<p>I found out today that I’m the new President for our school’s Spanish Club for this year. How much does being a President of a club actually help for admissions at UCs?</p>
<p>And another question: you know on the application, there’ll be a place where we fill in how many community service hours we have? Is that the number of hours we have up until November 31 (when the app is due) or can we approximate how many hours we’ll have by the end of senior year?</p>
<p>I’d say it’d help to some degree, but not so much as earning good grades. It demonstrates leadership and should help out with certain majors (business, polisci, etc.)</p>
<p>And I’m not too certain about the hours. I don’t even know how they check that you even volunteered. I hear people fabricate them all the time.</p>
<p>Only list community service hours actually completed. Adcoms look for reasonableness in the total hours and too many hours will look suspicious. You can always discuss future service projects and/or hours in an essay.</p>
<p>Grades, Grades, Grades, class ranking, Grades, Grades Grades…what amazing thing do you do with the club that you lead. Taking six people to Taco Bell vs. translating text or helping your school in a meaningful way… and then did I mention grades?</p>
<p>Basically the only two things that matter are grades and test scores. Besides that, everything is just about moot.</p>
<p>If you were applying for a private school however, the other things would matter more, since they would actually have more time to read and analyze the application. At the UCs, there are too many applications and not enough time.</p>
<p>Eh, these things matter a lot in UC applications, too. Sure, it’s probably not as big a deal as at privates, but yes, if you want to get into the higher end UCs, ECs matter a lot.</p>
<p>Your major selection and essay matter even more than scores. A good essay and major can make up 300 points on an SAT at least. I’ve seen some pretty inexplicable admissions at my school.</p>