What might be some great Extracurriculars?Answered
What can be great ECs that impress the admission officers? I have a passion for Computer Science. And I was thinking to start learning more over the summer.
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2 answers
I think it's great that you're spending time on this, but I believe you have to change your question slightly; how can I exercise my passion, and develop myself?
As far as I'm concerned, you don't find what makes you 'unique.' You've got to find what makes you, YOU. Instead of trying to do what the colleges want you to do, do what you want to do.
As much as colleges want you to do extracurriculars, they also want you to follow your passion. So if for example, computer science is your passion, learn some coding! Sure, it doesn't qualify as an 'extracurricular' but this WILL help you, as you'd be developing yourself as a person; colleges like MIT, Harvard, Stanford, Caltech, etc., all of them want a wholistic and well-rounded person.
I'm not saying "Don't do extra-curricular" at all, but most of what you spend your time on should be in an area that interests you.
So here what you can do :
Find your hobby/passion.
Research what you can do with it and how you can develop it.
If there is a club for it, go join!
If not, use the power of the internet.
Most of all, stop trying to impress a college and start trying you develop yourself.
Hope that helps! :)
Cheers!
Tharun
There's actually some great advice below already, I just want to add one thing. What colleges (especially elite colleges) value even more than a well-rounded and balanced applicant is an applicant with an outstanding extracurricular "spike." A spike is a specific area in which you have achieved very impressive things. A spike that aligns with your intended college major - for example, if you have a spike in CS and declare that you want to major in CS in college - is often extremely effective. However, spikes can also be in something unrelated and still be great for your college admission chances. If you want to learn more about spikes, check out our blog post on the subject: https://blog.collegevine.com/how-to-find-your-college-application-spike/
or any of my livestreams entitled "Finding your Spike."
In any case, there are plenty of more casual activities you could do to prove your interest in CS. Taking CS50 on Edx, teaching yourself some new programming languages, joining a coding club at school, and participating in a hackathon are all good examples of these. However, the way to really build a strong spike are to demonstrate leadership and to have impressive, quantifiable achievements. Coding your own website and cultivating a large number of monthly users/visitors, getting an app on the app store, organizing your own hackathon and having many people attend, winning or placing in competitive coding or cyberpatriot competitions, starting a coding club at your school, or starting a tutoring organization with volunteers who help teach younger kids how to program would all look amazing on a extracurricular resume!
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Thanks, Tharun for the help. I will follow your advice!