‘What activities should I do to get into university?’ Eight strategies to help

“How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.”

– Annie Dillard

This is one of my favorite quotes, as it so gently leads me to reflect on how I spend my hours.

It’s probably also the philosophy that admissions officers use to understand how a student used their time beyond the classroom walls – in short, the activities on a university application. This helps to predict how successful applicants will continue to shape their own lives and their communities at university.

“Which activities should I do to get into university?”

“Should I do competitions or volunteer? Research or lead a club? Write for the school newspaper or apply for a summer school? Or all of the above?”

“Will this look good on my application?”

Do these questions posed by anxious students feel familiar? The expectations for activities are decidedly and frustratingly less clear than the quantitative nature of grades, which are easy targets to aim for. It is no wonder choosing what and which activities is a source of great concern for my students, as uncertainty is one source of decision-making stress.

As a college counsellor, you can help by providing students with guiding principles and questions that they use to assess and plan their activities. You can also help demystify how the activities will be presented in their university applications. This helps students plan more carefully, instead of indiscriminately taking on any responsibilities that look remotely promising and realising too late that they have bitten off more than they can chew.

The following strategies, which students can use when choosing their activities, are ultimately quite simple. Here are some potential pithy statements to deliver to your students, which are followed by the reasoning behind the strategy.

Strategy 1: Don’t let your academics slip

Grades are always the number one measure admissions officers will look at. Stellar activities are great but will never take the place of achievements in a class setting when it comes to telling the story of a student’s academic potential.

For zealous students, a reminder that the responsibilities conferred by classes always take priority over responsibilities conferred by their extracurricular roles may be helpful, because their primary role is high school student, first and foremost.

Strategy 2: Quality over quantity

This strategy can be broken down into four smaller sub-strategies:

a. Length shows commitment

Universities are looking for signs of perseverance, and accomplishing something meaningful takes time. Both are reasons to stick to an activity for an extended period of time, not just a week or a month or a single semester.

b. Build on your existing activities

I say this to the student who is looking for the next best activity to take on, and ask them about how they can further their contribution in the roles they already have.

c. If shorter, reflect on its impact

Shorter activities can be great as well (summer activities tend to be short by nature) but I urge students to reflect on how it has shaped them, personally and academically, over this short period.

d. What are the signs of substantial growth, learning or contribution?

This question is always good to return to, to check that a student is engaging in activities intentionally, not thoughtlessly.

Strategy 3: Quantify your impact

Quantitative markers are effective ways to paint a clear picture about one’s engagement with the activity. Here are several examples, loosely grouped into possible categories (which are just guiding posts because these markers can easily apply across categories).

Leadership: Number of members (consistently maintained or increased), number of events organised, number of attendees

Public relations: Number of people reached, area covered

Entrepreneur/fundraising: Number of products sold, amount of funds raised, months engaged in

Competitions: Awards won, percentile in sample of test takers, number of contestants

Strategy 4: Find three to five action verbs

Any single activity easily involves a host of responsibilities, and it is important to understand that. I tell the student to Google “resumé verbs” or hand them this article as an example. Then they choose between three and five different verbs that capture the different elements of a role. Because this is a necessary skill for future resumé-building beyond school and university, it’s a great skill to start practising now.

Strategy 5: Find themes in your activities

As human beings, we have individual strengths and interests. From being an organised person to liking classical music to being a baker to having a passion for neuroscience to being really good at working with preschool kids to being a natural public speaker, we can identify themes that define us, if we take a birds’ eye view on what we naturally gravitate to.

Activities can (and naturally will) cluster around these areas of interest. Also known as an “application spike”, this helps distinguish you from well-rounded candidates (more on this later) and helps the admissions officer to get to know you better.

Strategy 6: Think beyond school, if possible

It is natural for students only to focus their efforts on school-based activities because these are accessible and this is their immediate community. However, I advise students to demonstrate their potential within and beyond the school walls, if possible. This can provide students with novel opportunities to discover themselves and to grow in unexpected ways, with the responsibilities required of them in new environments.

I ask them the following question: beyond the school community, what community are they a part of – for example, local neighborhood, city, region, country, globe – and how can they make an impact as a member of that community? Of course, opportunities to engage in activities are not equal in all regions so advise students with geographical and environmental constraints in mind.

Strategy 7: Collect evidence and external validation

If possible and relevant to the activity, collecting evidence of one’s commitment to the activities may be helpful. Examples can be a website, blog, photos or portfolio but are definitely not limited to this.

If there is an opportunity on the application (for example, the “Additional information” section of the Common App), one can show this to the university to further breathe life into the contributions the students made.  

If there is an opportunity for an external member of the community or body to recognise the contribution to the activity, that can serve as another concrete piece of evidence to showcase the applicant’s potential. Clear examples are regional, national and international awards conferred by competition organisers. But any acknowledgments on a school or civic level can also be easily highlighted in an application.

Strategy 8: What is the story in each activity?

Meaningful activities don’t start in a vacuum: there always is a reason why a student decided to engage in it. Subsequently, they probably overcame some challenges, and there was an outcome at the end (a meaningful contribution or growth).

There is a story (or stories) behind each activity. What is it? Understanding and weaving narratives can help a student reflect on and convey to others how they have grown as an individual.

If you are the literary type, you can refer to Joseph Campbell’s Hero’s Journey as a metaphor. And if you like science, note how human beings love stories.

Conclusion: Be active. At the right level for you. Doing what you like

This great quote is taken from Inside the Admissions Office podcast: activities section. This episode is superb, but the podcast series contains many nuggets of wisdom, and summarises succinctly the ethos of how one should undertake activities.