(Note: This article can also be found in our free, 110-page comprehensive guide to writing every college essay, How to Get Into America’s Elite Colleges: The Ultimate Guide.)
In addition to the dreaded 650-word Common App Essay and the numerous college-specific supplemental essays your child will have to write, they’ll also need to complete the Common App Activities section when applying to college.
Whereas the Common App Essay will show college admissions committees who your child is, the Common App Activities section will allow colleges to understand what your child has done and is doing outside of the classroom, offering one of the best opportunities to stand out among other applicants.
Without college essays and extracurricular activities lists, colleges would be limited to grades, class rank, and ACT and SAT scores to make their admissions decisions. Given that so many students with strong numbers apply to college each year, it’s important for your child to use the Activities section to develop an application theme—that is, to highlight their “it factor” and specialties.
Before we get into writing tips and sample extracurricular descriptions, let’s go over a few Activities section basics:
According to Common App, “activities may include arts, athletics, clubs, employment, personal commitments, and other pursuits.” In other words, pretty much anything pursued outside the classroom qualifies as an activity.
Yes. Your child can include activities that were organized formally as well as those activities that may have only involved your child. Examples of the former might be sports teams and school clubs whereas examples of the latter include activities and hobbies your child may also participate in independently, such as reading or scrapbooking. Additionally, your child may perform community service as part of a team or alone. Either way, it could count as an impactful activity for the Common App.
Your child may list up to 10 activities.
Common App sets the following limits for each activity:
As you can see, there is very limited space offered for each activity, so we’ll be discussing how to maximize the impact of each entry below.
Common App requests the following information for each activity:
Now that we’ve covered the basics, let’s discuss some proven approaches to completing a strong Activities section:
1. Include role and organization name in their respective boxes.
The first four fields for each activity on Common App look like this:
After selecting an activity type from the drop-down menu, your child should input both their position and the organization name in the corresponding boxes. That way, your child can use the full 150-character limit for the activity description box.
For example, your child should write “President” followed by “Student Council.”
2. Do not repeat words from the position description box in the activity description box.
Continuing with the student council president example: Instead of writing, “As president of the student body, I was responsible for…”, your child should write, “Implemented school initiatives such as free textbooks for low-income families, liaised with administration, and curated meeting agendas.”
3. Focus on quantifiable and significant impact.
Many applicants undersell their achievements because they don’t get specific enough about their contributions. For example, rather than writing something like, “Organized food can drive for local families,” your child should write, “Collected over 10,000 cans and provided Thanksgiving meals for 500 families in greater Cleveland.” With details like that, your child’s impact will be unquestionable to admissions committees.
Numbers also have a way of jumping out to a reader and demanding attention, and they can help break up long strings of text that a reader might have otherwise been inclined to skim over.
4. List tasks and avoid complete sentences to make room for more detail.
Colleges understand that your child does not have enough space to provide in-depth descriptions of each activity. Therefore, rather than write, for example, “At the hospital, I transported patients with physical disabilities on wheelchairs…”, your child should write, “Transported patients on wheelchairs, provided meals and blankets, assembled gift baskets, and attended grand rounds.”
Think of these descriptions more as bullet points on a resumé. It’s a good idea to begin each description with a strong descriptive verb — words like implemented, led, founded, tutored, established, managed, launched, etc. catch the reader’s attention and help them envision your child actively engaging in the activity.
Stick to direct pieces of information and cut out any “fluff” or filler information. While using proper grammar is still important, it’s also acceptable to eliminate things that would typically pad your child’s writing, such as prepositions, articles, and pronouns. You may be surprised at just how many characters your child can save by eliminating them!
5. Describe current activities using present tense.
For instance, rather than, “I tutored seventh graders in science,” your child should write, “Tutor 7th graders to help them master challenging science concepts.”
6. Mention recommendation letter-writers by name.
If your child received a letter of recommendation from a teacher, boss, or supervisor with whom they worked closely on one of their activities, the recommender’s name and title should be mentioned somewhere in that activity’s Common App description. This way, admissions committees can easily connect the dots between these two components of your child’s application.
