Why Are We Even Doing Extracurriculars?

Coming off the heels of a hectic admissions season where kids with literal X-figure businesses saw not the digital, multicolored confetti of acceptance, but the hard-to-swallow paragraphs commencing with “Unfortunately.”

We seem to be eons away from grasping what extracurriculars, activities, and sports get kids into these top schools, and which ones put a metaphorical bad taste in the collective mouths of college admissions officers. Even more worryingly, according to a 2023 article by Forbes, 84.3% of graduating high schoolers from states like California, New York, and Florida report that the motive behind their afterschool activities was heavily based not on what they actually liked to do, but on what they thought would look the best on their college applications. 

The weirdest thing about this trend? - It actually used to work. Parents, teachers, and old-school college counselors have heavily encouraged kids for decades to do activities that “look good for college.” Whether it’s yearbook editor, varsity basketball, biology olympiad, volunteering at animal shelters, or whatever activity they think has the most ”sheen.” And those things are great! - if you actually liked to do them. 

Most kids might learn to like what their parent or counselor has told them to do over time, but they don’t actually have a good reason to do them besides the obvious main objective: college admissions. They lack a spark, that intangible “why” behind their actions, because here’s the hard truth about elite college admissions: it’s not WHAT you do, it’s WHY you’re doing it. 

When you see these clickbait videos about applicants with million-dollar businesses or thousands of hours of volunteering, or other miscellaneous insane achievements getting rejected from every single top school, it’s not because they lied about their extracurriculars or didn’t donate a building. They got rejected because they didn’t have a why behind any of it. Ivy League admissions understands that not every kid has the resources or connections to build a business or cure cancer. It’s not a DEI or equity play; they simply want kids with a raison d’être, a powerful, unshakeable reason behind what they are doing.

Now that you thoroughly understand what college admissions officers are looking for with regard to activities, how can you, as a freshman, sophomore, or even junior, build an extracurricular profile that shows elite admissions officers your “why”?

That’s exactly what we are going to explore in our upcoming, intensive summer seminar this June. I, alongside my friends from UPenn Wharton, Cornell, NYU Stern, are going to work with you and a cohort of your peers to build some of the strongest college applications in the game. 

And it all starts this June. 

See you there. 

Best,

Joshua S.R.
Founder
75 Percent Chance