12 Extracurricular Activities for Your Resume in 2027 (With Example Lines)

Oct 4

Updated November 2026

TL;DR

The 12 extracurricular activities that strengthen a high school resume most are founding or leading a club, student government, debate or Model UN, the school newspaper, a part-time job, a remote internship, tutoring, organizing an event, robotics or coding projects, running social media, sustained volunteering and an independent project or small business. Picking the activity is only half the work. The other half is writing each one as a single line with a verb, a scope and a result, even if the result is a modest number. Start by rewriting three activities already on your resume that way.

Most advice about extracurriculars is written for admissions officers. What sets a strong resume line apart for an internship manager or small business owner is proof that something exists because you were there. Each activity below lists the skill an employer reads it for and an example line to adapt.

Building the rest of your resume? See Ladder's guides to building a high school resume, making extracurriculars sound professional and building a LinkedIn profile in high school.

Which extracurricular activities look best on a resume?

The best ones show responsibility, an outcome and time, so pick the role inside an activity, not just the activity.

Activity	What an employer reads it as	Strongest proof to include
Founding or leading a club	Works without supervision	Membership growth
Student government	Negotiates with authority	A change you got approved
Debate or Model UN	Communication under pressure	Rankings and field size
School newspaper	Writes to deadlines	Articles published, editing role
Part-time job	Holds a real commitment	Hours a week, trained others
Remote internship	Can work inside an organization	The project and who it was for
Tutoring	Explains ideas, patience	Students and duration
Fundraiser or event	Plans and coordinates	Amount raised, headcount
Robotics or coding	Builds working things	A live link and users
Social media	Drives an outcome	Before-and-after on a goal
Sustained volunteering	Reliability	Years and total hours
Independent project or business	Initiative	Sales, subscribers or users

What makes an extracurricular activity resume-worthy?

Three signals: responsibility (treasurer beats member, founder beats treasurer), an outcome (41 attendees against last year's 26 beats "successful event") and time (two years says more than six weeks). The National Association of Colleges and Employers lists communication, teamwork and critical thinking among the career-readiness competencies employers look for, and those show up through the three signals, not the activity's name.

Two students in the same club can write very different resume lines. If your activities don't give you an outcome yet, take on one defined responsibility inside something you already do.

1. Founding or leading a club for your resume

Starting something from nothing covers recruiting, scheduling and keeping people engaged after the novelty wears off, so an employer reads it as evidence you can operate without supervision. Attach the growth, not just the title.

Example: "Founded and led the school's Film Society, growing membership from 6 to 34 over two years and running a monthly screening series averaging 20 attendees."

2. Student government on your resume

The useful part is rarely the title and almost always the project you pushed through, because getting anything approved means working with administrators who can say no. Lead with what you changed.

Example: "Junior Class Representative. Surveyed 180 students and proposed a revised exam-week schedule that the administration adopted."

3. Debate or Model UN on your resume

Both train you to build an argument fast and defend it, and competitive results are hard evidence of communication skills rather than a claim. Quantify the field, since "competed in debate" says nothing about level.

Example: "Varsity Policy Debate, 3 years. Ranked top 15 of 120+ competitors at the state championship and coached six first-year debaters."

4. The school newspaper on your resume

Writing to someone else's deadline is a workplace skill, and editing adds the harder part: telling a classmate their piece isn't running. Name your output and any editing responsibility.

Example: "Staff Writer, then Features Editor, The Tribune. Published 24 articles over two years and edited a team of five writers to a biweekly deadline."

5. A part-time job on your resume

Don't leave retail or food service off because it feels unrelated: a manager knows exactly what a Saturday shift demands, from showing up on time to handling an annoyed customer. Translate shifts into responsibilities.

Example: "Barista, Corner Coffee, 14 hours a week alongside full-time school. Trained three new hires on opening procedures and handled closing cash counts."

6. A remote internship on your resume

An internship already speaks the reader's language, with a supervisor, a scope and a delivery date, so it removes the guesswork about whether you can work inside an organization. Describe the project and its purpose, not just the company name.

Example: "Marketing Intern (remote), [Company], 8 weeks. Built a competitor messaging analysis across nine products and presented recommendations to the founding team."

7. Tutoring on your resume

Teaching proves you understand a subject and builds patience with frustrated people, which carries over to customer-facing work. Paid or volunteer matters less than how many students and for how long, so track both.

Example: "Math tutor, 11 students over 18 months, including three weekly long-term students."

8. Organizing a fundraiser or event on your resume

Events come with numbers built in: a target, a date, a headcount and a total raised. Running one end to end covers budgeting, coordination and persuading people to show up. Put the hardest number first.

Example: "Organized the annual charity 5K, raising $4,200 against a $3,000 goal, with 12 volunteers, three local sponsors and 140 registered runners."

9. Robotics, hackathons or coding projects on your resume

Technical work produces something a reader can open, so a link is worth more than any adjective, and a finished project beats a long list of technologies you've touched. Say what it does and for whom.

Example: "Built a class-scheduling tool used by 60+ students at my school (React, Firebase). Placed 2nd of 31 teams at [Hackathon]. [Project link]"

10. Running social media on your resume

Small businesses often need exactly this skill, but "ran the Instagram" means nothing without movement attached. Follower counts are weak evidence; a before-and-after on what the organization cared about is strong.

Example: "Managed social media for the school theater program, growing the account from 300 to 1,900 followers and helping lift advance ticket sales 40% across two productions."

11. Sustained volunteering on your resume

The word doing the work is "sustained": a one-off service day is nearly invisible, while two years of the same shift shows reliability an interview can't test. Lead with duration and hours.

Example: "Volunteer, City Food Bank, 2 years (about 180 hours). Promoted to shift lead, coordinating six volunteers per session and training new arrivals."

12. An independent project or small business on your resume

Anything you built because nobody told you to, like a newsletter, resale shop or podcast, is the cleanest signal of initiative, since no one else put you there. Give the scale honestly; a modest real number beats a vague big claim.

Example: "Founded a vintage clothing resale shop on Depop: 240 sales and about $3,100 in revenue over 14 months, handling sourcing, pricing, photos and customer service."

How do you list extracurricular activities on a resume?

Put them under "Leadership and Activities" after Education, and move a serious internship, job or business you run into an Experience section. Each entry needs four things:

A role, such as Treasurer or Founder.
The organization.
A date range.
One line with a verb and a result.

Then cut hard: drop anything from before ninth grade and any line whose only verb is "participated." Keep four or five entries on one page, since three strong ones beat seven weak ones. Keep a running note of dates, headcounts and totals as they happen, because you won't remember them next spring.

Do extracurricular activities on a resume matter for college and internships?

Yes: at your stage they usually carry most of the document, and the same verb-scope-result lines work on applications, LinkedIn and in interviews. The gap between a weak resume and a strong one is usually a rewriting problem, not a participation problem.

School clubs rarely hand you a measurable outcome, which is where structured work helps. Ladder Internships places high school students in remote, eight-week start-up internships, where they work on a real project with a company coach and present a final deliverable, with full financial aid available.

Common questions about extracurricular activities for a resume

Should you put extracurriculars on a resume?

Yes. Employers hiring students don't expect formal work history, so they read activities as evidence of communication, teamwork and follow-through. List them as work you did, not memberships.

How many extracurriculars should you list?

Four or five, and fewer if those are strong. A long list pushes your best entry down the page and suggests you can't tell which activities mattered.

Do online activities count on a resume?

Yes, if something exists at the end that another person could look at, such as a remote internship, an open-source contribution or a newsletter with real subscribers. Watching a video course on its own isn't an activity.

Where can you get resume-ready experience in high school?

Try a structured internship. Ladder Internships runs remote, eight-week start-up internships for high school students worldwide, at 5 to 10 hours a week, with a company coach and full financial aid available. The next deadline is November 15, 2026, for the Winter I cohort starting December 7, 2026.

Dhruva Bhat

Dhruva Bhat is one of the co-founders of Ladder, and a Harvard College graduate. Dhruva founded Ladder Internships as a DPhil candidate and Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University, with a vision to bridge the gap between ambitious students and real-world startup experiences.