What are good extracurriculars for college admissions?

Activities done outside of a classroom setting which result in a quantifiable real-world impact, resulting in the life of at least one real person being tangibly improved.

That's the simple answer. But let's talk about what this really means in today's admissions landscape.



For decades, students approached extracurriculars as a checklist: join three clubs, play a sport, learn an instrument, volunteer at a soup kitchen on weekends. The goal was breadth and consistency, showing colleges you were "well-rounded" and could manage multiple commitments.

That model is obsolete.

Today's competitive applicants to schools like Yale, MIT, Stanford, and Princeton aren't building resumes full of club memberships they'll abandon the moment they receive their acceptance letter. They're not learning violin solely to satisfy the "musical extracurricular" box, knowing they'll never touch the instrument again after senior year. They're not joining Model UN because it sounds impressive, despite having zero genuine interest in international relations or policy work.


Here's the new reality: if you're targeting Ivy League and equivalent institutions, your extracurricular activities should meet the same standard as what you'd put on a professional resume when applying to Google, Goldman Sachs, Citadel, IBM, or any other highly selective employer.

Think about that for a moment. Would "Member, Spanish Club" belong on a resume you'd send to McKinsey? Would "Participated in three school plays" make it onto your application to Jane Street Capital? Would "Played JV soccer for two years" strengthen your case for a position at a top-tier research lab?

No. Because these activities, while perfectly fine ways to spend your time, don't demonstrate the creation of tangible value or measurable impact.

The extracurriculars that matter today are the ones where you can point to concrete outcomes:

Research: You didn't just "do a research project," you conducted original research that resulted in a publication, presentation at an academic conference, or meaningful contribution to ongoing scientific work.

Entrepreneurship: You didn't just "start a club," you founded an organization or business that generated revenue, served real clients, or solved an actual problem for a defined group of people.

Technical Development: You didn't just "learn to code," you built software that people use, contributed to open-source projects with active user bases, or created tools that measurably improved processes or outcomes.

Policy and Advocacy: You didn't just "volunteer for a cause," you conducted policy research that informed real decisions, organized campaigns that produced legislative change, or created systems that continue to serve communities.

Creative Work: You didn't just "write stories" or "make art," you published work that reached audiences, exhibited in real venues, or created content that generated meaningful engagement.

Notice the pattern? Each of these involves creating something that exists independent of your college application. Something that would continue to matter even if you never applied to college at all.

This shift reflects a fundamental change in how selective colleges evaluate candidates. With acceptance rates at top institutions now in the single digits, admissions officers need ways to differentiate between thousands of students with perfect test scores and impeccable transcripts.

The differentiator has become: What have you actually accomplished?

Not what activities you've participated in. Not what positions you've held. Not what experiences you've had. What have you done that created value in the world?

This is the era of competitiveness we're in now. Students who understand this reality, and who spend their high school years building genuinely impressive accomplishments rather than collecting activities, are the ones who earn admission to the most selective institutions.

The question isn't "What extracurriculars should I do?" The question is "What impact can I create?"