Maximizing Your Activities Section Common App

Want to learn about maximizing your activities section Common App? It seems simple enough: just list out all of your extracurricular activities, sports, honors, and accomplishments and trust that the information will speak for itself… right? Well, like any aspect of college applications, using a little strategy can maximize this section of your application and boost your chances of getting into the best colleges in California and across the nation.

Tips for the Activities Section Common App

List It

Your first step should be to create a list of everything you have done outside of class. In this step, do not leave really good experiences off your list because you didn’t spend a long time doing it. Generally, if you did something that lasted longer than two weeks, as long as it wasn’t video games or a YouTube binge, it’s probably worth noting.

Describe It

Next, write a two-sentence description of each activity. The first sentence should describe what you did. The second one should be about the effect this activity had on you. In other words, describe what you learned or gained from it.

One of the most significant parts of your college application is the Activities Section. Here's how to ace it. — Photo by Benjamin Hibbert-Hingston on Unsplash

Organize It

After that, it is time for you to organize and order your activities into the following categories:

Leadership
Learning
Other

Listing your activities in this order will make your involvement easy to follow while communicating to admission readers that you are both well rounded and organized. So how do you decide how to categorize each activity?

Leadership is defined as any formally recognized experience that required you to help or empower others. Typically, titles associated with this category have to do with club involvement, leadership class, school events, sports, or band. If you had a leadership title, it counts!

Learning includes both formal and informal academic learning experiences that were part of your high school experience. If you were a general club member, for instance, of a Robotics team, then this would be a good place to put that. However, if you were part of the leadership of that Robotics team, you’ll want to put that in the Leadership bucket. Note that personal projects and internships also fall into this category.

Other, of course, includes any experience that doesn’t meet the prior definitions. Popular entries here include sports and recreational activities, such as music or crafts not pertaining to your major.

Knowing howto apply to top colleges includes understanding the Activities Section. These tips will help you maximize your Activities List for the Common App and the UC application. — Photo by April Walker on Unsplash

Now, here are some more tips tailored to the UC Application.

UC Best Practices for the Activities Section

For the most part, you’ll fill out your UC Activities Section similar to the Common App Activities List. For example, you should still include meaningful activities even if they were short-term, and you should list your activities in the same order (leadership, learning, other).

One core difference is that the UC application gives you more opportunities to elaborate elsewhere. Elaborate elsewhere. If you find yourself needing way more words than the character count allows, that probably means you should consider writing a PIQ on it. At the very least, describe the activity in further detail in Additional Comments at the end of your application.

Here are a few tips specific to the Common App Activities Section.

Activities Section Common App Best Practices

First, use the Awards Section. Don’t take up valuable space in Activities when you can highlight your awards elsewhere.

You should also choose the right category. Select the option from the dropdown that best reflects the nature of the activity. If the activity was largely career-oriented, then designate it as such. However, if it was more of a fun learning experience, then be honest. Lastly, don’t stress if you’re not sure which category is best. Chances are you’re thinking way harder about it than your reader will.

Lastly, combine. If you had different involvements or positions within the same organization, then put your highest earned title when asked for your position, and provide a description of your changing roles in the description. This allows you to highlight your greatest accomplishment while saving you space for more activities.

Optimizing your Activities List for your college application is easier than you think. Here's how to navigate various application portals. — Photo by OCG Saving The Ocean on Unsplash

As a bonus, here’s a list of some of the activities that you are most likely forgetting about.

Commonly Forgotten Activities on the Common App Activities Section

That sport you only did for one year in 9th grade (but had to stop because school got busy)
The club you were a general member of (but the club wasn’t always active)
The volunteer experience that lasted only a day
The self-taught Python course, or any Coursera/edX/other course, you decided to take
The personal project you undertook – whether it was designing your own computer games or that electric skateboard you tried building. Even if you “failed,” it reads well on paper that you did it.

For more details about putting together your Activities Section, check out our YouTube video about it.

We are always posting more helpful tips and tricks to help reduce the stress of college application season. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and LinkedIn. Then, sign up for a free consultation!

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Sarah Gooch

Essay Editor

Q:How many total years of experience do you have in your current role, including but not limited to ReadyEdgeGo?

A: I have five years' experience in coaching student writing, but this is my first year with ReadyEdgeGo.

Q: What about working with students do you most enjoy?

A: I love helping students find depth and meaning in their own stories—but I also just love it when they make me laugh!

Q: What do you like to do in your free time?

A: In theory, I enjoy painting and writing poetry, but these days I actually spend most of my free time socializing or watching movies with my husband.

Q: What is your one piece of advice for high schoolers?

A: Don't just focus on achieving top grades and credentials because they look good on applications, or your education will be meaningless. The numbers and awards have their place, but stay connected to your sense of curiosity, discovery, excitement, and wonder so that the content you're learning is constantly transforming you—it's something you care about, something you remember after the final exam. Work on the aspects of yourself no one can measure, like integrity, wisdom, kindness, and compassion, so that you're not only developing your academic and career potential but also investing in the type of adult you're going to be, the person you'll have to live with after you clock out every day for the rest of your life.

Doing the hard inner work of building your character and learning deeply instead of just earning grades will set you up for a satisfying, well-rounded life. Strange as it sounds, it will also put you ahead in your academic and career goals, because colleges and hiring managers aren't looking for an empty set of data on a spreadsheet; they want a fully fleshed-out person marked by passion, creativity, and a story no one else has lived.

So go on studying hard for tests, but also spend some time asking yourself what matters in life and who your role models are. Read up on topics that amaze you, and build something incredible just for fun. Cultivate that spark of joy you feel when you're immersed in a subject that fascinates you. If you can hit that balancing act of doing your homework and meeting deadlines but also investing in the kind of person you want to be, then trust that all the rest will follow: schools will recognize you as a dynamic, all-star person, and you will also build a life of happiness, close relationships, and peace.

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