Which Extracurricular Activity Should My Teen Join for High School? Tips From a Former School Counselor and Mom
It was 7:45 on a Tuesday night, and my 10th grader Leo had spread every club fair flyer across our kitchen table, half a cold slice of pizza tucked under the robotics club flyer and a crumpled environmental club notice peeking out from under his algebra workbook. I was folding socks and listening to him scroll through his friend group chat, when he looked up and asked the question every parent and high schooler I ever worked with asks at this time of year: Which one should I join? All my friends are doing debate or robotics, everyone says those look the best for college, right?
I paused, holding a pair of his holey athletic socks, and thought of the stack of high school resumes I used to sort through when I worked as a high school counselor 10 years ago. Half of them had four or five clubs listed, most only for a semester or two, all the “impressive” ones: debate, student government, robotics, National Honor Society. Very few had the thing the kid actually cared about listed.
I remembered Lila, a senior I worked with my second year on the job. She came in crying one October afternoon because her dad had threatened to cut her gas money if she quit student government, a role she’d taken on only because he said it would get her into vet school. She spent every weekend and most weekday afternoons trapping feral cats behind the local grocery store, getting them spayed and neutered, and finding homes for the ones that could be socialized. She’d never put that on her resume because it wasn’t an official school club. I helped her rewrite her activities list to put that work first, and write her college essay about the time she spent three hours chasing a semi-feral kitten through a parking lot in the rain just to get it help. She got into her top-choice vet program, and last I heard she’s the lead vet at a small animal shelter two hours from here.
I also thought about last year, when I fell into the same trap as every other parent. Leo was starting 9th grade, and I pushed him to join cross country. It keeps you in shape, it looks good on applications, everyone does it, I said. He went to practice for two weeks, came home every single day sore and grumpy, and told me he hated every minute of it. He quit, I felt guilty for a month, but I learned something: forcing a kid into an activity just because it looks good doesn’t help anyone. It just takes time away from something they’d actually enjoy.
I leaned against the table and asked Leo three questions, the same three I used to walk parents through when they came in confused about extracurriculars. First: When was the last time you went two full hours without checking your phone because you were busy doing something? He thought for a minute, twisting the end of his hoodie string, and said the weekend before, when we helped the neighborhood association clean up the community garden. He spent three hours moving tomato plants to a sunnier spot and helped Mrs. Henderson from next door plant her lavender, and never even thought about his phone. Second: What do you not mind doing even when you’re tired after school? He said he hated public speaking, so debate was out, and robotics practices ran three hours four nights a week, and he just wanted to go home and work on his old mountain bike after school. Third: If you could only do one thing after school this semester, what would it be—not what your friends are doing, not what you think colleges want? He reached down and pulled the crumpled environmental club flyer out from under his workbook.
That’s the concrete insight I’ve picked up over years of working with teens and parenting one: you don’t need a long list of impressive activities. The practical reality I saw over and over as a counselor is that admissions officers don’t care half as much about the name of the club as they care about how much time you put into it. It’s better to do one thing for three years than six things for one semester each. It’s also fine if the thing your kid loves isn’t an official school club. Working a part-time job at a coffee shop, fixing bikes for neighbors, taking care of younger siblings after school, all of that counts just as much as a school-sponsored club.
Another small, actionable trick I share with parents: let them test it out for low stakes. Almost every high school lets kids sit in on one or two meetings before they commit. No one has to sign up for a full year right away. If they go once and hate it, they can leave without any guilt. Quitting an activity that’s not a good fit isn’t a failure, it’s how you figure out what you like.
Leo went to his first environmental club meeting last Thursday. He came home with dirt under his fingernails and a crumpled list of native plants they’re going to order for the new school garden. He’s been talking nonstop about planting milkweed for monarch butterflies and designing the layout for new raised beds. He might get bored halfway through the semester. He might decide it’s too much work and quit. That’s okay.
I still don’t know if it’ll “look good” on his college application four years from now. I do know he comes home happy talking about it, and that’s more than any impressive club name can give him. Right now, that’s enough.
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