SOPHOMORE YEAR TIMELINE FOR PUTTING TOGETHER AN ACTIVITIES RESUME

This is the year to begin getting serious about your involvements. The key is to choose what you love to do. If you love art, pursue it every which way you can, including finding volunteer opportunities that involve art. If you’re a surfer and need a community service activity, create a surf-a-thon to raise money for some worthwhile cause. If you’re a writer, join the staff of your high school newspaper or literary magazine, but also look for writing contests or summer jobs and special experiences that make use of your writing skills.

Even if your school requires a minimum amount of community service hours, if you’re really into it, do more than the minimum. Colleges want students who give back to their schools and communities. They also like when you create something new or useful, whether it is in or out of school.

JUNIOR YEAR TIMELINE FOR PUTTING TOGETHER AN ACTIVITIES RESUME

Your junior year is the time to develop leadership positions in whatever you do, or to lay the groundwork for those kinds of positions in your senior year. Look for ways of increasing the depth and quality of your activities. Remember, colleges like you to show unusual initiative, enthusiasm, commitment, and accomplishment (e.g., you take an ordinary ASB position such as public relations and turn it into a powerful marketing force; you teach chess at a school for homeless teens and begin a chess club there as well).

If you haven’t been involved with volunteer activities up to this point, get involved now. It’s never too late.

Likewise, if you’re a member of a club or involved with an activity that isn’t your “cup of tea,” perhaps now is the time to drop it. Save your time and energy for things you like and that count.

SENIOR YEAR TIMELINE FOR PUTTING TOGETHER AN ACTIVITIES RESUME

Even if you have not done a lot in the first three years of high school, it’s not too late to do something. Admissions officers have difficulty seriously considering applicants who are “couch potatoes,” or students who don’t give back to their schools or communities.