Still quite stressful but at least feasible.
I have a 4.0 and good extracurriculars, it’s possible.
don’t pay it a lot of mind. some people can manage a ton of ecs and good grades - some people manage incredible grades and ok ecs, etc. every person is different. i personally had good grades and good ec balance - nothing extraordinary, but good enough to get into the schools i wanted to go to.