Where did the idea come from that extracurricular activities were important for university applications?

[Reallybadidea]

Was it ever true? I applied to universities in the 90s and throughout secondary, my parents were obsessed with me joining clubs, sports teams, DofE so that I'd "have something to put on my UCAS form to show that you're a well-rounded applicant". It still seems to be a popular belief on here that having grade A piano (for eg) will enhance your application.

I get that courses such as medicine, nursing etc need relevant work experience. But the other stuff? Is it/was it ever important?

My DCs school was filling their heads with this stuff within the last decade so it's an idea still in currency in some places anyway - in their case the careers/UCAS advisor lady had read some dubious 'study' (I doubt it was proper academic research) showing that a large % of Oxbridge/RG successful applicants did lots of extra-curriculars very successfully and therefore top universities must be deliberately selecting 'well rounded' students. This ignored the fact that (as any good university lecturer knows) correlation does not = causation, I think the case is as PPs have said that it's the privileged middle class/private school students who happen to do a lot of extra curriculars alongside having good academics that drive this, not that being a good sportsperson/musician/volunteer predicts academic success per se. I suspect that filling your PS with stuff about your Grade 8 piano or county level hockey team or whatever is at best a waste of time as it probably doesn't even get read in most cases, by far the most important factor surely is grades and/or scores in any aptitude or other testing the university does, followed by a cogent and clear explanation of your interest in the course/university, followed by relevant hobbies/interests/work experience such as the out-of-school science research project a PP mentioned, with other hobbies a long last...

Luckily it didn't really do my DC much harm, they all did extra-curricular stuff for enjoyment/to be a well rounded person anyway so they weren't pushed into doing anything they wouldn't otherwise have done or that was a waste of time, but I do think many of the hours spent angsting over their personal statements probably could have been better spent elsewhere (e.g. studying, or even actually doing said extra-curriculars!)

@safariboot

When I applied to Cambridge it was clear that three or four As wasn't enough. More students have the top grades than Cambridge and Oxford have places for. So that's why other activities are seen as a good thing.

I agree with a PP though, it's biased towards children who had an easy life with rich-ish parents.

I think this is both true and not true. Oxford and Cambridge are probably over-subscribed for their grade requirements, although the new (ish) A* grade makes a difference, but in my experience I don't think they select on the basis of Grade 8 piano or orphanage volunteering at all (admittedly based on unscientific basis of applicants I've known and what I've read online). It's my understanding that for oversubcribed courses they select on things which are shown to predict academic success, i.e. grades first, then aptitude testing and/or other tests administered during the interview process e.g. language tests for language courses, then on the basis of an interview, during which the candidate almost certainly won't be asked about their piano-playing or whatever except in a polite/cursory way, but will be asked to show a deeper understanding of and passion for the subject through questioning, in which the best candidates will go 'above and beyond' what they learn in school, so e.g. for English to discuss novels/poetry they're read in an intelligent and critical way, not just their A level set texts. For science to show/discuss what projects they've done or lectures they've listened to, etc. The candidates that can do this may also be a star ballet dancer or a brilliant football player, but that should be incidental to their academic ability....

I think 'passion' is another myth that needs to die a death, TBH.

Somewhere out there, there are clearly UCAS advisors/dodgy 'prepare your child for Oxbridge' programmes that drone on about how you must demonstrate 'well-rounded interests' and 'passion for your subject' because these things come up again and again. It is really, really painful interviewing a candidate who is determined to shoe-horn their D of E gold into the conversation because they've been told it matters, or who has been taught to start every reply with 'I really LOVE this and I feel PASSIONATELY about the importance of this subject'. They lose out on time and it's such a short interview anyway.

Even sadder when you come across really bright people who say 'I never applied to such-and-such a university because I thought I needed all these extras on my CV'. That still happens a lot too.

It carries over into job interviews too Sarah , I interview for a lot of graduate + roles, for fairly dull corporate roles in obscure corners of the public sector, and every candidate feels compelled to answer the question of why they want the role with a rigamorale about how it's their childhood dream to service computers for XYZ NHS body or they have a deep and abiding 'passion' for doing the accounts of Blah-Blah small government department when that is surely a blatant lie. I get that it's necessary to play the game (I even do it myself in a more restrained way when applying for jobs) but I do think we do young people a bit of a disservice by teaching them that they should always be rampantly enthusiastic and joyful about everything they do, it's fine sometimes to find something mainly interesting, occasionally boring, OK on the whole but you'd sometimes rather be elsewhere, I think that's the reality of life for the majority and as you say there must be perfectly good candidates out there that just haven't been taught the 'rules of the game' and/or genuinely think you need all this stuff to succeed in life and so don't put themselves forward as a result which is sad?

I should have been clear. Applicants and 6th forms felt that extra-curriculars were important. I'm not sure how much Cambridge admissions actually care(d). I mean I did next to no formal extra-curricular stuff and got in. My personal statement focussed more on my interest in my subject beyond school. Which fits with what maxelly said above.

The use of the word passion and other descriptives should definitely be discouraged. Any "passion" for their subject would show if they write a personal statement with personal opinions on what they have read.

@safariboot

I should have been clear. Applicants and 6th forms felt that extra-curriculars were important. I'm not sure how much Cambridge admissions actually care(d). I mean I did next to no formal extra-curricular stuff and got in. My personal statement focussed more on my interest in my subject beyond school. Which fits with what maxelly said above.

Cambridge likes extra curriculars because it gives you something to give up when the works gets hard!

So - to give an example - dh has 9 As at GCSE and 3 As at A level. (He is too old for A*s ) He also spent 13 - 18 representing his country at a (minority) sport.

What that means is that he basically has the underlying ability to get those As without really working very hard at all. Because if you can knock up an A grade piece of coursework whilst on a plane to the European Championships imagine what you can do if you actually put a bit of effort in!

I am fairly sure Cambridge didn’t care at all that they won the Varsity match for (insert minority sport) for 4 years in a row!

Only exception is if you are really good at rowing. Cambridge wants you then!

@Mumoftwoinprimary, that is absolute nonsense. Sorry, but it is.

If a candidate has a hobby that takes masses of time but also has excellent grades, it might demonstrate that they are very good, but ... virtually all Cambridge applicants have or are predicted excellent grades. It's not going to be the issue. They would look at really serious things, like someone being a young carer.

Cambridge also do not give a shiny shit if you are good at rowing. Indeed it is perfectly possible to be kicked off the blues team if your academic work is suffering (I know; I supervised the dissertation of a rower on a blues team, and she very, very narrowly missed being required to give up the rowing).

Even sadder when you come across really bright people who say 'I never applied to such-and-such a university because I thought I needed all these extras on my CV'. That still happens a lot too.
THIS

The extra curricular myth is a "gatekeeper" to stop the hoi polloi thinking they are equal to the kids from Eton

I think relevant extra-curricular activities are probably still important.

E.g volunteering in a nursing home if you want to study a healthcare related degree, volunteering in a school to help with reading etc if you have a gap year before applying for teacher training. But that's probably more important for an interview so you have some albeit limited knowledge of what you are getting yourself in to and you can demonstrate that you had a clear idea of what you wanted to do and did some activities relating to the subject.

It's presumably less important if you are studying a subject which doesn't have an interview, or if you are going straight from school to university.

E.g volunteering in a nursing home if you want to study a healthcare related degree, volunteering in a school to help with reading etc if you have a gap year before applying for teacher training.
I hope not
as only the rich can afford volunteering and gap yah's

I think one thing that extra curricular do tend to do is give people more confidence and this might affect ( vaguely ) interview performance .

I was slightly taken aback at a year 12 day at Cambridge when in the parents session they said that they did not want people who had had to give everything up to achieve the grades as they would be unlikely to cope . Maybe they were trying to say to parents don’t let them become obsessive about Cambridge but it didn’t really come bc across line that .

I also hate the whole ‘passion’ business , how many people are really passionate about an academic subject at 17

I think that the extra-curriculars often make children more well-rounded people, and parents and teachers know this, so they tell children that they will be important for later applications in order to get the child to continue them when they get to that 'hump' where the activity becomes difficult/time consuming/uncool and they might otherwise give up. And thus the myth continues, either because the parents just want the child to keep going because they know it's probably the best thing for them but it's hard to justify that to a child - university applications is an easy explanation - or because by that point, some parents have started to believe it and/or other parents assume that they are doing it for that reason and they'd better make their own children do it too. Etc.

Also, the activities probably are important for applying for things like private secondary schools, where they want well rounded applicants or those who can represent the school at things. Or for the purposes of scholarships. So it's not that much of a stretch to assume that universities might want them too, if a parent/child had already had that experience.

I think it's also true that it can give children some ideas for experiences to talk about when asked questions for an application or a job interview on things like team work, or resilience, or time-management, or whatever. Working in a shop or looking after younger siblings, or whatever would also give those examples, but for many children with an easy life who don't do anything else, they wouldn't have any examples to refer to. So be able to to mention something like volunteer work, or captaining a team, or managing high-level musical commitments alongside A-levels, gives them experience to refer to. I can see how a school mentioning those things might then give the impression to a student that they should do the activities 'because it will help their university applications', even if that was not what was said or meant.

The UniFrog website - which is otherwise brilliant- has a PS format to help structure it. It has a whole section for extra curricular. I check PSs a lot at school as an English teacher. I can spot a UniFrog one a mile off. And, yes, there are still sixth form teachers who encourage this. That said, there is very very little training from unis to schools about university admissions.

And some courses : journalism, film, media etc. still - rightly or wrongly- focus on students having some kind of relevant experiences which definitely privileges those with networks and equipment.

@ListeningQuietly

E.g volunteering in a nursing home if you want to study a healthcare related degree, volunteering in a school to help with reading etc if you have a gap year before applying for teacher training. I hope not as only the rich can afford volunteering and gap yah's

I disagree - volunteering in a residential or nursing home for a couple of hours after school one day to support with activities is not only open to the rich.

And the gap year was more an example. A friend of mine worked for a couple of years before she applied for teacher training and she still managed to volunteer for a couple of hours one evening a week with a youth group.

All relevant and shows that you are focussed and enthusiastic about what you want to study.

I have a friend who does interviews at Oxford. They like students who have had part time jobs as it shows they have applied themselves whilst studying & have focus & drive.

Extra curriculars are fun and should be done for pleasure, surely it’s good if x plays sport and enjoys it or if y plays the trumpet.

Things like volunteering for St John’s Ambulance are available to anyone unless they have caring responsibilities and if they do their school should note that on the student’s application.

Lots of myths and snobbery on here.

To be clear, teacher training is generally postgrad and experience is actively required so that is a bit different. Very few schools take unpaid volunteers these days so most people seek out internships (largely for STEM aspirants) or working as a TA , or just observing really. Younger students might work in a nursey type setting, or do work experience.

I hope with covid even less emphasis is put on this kind of thing as it has been hard to impossible to sort out for many young people.

It probably depends on the course you are applying for, and whether your extra-curricular activities are relevant to the course or not (vocational ones in particular).

@Ironoaks

(I have heard that Durham is interested in things like being head girl or playing hockey for the county. They provide the opportunity to submit a separate personal statement which has more of an extracurricular focus than the general UCAS statement)

This is not the case. The alternate statement at Durham is for those that have applied for a different course at Durham than they have for other unis.

It was true, back in the days of UCCA and when nearly every university interviewed for nearly every course

I think it changed a lot when there were the big changes (polys becoming universities, UCCA to UCAS) and it also went in step with also because of the general decline in interviewing.

Changes such as this sometimes take a while to filter through (and I think university transfer, along with careers advice, is one of the areas where some schools still perform quite badly and outdated advice can still be found). Also parents will remember what was important in their pre-1992 admission, and think it still applies

I don’t think they are important unless they directly relate to the subject. So music wouldn’t be particularly relevant if you wanted to study medicine, but experience in a nursing home would be. Where applicants are interviewed, they are looking for the suitability of the candidate to thrive in that particular environment. It’s entirely possible for an average student to achieve straight A’s through hard work, but that’s often not what they’re looking for. They are very skilled in asking the right questions to see if a student has genuine ability in their chosen area of study, other than than being able to regurgitate information from a text book. They know pretty quickly who can cut it and who can’t.

@SeasonFinale

This is not the case. The alternate statement at Durham is for those that have applied for a different course at Durham than they have for other unis.

That would make a lot more sense.

I applied to UCCA in early 1980s - I can't remember much about the Personal Statement part but I'm sure I put down extra curricular activities and didn't stress my 'passion' for the subject or even highlight any extra reading/courses etc I had done. I applied to 4 universities, interviews and then offers for 1st & 2nd choices (we had to rank them in preference order on the form) and was offered places without interview at 3 & 4.
I then applied for a PGCE and was interviewed - I did get experience in the holidays in a primary school but I don't think it was stipulated as essential before applying.

E.g volunteering in a nursing home if you want to study a healthcare related degree, volunteering in a school to help with reading etc if you have a gap year before applying for teacher training.
I hope not as only the rich can afford volunteering and gap yah's

Rubbish! Of course poor kids take gap years precisely because they are poor. Gap yrs aren’t just about jetting off to India to wash elephants, many take gap yrs to work locally because they have responsibilities at home or are trying to save a bit towards cost of uni.

As someone who recruits grads into a prestigious industry I’d say actual work in a cafe, shop, nursing home, childcare etc trumps D of E, grade 8 piano etc.

Being able to hold down a job, work with adults etc is very valuable - I realise that’s tough at the moment but even washing cars etc shows a bit of get up and go