What extracurriculars does Harvard look for?

HHarvard's admissions readers rate every applicant's extracurricular record, and the procedures reported from the SFFA filings describe a 2, the second-highest mark, in terms most ambitious students would be proud of: significant accomplishment in school and possibly the region, illustrated by a student body president or a debate captain who also leads other clubs. That is very good work, and it is still the second rung. The criteria for a 1, the top rating, were redacted in the filings, which leaves families guessing at what separates the two.

The best guide comes from the people who used the scale, and what they describe changes how a student should spend junior year.

Leadership and impact in Harvard's extracurricular rating

A former Harvard admissions officer describes the quality readers look for as citizen leadership: impact that reaches past the school to the district, the city, the state or further. The question is how far your work spread. A tutoring club that serves your classmates is a school achievement. The same club, rebuilt so that three neighboring middle schools run it with their own volunteers, has started to travel.

The same reader looked for students who found a need and filled it, and who would plainly do the same at Harvard, perhaps by founding a program for students who arrive without the preparation others take for granted. The activity is evidence of a habit, and the habit is what Harvard is admitting.

The activity is evidence of a habit, and the habit is what Harvard is admitting.

Depth beats the menu

Former Harvard officers repeat a warning about breadth. One described real involvement in a single club over a long stretch as worth more than five clubs at an hour a week. Another urged students to drop activities they keep only because they sound good, and to look past their school's standard menu of model UN, debate, piano and olympiads unless one of those is where their energy truly goes. Readers who cover the same region every year have seen every version of the standard file, and they also see every applicant from your school, so an inflated title or impossible hours total gets noticed.

How to show the reach

On the activities list, give the reader the measure of spread: how many schools, how many towns, who adopted the thing you built, whether it will outlast you. Ask an adult outside school who saw the work grow to write a letter or to be named in your description. Then, in a short answer about how you will use your Harvard education, show the reader the next version of the same habit.