Is this practice particularly frowned upon?

Northstarmom
Sat, 16 Aug 2008 14:43:58 +0000

Your ECs don’t have to reflect your intended major. One can be very interesed in politics, for instance, while still being a doctor, social worker, teacher, etc. Adults don’t spend all of their waking hours including their time with hobbies doing things related to their jobs. Colleges don’t expect you to do that with your major. The relatively few colleges that factor ECs into admission – and those tend to be places like HPYS – just want to create student bodies filled with a diverse group of students who are contributing to the life of the campus and surrounding community.

College admissions officers know that most students switch their majors at least twice in college, so it would be silly for admissions officers to make decisions based on whether students’ ECs match their majors.

The exceptions to this are very competitive, focused program like 6 year MD programs.