Activities to get into HARVARD?!?!?! <333?

Question

I want to really get into Harvard. It has always been my dream. Now, I know in order to be accepted you have to have a lot of extra curricular activites. What are some that I can start? Any impressive ideas?

Answer 1

For Ivy League you need to think bigger than joining a school club or team.  You need to show how you stand out from the rest of the pack.  Leader, not just member.  Winner, not just competitor.  Innovator, not just participant.  Consider activities that your school cannot offer just through organized clubs, such as starting a business (you will need an adult sponsor though), start your own group and really get it to grow in membership (whether school sponsored or not), write a novela and get it published and sold at major bookstores.  Or a poem accepted by a literary journal.  Get anything published in something bigger than your school yearbook or newspaper - local news is good; national news is better.  Invent something and get it patented (helps again to have help from adult mentors, teachers, business people).  To sum it up, ACHIEVE something that most students your age cannot do or will not even try.  If your endeavor is competitive you need to be a WINNER on the highest level you can (state, national).  Being on a winning school team is good, but more important if you are a captain or MVP.  For Ivy League winning at sports, especially the most common ball sports, is not as big of a deal as it would be for someone looking for sports scholarship to a big name state school.  You should present your athletic achievements as merely a physical and emotional outlet for your competitive and adventurous spirit.  While your athletic (or musical, or artistic) achievements could very well play a critical role, your more meaningful contributions to the "real world" will stand out more.  So your primary focus should be on activities that will tie to your career, whether that focus is rather broad at this time or well defined.  It helps immensely if your achievements have a humanitarian element to them, such as raising a record-breaking amount of money or food contributions from your community to help people in need.  There really should be a connection between at least one primary extracurricular activity to your future intended career field.  Taking your debate team to nationals would be a good achievement for someone interested in law, but not quite an achievement for an aspiring archeaologist - though if you have the talent in debate don't walk away just because there's no direct connection.  Instead try to find a way to connect debate with archealogy - maybe the study of ampitheatres, or controversial topics in archeology where your debate skills may be used often.

To get this right, consider where you are now, how much time before you must submit your college application, and what you can reasonably accomplish within this time window.  Read up on "strategic planning" and act accordingly.  Treat this as a long term project - one that really will transform into your life's work.  Don't forget to work within or creativey work around the natural constraints on your budget, physical condition, family responsibilitis, moral values, etc.