The Problem with Defining your Passion

Why has the standard for college admissions become the ability to prove that you’ve immersed yourself in a single subject? Why are students urged to define and demonstrate their passion?

I’ve found my peers stressing over completing extracurricular activities like working an internship, founding a startup, starting a club or a business to prove to colleges they know what they want. This hyper-focused way of navigating high school strikes me as a problem for two major reasons:

1) It perpetuates the idea that high school is a game, its sole purpose being to gather items on your resumé to get into college.

2) It prevents students from exploring all of their interests. For God’s sake, we’re high schoolers! I find it cruel that they expect us to forgo our curiosity in exchange for a narrow, career-prep set of activities.

I’m not even certain if it’s solely the colleges urging us to pursue activities in one category; it could very well be parents, counselors, and the education system, all giving us an impossible standard to reach. It used to be “you’ll get into this school if you get good grades!” That’s not enough anymore. That statement evolved into “you’ll get into this school if you get good grades and good test scores!” That’s not enough anymore. Then it became “okay, you’ll get into this school if you get great grades, great test scores, and participate in a bunch of clubs. (Note: If you’re feeling annoyed that this sentence structure keeps repeating and seems like it just won’t end, good! That’s how we feel about the bar continuously being raised without a chance for us to reach it!) And here we are in the present day: “you may have a shot if you get stellar grades, stellar scores, steller letter of recommendations, and here’s the kicker that oftentimes decides it all: quality, career oriented activities that align with your intended major. That’s just stupid. Sorry if I want to spend my time going on hikes. Sorry if I want to spend my time hanging out with friends, babysitting, playing sports, walking dogs, or anything remotely applicable to being a teenager. The education system is robbing us of our childhood, prematurely cutting our days of genuine happiness short.

The skills you learn from hobbies and activities outside of a designated career path are far too valuable for us to miss out on. Not only do they help you destress and think about other things besides college, but also help you explore new things about yourself. Take this blog for example; none of us want to do anything in college remotely close to psychology, but we have both been very close with people with mental health issues, and know its importance. We are doing this for our loved ones and our community because we hope at least something you gain from one of these articles impacts your life for the better.

Granted, all schools don't have these high expectations, and I am not saying they do. But many of the ones I’m applying to, and many of the ones that a lot of you are applying to/attend/will apply to follow this same principle. I mean they’re the ones taking the loss too. They’re stripping us of so much of our curiosity before we even attend their schools.

I’m truly sorry to the people who’ve had their childlike sparks put out by society for this reason. Please do what you love. If you do, you’ll end up in a place meant for you. If you have any thoughts on this issue, please DM us or leave us a comment on our instagram.