Aren’t most of these ‘pay to play’ ? There are very few that move the needle that my kid is not competitive for like RSI at MIT, COSMOS, TASS etc.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous[b wrote:]The vast majority (other than Chicago[/b]) provide no advantage at that particular school. They may be useful in giving a student exposure to an area of interest, which could help a "why major" essay (and be helpful generally).

This is true. Yale Young Global
Scholars is a legit competitive program worth looking into but did not help
Most participants in getting in

It used to. Later they increased it to multiple sessions, on campus and virtual, …to admit a lot of students. Now it is not useful anymore.

Plus it costs 7k for 2 weeks. It’s slightly more competitive pay to play.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's one that is noticeably absent whenever this comes up. As if people are unwilling to share the secret. I wish I heard about it earlier because DS would have liked to get into that school (he didn't), but now I'm on the hunt for others for my younger child.

What’s the school?

PP knows the secret and won’t share. She just wants to troll DCUM.

My kid is

But the school isn’t very selective, the summer program is not expensive & it’s mostly for career exploration. And to check out if the dining hall is consistently edible, lol.

There are residential summer programs/camps that are under 1.5k (sometimes much, much less) if the goal is career exploration. If in DMV, UMW has a great sounding program where a kid can pick a few areas to learn about vs very focused. Or GMU has a few options (game design & math & language) plus a few more expendive ones that earn credit. VT has STEM/data science. I think UMD has a few? Milwaukee School of Engineering has some solid options for…engineering. Susquehanna has music, writing & entrepreneurship options (it’s rare to find a business option not $$$$$).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous[b wrote:]The vast majority (other than Chicago[/b]) provide no advantage at that particular school. They may be useful in giving a student exposure to an area of interest, which could help a "why major" essay (and be helpful generally).

This is true. Yale Young Global
Scholars is a legit competitive program worth looking into but did not help
Most participants in getting in

It used to. Later they increased it to multiple sessions, on campus and virtual, …to admit a lot of students. Now it is not useful anymore.

Anonymous wrote:There's one that is noticeably absent whenever this comes up. As if people are unwilling to share the secret. I wish I heard about it earlier because DS would have liked to get into that school (he didn't), but now I'm on the hunt for others for my younger child.

What’s the school?

There's one that is noticeably absent whenever this comes up. As if people are unwilling to share the secret. I wish I heard about it earlier because DS would have liked to get into that school (he didn't), but now I'm on the hunt for others for my younger child.

Anonymous wrote:From what I understand, the summer programs are run by outside organizations cashing in on false hope. They rent the spaces from the schools and hire the teachers independently.

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There are both. Many colleges rent the space AND have some of their own programming. The former is no use for anything, except maybe for the student to figure out if they like the subject and the type of campus (but not the particular school, since a summer session vibe is pretty different than the vibe during the school year).

A lot of kids believe the Boston University summer program provides a leg-up for getting into BU. Not sure there's data on that but anecdotally know of kids who got in after doing that program who weren't super talented academically.

You can do "Running Start" at UW Seattle and I've heard it can be helpful.

Anonymous[b wrote:]The vast majority (other than Chicago[/b]) provide no advantage at that particular school. They may be useful in giving a student exposure to an area of interest, which could help a "why major" essay (and be helpful generally).

This is true. Yale Young Global
Scholars is a legit competitive program worth looking into but did not help
Most participants in getting in

They are a cash cow and do not improve one’s chances.

From what I understand, the summer programs are run by outside organizations cashing in on false hope. They rent the spaces from the schools and hire the teachers independently.

The vast majority (other than Chicago) provide no advantage at that particular school. They may be useful in giving a student exposure to an area of interest, which could help a "why major" essay (and be helpful generally).

We are starting to get mail. Pros? Cons? They are not cheap. Do they really give applicants an advantage?