As far as college admissions go, is gaming by default a bad hobby?
Would it be best to leave out gaming in the admissions process?
It can become a wasteful obsession.
In my opinion, hobbies in general are probably less important in your admissions process than other extracurriculars. Hobbies are often things you do for yourself that have little impact on anyone else. I read; that’s not an impressive achievement to put on a college app. Writing stories, not super interesting either. But starting a writing club, holding open mics, and winning in a national writing contest, however? That’s more interesting.
If you are pro level or you make mods or you do something that is arguably more constructive than just entertaining yourself with video games, then sure, put it in. Otherwise, don’t.
My Common App essay was about my professional Mario Kart career. I think what made it acceptable was the fact that I integrated it well into a more-holistic biography; it gave a strong picture of who I am as a person, which is what admissions officers are looking for from that particular essay, as opposed to what I accomplished as a gamer. I was wait listed to quite a few top-tier schools, rejected from Columbia and Dartmouth–don’t think it had to do with my essay–and ultimately will be attending to my dream school, Cornell. So, long story short, I think video gaming is not necessarily an inherently bad hobby. I’d be happy to let anyone read my essay if he or she would like.
By definition, “professional” is not the same as “hobby.”
Rightly or wrongly, a lot of grown-ups harbor some stereotypes about “today’s teens” blankly staring at (as the Onion put it) glowing rectangles all day long. Adcoms probably assume that their applicants enjoy the internet, iPhones, and games. I think that the best application will highlight IRL activities and hobbies.
@novacat I would love to read it
@snarlatron Decent point, probably only worth mentioning if it adds something to the overall picture of the applicant, tying in with their personality.
@snarlatron by this point, 35 years after the advent of video gaming, most adults game as much as teens (or more, since we have more disposable income). There’s no stigma about gaming, per se, any more than there would be about watching TV or listening to music. Everybody games.
That ubiquity is really why mentioning gaming would be a mistake. It would be like mentioning that you wear shoes. The whole idea of “gamer” as a separate identity is like thinking “tv watcher” is a point on your CV.
There is stigma about being obsessive about media consumption, if it is neither productive nor contributing to character or intellectual development… but that’s a charge one could level at reading Westerns or playing golf as easily as one could at gaming.
^^^ great points; agree.
I was nodding along in agreement until I got to here.
Reading has been demonstrated to have intellectual development qualities that video gaming has not.
Golf, particularly in an organized fashion, is a highly difficult discipline, and one that requires more and more of you the worse and worse it gets. Especially with how tee times and clubs work, there’s no reset button or load save in a round of golf.
Inherently? No. But there are many people (usually boys) who become obsessive and spend too much time playing to the ruin of their grades, personal relationships, & health.
Some gamers are able to consructively leverage their gaming skills to occupations like operating drones.
I’ve got to disagree with @ProfessorD on how common gaming is. Everyone does not game. I’m sure its common in some circles, but I don’t know any heavy gamers. My kids (ages 17 and 15) have never played computer games, and neither have I or my husband. We do own a PS4 but it only gets used when the weather is really bad or they are terribly bored and can’t think of anything else to do.
That said, I do agree with the conclusion that mentioning this will not help your application. It may not hurt it, but I can’t see how it will make you a more attractive candidate.
I actually think gaming can expand certain skills. But even the pro level can be dicey. It isn’t necessarily relevant to top colleges that want/need to know how you integrate IRL, how you put down the controller and go do something that contributes, is responsible, and speaks for how you might spend your free time at their college. Literally and figuratively, you’re on your bum or out there engaging with deeper challenges?
I thought I’d add my perspective as a college freshman who games semi-frequently.
Teens play more video games than adults. However, the rise of mobile gaming has expanded gaming to more and more adults––but it’s a different form. The type of gaming adults do––by and large––is pick up the device, play for a few minutes, and then do something else. In contrast, teens will spend HOURS sitting with their controller and in front of the screen.
I’d also wager to say that the average adult feels our generation wastes too much time gaming. Is that a fair statement? Maybe, maybe not, but it exists. What does that mean? In my opinion, if you include gaming, you must have accomplished something unique that shows you were active and increasing your intellectual development (i.e. developing mods, advanced coding, designing a game, stated a school club, etc.)
Good insights! Good debates here as well. The dedicated “gamer” is less common than it may seem. The person who casually games is much more common, but still, I think, less common than @ProfessorD is implying. Unless you count playing candy crush on a train ride being a casual gamer, I would say many kids (and perhaps disproportionately more kids applying to top universities) will not game often. Consider also that there will be many others, like me, who are unsure as to if they should even mention their gaming, which may lead to a portion of those who do game omitting it ( in a “for pleasure” essay for example ) to talk about their “bug collection” which they only really did once for a project in 8th grade science, leading to a non-genuine essay.
When applying to highly competitive colleges, don’t assume “genuine” means some free for all. You could tell your hs teacher you game and he/she would already know more about you, put it in context. Adcoms are strangers.
You can still ponder what you “do for pleasure” that will resonate with adcoms who are looking for certain qualities in the class. For top colleges, a solid applicant shouldn’t have to resort to some 8th grade bug collection fakery. The best candidates already can choose among other worthy pursuits.
Just some context for any mention of gaming (in college applications or anywhere else): gaming is, in fact, ubiquitous, with both Princeton/PEW and the Entertainment Software Association finding 59% of the population overall play video games. While teens are more likely to consider themselves gamers (78-81%, depending on phrasing of the question), the majority of adults (53%) do as well. Further, research by the ESA concluded that the largest single demographic of gamers is actually women 18-36 (36%). And while PEW’s 2008 survey found only 23% of those over 65 gamed, they were the most likely to do so for extended periods: 36% of them, as opposed to only 20% of gamers 18-29. Because retirees have more free time.
So the conclusion stands: there’s not really any profit in declaring videogaming itself as a point of uniqueness on an application.
@ProfessorD Surveys asking “do you consider yourself (this)” Are inherently inaccurate. But sure, depends on the framing of the question. But again, the applicant pool at highly selective schools, which is generally higher income and higher achieving in school, most likely does not reflect polls, like I mentioned earlier, (don’t know exactly what group of people were polled), and we can assume that only a certain percentage of those who do game frequently will mention it. I’m just suggesting that the polls you are citing will over represent the amount of people who mention gaming in an application.
Anyway, a more relevant point is that hobbies just won’t end up mattering that much. Usually things that matter are linked to accomplishments or character developments. So conversations about how unique something is are, I think, not that important.
@lookingforward Sure, genuine means nothing without context, I agree.
On the second point, I think some would disagree about pandering (however much) in a “for pleasure” type of essay. I’ve heard some argue that it should be the first thing that comes to your mind, what you do for fun “the most often”. I’m not disagreeing, just wondering if some pandering ( that makes sense given the applicants application, fits character) is actually fine (in your opinion).
(pandering as in choosing to write about one activity over another because you think that adcoms will prefer it)
Not the first thing that comes to mind! It should be well considered. Filtered through some awareness of what matters. You think kids who say tending to their Hummel collection or arranging their books get some boost? It’s not pandering to focus on something relevant to adcoms that gets them nodding. You’ve named schools like MIT and Chi. They like real but “real” still has to be relevant, show the attributes they want.
If gaming is the only thing that comes to mind, that’s not good. What else do you enjoy? You don’t have to say it’s working out complex math equations.