Tag: parenting (Page 3 of 14)

If you have had a senior in high school, chances are you’re familiar with the Common App. The Common App is the common way to have your high school senior apply to colleges.

One important page in the application is the Activities page. Here, your child can fill up to 10 slots with activities he has been involved with in the last several years. I’m told leadership and service examples in one’s activities are looked upon favorably by college admissions personnel. Also, multiple years dedicated to a given activity is supposedly viewed favorably…as opposed to the activity your senior embarked on a month before filling out his application because he suddenly realized listing one demonstrates depth of character.

As you fill out your activities, you tag each with a category. In 2020, the Common App listed 30 categories:

Academic	Journalism/Publication
Art	Junior R.O.T.C.
Athletics: Club	LGBT
Athletics: JV/Varsity	Music: Instrumental
Career Oriented	Music: Vocal
Community Service (Volunteer)	Religious
Computer/Technology	Research
Cultural	Robotics
Dance	School Spirit
Debate/Speech	Science/Math
Environmental	Social Justice
Family Responsibilities	Student Govt./Politics
Foreign Exchange	Theater/Drama
Foreign Language	Work (Paid)
Internship	Other Club/Activity

So, how can you help your college-bound child develop a rich list of activities to provide on his college application? Here are 10 ideas to think about…and think about strategically several years before your child enters his senior year of high school.

School clubs and extracurriculars

These days, most high schools have a club or extracurricular activity that hits nearly all the above categories. Most schools even accommodate your child starting his own club if he doesn’t find a suitable existing one. Unless your child starts his own club, achieving a leadership position in an existing club or extracurricular could be difficult, especially among the more popular organizations.

Sports

Sports is certainly an acceptable activity in the Common App and most schools have a wide variety from which to choose. Of course, competition in your child’s chosen sport may limit his leadership options or even his participation altogether.

Work

Work is its own category in the Common App. Thinking strategically, consider steering your child towards lines of work with management possibilities to, thus, hit that leadership buzzword.

Religious Institutions

Religious institutions usually have service opportunities well covered. For example, my religious institution has a “Peanut Butter” ministry where my children can spend an hour each week making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for the hungry.

Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, or similar organization

Groups like the Boy Scouts provide a variety of opportunities for your child to hit several of the Common App activities. These organizations also provide several leadership chances.

Local, private businesses and organizations

My town hosts several local dance studios, theater groups, music schools, and more. Patronizing many of these businesses can be expensive, but might help your child hit an activity or two.

Camps

Camps come in a variety of forms: religious, Scout-oriented, and even commercial such as computer programming camps, chess camps, and the like. Are there camps in your area that interest your child? Are there camps in your area that need volunteers or need to hire a fine, upstanding teenager? Patronizing a camp or even working at a camp might help build out your catalog of activities.

Your local Kiwanis club

Kiwanis clubs or similar local, civic organizations have their fingers in lots of unique and interesting local operations. If your town or city has such an organization, I highly recommend checking it out and consider involving your child and/or yourself with it. Not only can you check off a Common App activity or two with your involvement, these organizations often sponsor college scholarships and your child’s involvement in such and organization might help him earn one of them.

Your own work

Many businesses–especially larger employers–seem to be expanding more into volunteer work and local community involvement. After a long day at work, you’re probably not interested in dragging your child to a service opportunity sponsored by your place of business, but that could still be an option as you help your child build out his catalog.

Family and friends

On occasion, even your family and friends might have fresh and interesting ideas. If you’re struggling thinking of ways to help your child develop his list of activities for his college applications and none of my above suggestions work for you, take a survey of your family and friends for suggestions.

Here’s an interesting and astute graduation speech I listened to recently:

“A lesson learned should be a lesson shared.”

Kyle Martin

In the speech, Kyle declares that “a lesson learned should be a lesson shared.” As a dad, I think about this a lot. I want my children to be more successful than me: professionally, personally…across the board. I’m always trying to share lessons I’ve learned with them–most often, mistakes I’ve made that I hope they can avoid.

Of course, a critical component of a learned lesson is the learned part. The fact that you’ve lived enough under certain conditions to have learned a valuable tenet–good or bad–from those conditions and your responses to those conditions. I wonder if a better name for these lessons is lessons lived. As I share my lessons lived with my children, part of me thinks, “will these lessons even resonate with my children if they’ve never lived them in the first place?” Nevertheless, I keep sharing.

Another thought that occurred to me while watching this video was, what must the Salutatorian be thinking? “Heck, if he regrets earning the Valedictorian spot, give it to me!”