Honors

“Honors” are any award you have won for academic, extracurricular, community service, or professional achievement since ninth grade (or international equivalent). You can also include publications or character/sportsmanship awards. You can include up to 5 honors in the Education section of the Common App. Avoid listing any extracurricular activities in this section, as there is a separate Common App category for this. We recommend trying to list as many honors as possible.

Reminder: French schools and French associations often do not give out awards or honors in the same way that American equivalents do. This means you might need to be a bit more creative in how you fill out this section. For example, you might include being recognized for a particularly high grade you received on an essay or in a class. If you are stuck, consult your mentor to help you fill out this section to the greatest extent possible!

Exercise 1: Create your list of Honors

Write down a list from newest to the oldest, and Most Significant (International Recognition) to Less Significant (School/Regional Recognition). At this time, do not be worried about the character limit or description. We will hone that later on.

We strongly recommend that you write out your honors in a separate document (remember to save it!). You will Copy & Paste these honors into the Common App after many careful rounds of editing. This helps you save your work in case the Common App glitches, catches spelling errors, and edit the phrasing to maximize impact!

Example List of Honors:

2nd Place, Quidditch World Cup Tournament (July 2025)
Dean’s List (2023 – 2022)
Gryffindor House Prefect (2024-2025)
1st Place Winner of the Triwizard Tournament (2023)
Assisted Professor Snape in conducting lab experiments into the psychological effects of taking Polyjuice Potion. The scientific article was published in Potions Quarterly (2022)

Exercise 2: Refining your Descriptions

Now that you’ve created your preliminary list, it’s time to make sure each section meets the character limit. Each section can be up to 100 characters, including spaces. Take advantage of all 100 characters to fully describe your accomplishment.

A couple of suggestions for completing this section:

To make the most of the limited space, list the title of the honor first, then describe the accomplishment using phrases rather than whole sentences. You can separate the title and description with colons (“:”) or dashes (“—”).
Try to quantify your accomplishment if possible. If you were given an award or scholarship or won a competition, you might want to describe how many other competitors were involved or in what percentage you ranked. This is your chance to show off!
When you Copy & Paste this honor into the Common App, you will have a separate place to include what years of high school this award applied to and what level of achievement (school, local, national, international, etc). Avoid listing years, grades, or levels into the description unless you believe doing so is necessary to increase understanding of the honor’s nature.
If you are describing a research project or publication, you should list the name of the study, your supervisor, the publication name and date, and if possible, a brief description of your role.

Example List of Honors:

2nd Place, Quidditch World Cup Tournament (Youth Division): competed against 16 international teams
Dean’s List: awarded to 10% of students with the highest GPAs
Gryffindor House Prefect: supervise residential affairs and social activities for 100 students
Winner of the Triwizard Tournament: competition tested wizarding abilities and physical endurance
“Physical Effects of Polyjuice Potion” (Potions Quarterly, Volume 112): Supervised by Prof. Snape

Now you try!

I recommend that you share this list of honors with your mentor. Only after careful editing can these honors be Copied & Pasted into the Honors section of the Common App.

Extracurricular Activities, Work Experience, and Family Responsibilities

In the “Activities” section of the Common App, you have the opportunity to list up-to 10 activities that you do outside of the classroom. These can include extracurricular activities such as arts or music, clubs, athletics, or hobbies, public service opportunities, or jobs. You can also list familial responsibilities such as caring for children, supervising younger siblings, or routinely taking care of household tasks. The admissions committee simply wants to learn more about how you use your time outside of school.

Exercise 1: Create your list of activities

A couple of reminders:

Try to take advantage of this opportunity to tell the admission committee about yourself by writing down something for all 10 activities.
Do not worry about the titles or descriptions; we will hone that in the next exercise.
You can include activities that have been related to school, such as your work on a school council. Do not list activities related to your coursework, such as completing homework or writing essays.
Like you did for honors, we recommend you write and edit your activities in a separate document. You will Copy & Paste these activities into the Common App when they have been thoroughly edited!

Example List of Activities:

Theater Society
First Chair Clarinetist in high school concert band
Provide daily child care to my younger siblings after school on school nights
Pumpkin Festival Lead Organizer; led group of 5-person student committee to plan annual community event; raised €5,000 for children with cancer

Exercise 2: Take a Moment to Reflect

Most U.S. colleges do not require students to submit résumés. This means that your activities list is the most important section for telling admissions officers how you spend your time. Your activities list is a good way to show your readers what is important to you, how you spend your time, and complement the point you are trying to communicate in your writing requirements. For example, if you describe how excited you are to participate in public service while in college, make sure that your prior public service experiences are heavily featured in your activities list! Have you listed everything you need to?

Now you try: When creating the second draft of your activities list, place the most recent and most significant activities first (1) and the oldest and less significant activities last (10). Activities that are ongoing should be listed higher than those that you have since completed.

Exercise 3: Refining your Descriptions

We recommend that you take advantage of this section by maximizing your description of each activity.

For each activity, you must list:

Activity Type (see drop-down options in the “Activity” section of the Common App);
Position/Leadership Description (50 characters maximum);
Organization Name (100 characters maximum);
The hours per week and weeks per year that you have dedicated to this activity;
and a description of the activity and your notable accomplishments (150 characters maximum).

Now you try! In the same document as your activity list, write out the Position/Leadership Description, Organization Name, and Activity Description for each of your activities. Please follow the structure of the sample activity description below. When you are done, share the document with your mentor for edits.

Table 1. Sample Activity Description

Activity 1:

Activity Type: Theater [Drop down option]

Position/Leadership Description (Max characters: 50): President (12), Social Chair (11), caste (9-12)

Organization Name (Max characters: 100): High School Theater Society

Activity Description (Max characters: 150): Cast in several high school productions (A Midsummer’s Night Dream, Puck, ‘24; Beauty and the Beast, Bell, ‘23; The Addams Family, Wednesday, ‘22)

Participation Grade Levels: 9, 10, 11, 12 [Choose as many as apply]

Timing of Participation: During the school year

Hours spent per week: 10

Weeks spent per year: 8

I intend to participate in a similar activity in college: Yes [select either Yes or No]