Hi Everyone. My name is Katherine Miklosz and I’m an Admissions Counselor here at The College of New Jersey. This week, I’m going to provide you with some pointers on putting together an extra-curricular activity sheet or resume. For those of you who have already started the CommonApp, you’ve seen that there is a section devoted to this area as part of the application. However, we find that students sometimes struggle with fitting all of the activities they’ve been involved with, or all of the details about these activities, into the space provided. This is why we encourage all students to submit an additional extracurricular activity sheet to TCNJ. When compiling your list of activities, feel free to arrange it in the way that you feel best emphasizes your experiences outside of the classroom – this may be a simple list format for some of you, while others might want to create a more formal resume.
Regardless of how you decide to compose your list of extracurriculars, there are a few tips that will help you best convey your involvement and your passions to our admissions committee.
Don’t abbreviate. I usually tell students that there is only ONE organization or activity that you can safely abbreviate and still be sure that anyone who reads it will know what it stands for…and that’s NHS. If it isn’t NHS, then don’t assume we know it means. Take the time to write out any acronyms.
Likewise, even when you’ve given the full name of the organization or activity, don’t assume that everyone knows what that group entails. While some are more obvious, organizations such as “Heroes and Cool Kids” or “Interact,” aren’t always self explanatory. Be sure to not only explain YOUR involvement in each activity, but what the organization as a whole is all about.
It’s one of the oldest clichés – but your extracurricular activity sheet should be about quality, not quantity. We’d rather see a student who is passionate about a few organizations and becomes highly involved within them, than a student who is a participant in a dozen different activities but never does more than attend their monthly meetings. One way that I describe this to students, is that your activity sheet should be wider than it is long. Where you need the extra space should be going across, because you need to list so many things you’ve done as a member of a specific organization, rather than long because you have so many activities to list.
Don’t be afraid of sounding like you’re bragging. Make sure you highlight the times you’ve gone above and beyond what is asked of a general member. A good example of this is Relay for Life. We see many, many students who have participated in Relay for Life in one way or another and we like to see students getting involved for a great cause. But…there’s a big difference between someone who walks in Relay for Life once a year and a person who was on the planning committee, who met weekly all year to get set up, work with sponsors, etc. If all you write on your resume is Relay for Life, we will have no way of knowing how involved you were. Make sure we know the true level of your involvement. If you held a leadership role, this should be more obvious….make sure you list the positions you held. But even if you didn’t hold a formal title, don’t be embarrassed to tell us about the ways you took your involvement to the next level.
Don’t sell yourself short. I can’t tell you how many times I read a recommendation letter from a teacher or a guidance counselor where they share a story of a special extracurricular accomplishment the student achieved, only to search everywhere through the student’s activity sheet and see it mentioned NOWHERE. Don’t think that any involvement, activity, or experience is too small or not relevant enough to mention. As long as you accomplished it in high school, we want to know about it! And that holds true whether it was school-sponsored or not. It also holds true for those activities that seem less “official” – feel free to share it all with us, even if “it’s only” how many languages you speak, that you’re in a rock band, or that you spend your afternoons helping an elderly neighbor down the street.
I hope this information will help you create an extracurricular activity sheet that truly highlights all that you do and what makes YOU special. When you start working on yours, just remember this: When in doubt, tell us about it! Stay tuned for upcoming webinars on how to make every part of your application the best it can be. And, if you have any questions, you can always feel free to get in touch with me at miklosz@tcnj.edu or at 609.771.3204.
Katherine Miklosz
Katherine Miklosz graduated from the University of Delaware in 2006 with a major in English. While at UD, she worked for 4 years as a Blue Hen Ambassador in the Undergraduate Admissions Office. She began working at The College of New Jersey in March 2007 and has coordinated the In-State Merit Scholarship program for the past three years.
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