Back in your grandparent's day, it was acceptable to play a sport for fun for four years, get solid grades, take the SAT without practicing much and expect to get into a great school. With Ivy League schools now boasting acceptance rate in the single digits, those days are long gone. But kids often ask us what resume items look good on college applications and particularly, which sports look best. In this post, we talk about how you should structure your extracurriculars.
The Importance of the Extracurricular
Before we get into the nitty-gritty of sports, it’s important to understand the purpose of extracurriculars on the college application. Grades and test scores (when they’re accepted) are far and away the most important part of the college application. But college is so competitive these days, that every single element is going to count. There are probably hundreds of kids with perfect GPAs and scores competing for the same spot at each prestigious university. Extracurriculars are how you set yourself apart. We at The Koppelman Group don’t love the question “does this look good for college?” (more on that later). A better question might be, “does this align with my objective and my interests in life?”
Excelling in Your Activities
When you choose an extracurricular, you should do so with the thought in mind that you’re going to need to hold a leadership position. We don’t recommend just being in the booster club. You should be the president. But more than just holding a leadership position in just any old club, you should choose extracurriculars that align with your academic field; that is, the academic field you want to pursue in college. Consider high school a time in which you’re building a brand that you’re going to try and sell to colleges. The more specific the better.
So where do sports fit in? Well, playing a sport doesn’t necessarily ‘look good for college.’ There are exceptions. If you’re being recruited to play a sport in college, then playing sports in high school obviously makes sense. It’s part of your brand and aligns with the objective you intend to pursue in university.
If you’re not at the level where you’re being recruited, but you’re really, truly excellent at a sport and have a great relationship with your coach, you might want to play sports throughout high school. We tell our students that the college application is also to show a given school a part of your personality that’s not obvious from your GPA. If you’re really committed to sports, you might demonstrate leadership qualities by the fact that you’ve been team captain since sophomore year.
Love What You Do
This sounds like a cliché and it is. But we want to stress the point that doing anything because ‘it looks good for college’ is likely a recipe for failure. When kids do things they don’t love or even enjoy, they don’t give it their all. Your extracurriculars should build on each other from year to the next and you should give them your all, because you can guarantee your competition is doing just that. So, you should only commit to activities about which you’re truly passionate. Don’t do anything just because you think you should or you think a college might like it. There has to be authenticity behind it.
Explore your passions and let your resume follow. Just be mindful to stick with one, linear academic interest you love and start from there.
Need help with your resume? We’re experts at helping students with their applications. Call us.