T20 Schools - What does Depth in Extracurricular mean to them?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Agree with PP in that if they can tie their interests together in some way, that might be interesting to a college. Admissions are crazy, though, and there's no guarantee that whatever "depth" someone has, develops or forces will be interesting to a school.

Not sure if this will help but my DD (currently HS senior) was into all kinds of ocean sports since she was little, and had a strong and demonstrated interest in wilderness medicine and emergency preparedness developed due to participating in such sports. And on the other hand she had 3 foreign languages (from immersion elementary school to high school AP), time spent living abroad with us and also in virtual and in-person exchanges.

How did she tie it all together? How does the FL relate to ocean stuff/wilderness & emergency preparedness ?
Major?

[Anonymous]

Oh, sorry -- I didn't mean they were tied together into one whole. They're more like two separate "streams" where she had a strong personal connection to what she was doing and could explain why she was into it. For example, the ocean sports -- she loved to surf, sail, outrigger canoe, paddleboard but then got really anxious about going out, after something terrible happened to people she knew in 8th grade. We found the wilderness med class and thought it would help. It did, she loved it and went on to get certified in other areas as well, then became a CERT, then a disaster service worker ("called up" in 11th and 12th grade when our area had severe storms and flooding), then did a Capstone on bringing some preparedness training to her school. So it ended up pretty deep but just started when when she couldn't really enjoy her hobbies due to anxiety.

Majors pretty much everywhere were related to foreign languages/area studies or IR.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Mine did fine just dabbling with various EC's (1 year here, 2 years there) and doing only one EC sustained for many years (between 8-17 years old.) Regional Awards (Not National). And then doing one activity outside of school aligned with career interests/major.

Mine was the same. Dabbled in various sports upto JV, some volunteering work, some work experiences, even added reading as one of the 10ECs! But spent 7 consistent years in Music, in Band (not included as EC) and in Junior and Senior Yrs in inter-school and community events (included in ECs). More importantly Music and some of the other activities were seamlessly referenced in the Personal Essay and one Supp. While these very pithy/short mentions only, it was done in a way that demonstrated curiosity, experimentation, determination (ie using the activity to give a picture of the person more than as a demonstration of achievements) and blended into the narrative of the Essay/Supp . Worked out well in the end, ED admit into a selective school, withdrew all other apps.

[Anonymous]

example: Eagle Scout or Girl Scout Gold Award

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agree with PP in that if they can tie their interests together in some way, that might be interesting to a college. Admissions are crazy, though, and there's no guarantee that whatever "depth" someone has, develops or forces will be interesting to a school.

Not sure if this will help but my DD (currently HS senior) was into all kinds of ocean sports since she was little, and had a strong and demonstrated interest in wilderness medicine and emergency preparedness developed due to participating in such sports. And on the other hand she had 3 foreign languages (from immersion elementary school to high school AP), time spent living abroad with us and also in virtual and in-person exchanges.

How did she tie it all together? How does the FL relate to ocean stuff/wilderness & emergency preparedness ?
Major?

Easy to tie together if kid was pre med (off shore/foreign ER)….

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agree with PP in that if they can tie their interests together in some way, that might be interesting to a college. Admissions are crazy, though, and there's no guarantee that whatever "depth" someone has, develops or forces will be interesting to a school.

Not sure if this will help but my DD (currently HS senior) was into all kinds of ocean sports since she was little, and had a strong and demonstrated interest in wilderness medicine and emergency preparedness developed due to participating in such sports. And on the other hand she had 3 foreign languages (from immersion elementary school to high school AP), time spent living abroad with us and also in virtual and in-person exchanges.

How did she tie it all together? How does the FL relate to ocean stuff/wilderness & emergency preparedness ?
Major?

Easy to tie together if kid was pre med (off shore/foreign ER)….

This would have been a great story at Dartmouth and JHU….

[Anonymous]

Scuba. Divers do it deeper.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Easy to tie together if kid was pre med (off shore/foreign ER)….

This would have been a great story at Dartmouth and JHU….

Haha! Rejected from Dartmouth actually. Zero in pre-med and is thrilled with her choices, so it's all good.

[Anonymous]

oops -- that s/b 'zero interest in pre-med'