What's better?

Question

I'm a high-school sophomore and I've been thinking about university quite a bit lately. I was just wondering if it's better to be well rounded (participate actively in a variety of things) or to have one solid interest/skill (all activities contributing to this interest) when applying to university. In other words, is it better to be an all arounder or have one special talent?

All help is appreciated...also, please do not make a post about how I'm too young to be thinking about college or that I need to do certain things that don't actually resolve my problem.

Answer 1

Actually, you aren't too young to be thinking about college at all. My experience is that if you have one particular talent, it had better be a strong one. Of course, if you are a concert musician, or a working actor, or something like that, they will expect less in other areas, but most of the top candidates I see for college admissions are people who seem to be willing to try a variety of things (but not just dabbling, going to a meeting here and there; they really have several interests at once). The football player who led the canned food drive, the school newspaper editor who worked on a robotics project, and the math club president who played clarinet in the school band are all appealing. Also remember that as much as people often obsess about their extracurricular activities, no decent school will want someone with poor grades just because they have a lot of activities. I see too many posts here saying, "I have a 3.0, but LOTS of activities. Will these be enough activities to get me into Harvard?" The answer is always no, no activities will help you if your GPA an SAT scores are not high enough.

Answer 2

Universities like to see well rounded applicants. However, it is only natural that you will excell in some activities rather than others. You should not ignore that. Your resume will look the best if you have a number of activities AND you have acheived some distinction in one or two of them. The answer to your question is that you need both to be a truly attractive applicant at the top schools.

Answer 3

This all depends on how good you are at the one thing you'd choose. For most of us, we lack the natural talent to be absolutely amazing at something. There are only so many Einsteins and Mozarts out there. If you can be one of them, concentrate on that. If you can't, go the well-rounded route. Show the college that your talent is the fact that you can handle a lot of responsibility and manage your time efficiently. Good luck!

Answer 4

A little bit of both. Having one or two things that you're clearly passionate about and want to pursue into college and beyond is terrific, but you want to show that you're capable of having other interests and skills outside of those areas. So if you wanted to be a doctor, for instance, you'd want to do very well in your science classes and have some research internships or hospital volunteering or related clubs on your resume, but you'd still want to be a good writer and have some other hobbies.

Answer 5

I would definitely try to be well-rounded. First, it looks better to the college to see that you can "do it all". And second, you don't want to concentrate on one thing your whole high school career and then find out that it's not what you want to do the rest of your life. Don't paint yourself into a corner. Be well-rounded in high school and wait until college to specialize.

Answer 6

The answer is both. At least in HS get all the general education you can get. In college, you need to pick something to specialize in. There is lots of research on where the jobs will be in 5,10,15 years....getting this info is the job for your school counselor. Use that resource.