It’s already late on a school night, and you are only seven pages into your bench memo due next week, but you also have to make a Google form for your internship. Oh, and don’t forget to make a list of people to recruit for the club you are starting, and remember, musical auditions are soon, so you should prepare for that too. All of this stress just to make sure you look good for colleges, but are they really looking that closely?

Extracurricular activities are something that almost every student is encouraged to participate in. Whether it is football, Youth and Government, or even Chinese Honor Society, extracurriculars take up a lot of your time. However, that is the minimum that most students participate in. Many students also do more, such as volunteering at local organizations or having internships. 

Recently, I have been doing college research to prepare for my senior year. However, as I started looking at certain schools, I realized that some schools won’t even look at my extracurriculars. This made me start to spiral. All these clubs and programs I have been joining since freshman year won’t even matter to some admissions officers. So what even is the point of doing them? 

That is actually a great question that many people would not even be able to answer. 

When most colleges are looking at your application, they look holistically. This means they look at not only your grades but also your standardized test scores and extracurriculars. When it comes to college admissions, many students join as many clubs as possible to seem as though they are “well-rounded.” But in reality, if you are just joining a bunch of random clubs, how do you even know what you enjoy doing? 

This year, when looking back at everything I have joined since freshman year, I have realized I do quite a lot. But I have started to question myself; how much of these extracurricular activities will I even continue in college? Did I start these activities just to seem more interesting to some random officers who don’t even know me? Yeah, that seems right. 

Yes, these clubs and organizations I have joined may have been for my college application, but on the other hand, they have opened up whole new worlds to me. Clubs like Youth and Government have introduced me to many new friends and experiences that I, along with others, cherish. Similarly, sports have taught me work ethic and how, no matter how you are feeling, the world keeps going. 

Extracurricular activities may seem insignificant to many when in high school, and it may be the case, as some colleges won’t even look at them. However, these activities that you participate in right now will shape your perspective on things for the future. As dreary as some of these activities may be, they will really introduce you to who you are as a person and always have a little fun with it as well.

Don’t just participate in extracurriculars for the community hours or reputation. Do the extracurriculars you genuinely can enjoy and learn from.