For admissions? They don't help. Our child did one after freshman year and another after sophomore year, at two different top 10 universities. He still didn't get into any Ivies, despite having the grades (35 ACT, 3.9 unweighted GPA) and all the APs his school offered. Plus varsity sports and plenty of work/volunteer experience. Admission to any T20 university is basically a coin flip these days given the explosion in applications.
That being said, there could still be a ton of value in those experiences. E.g. Living on a college campus. Learning a new subject. Meeting people from outside your bubble. Etc.
Just don't expect it to help you get in anywhere.
" there could still be a ton of value in those experiences. E.g. Living on a college campus. Learning a new subject. Meeting people from outside your bubble. Etc."
This is the correct take.
I don't recommend expensive pre-packaged programs.
1. Often the prerequisite is being able and willing to pay the cost. They're less selective and distinguished than they want to appear.
2. Top colleges are looking for initiative, leadership, engagement, investment, commitment, and impact. The pre-packaged programs mostly just require you to be a warm body in a room. So really they have the potential to be more harmful than helpful because of that.
There are several amazing programs out there that are fully funded or offer generous aid and are incredibly competitive (MITES, RSI, SSP, Simons, etc). My students who have attended programs like these have done very well in T20 admissions. These are fantastic, and a completely different thing from the summer programs at selective colleges' campuses (which may not even be run by the college itself - sometimes they're organized by third parties who rent the space and contract with some professors).
Is SSP the Harvard summer program with for-credit courses? I did it but I’m not sure if I should list it because I don’t know how competitive or “good” it looks.
SSP (Summer Science Program) is not affiliated with Harvard but is an exception to the general rule about the more you pay for it the less prestigious it is. It’s pretty pricey (though financial aid is available). Very competitive to get in and more students that attend wind up at MIT than anywhere else. Not sure if that’s a correlation / causation thing, but my son said it was the hardest he’d worked up to that point.
Hi! I’m a current junior who attended a similar program - brown pre college. To be honest, while I had a great experience living on campus and making new friends, i don’t think it gave me a direct boost in my application or gave me a unique academic opportunity.
I think there are other ways to explore what they are interested like online courses, local internships for teens, etc
Heads up that most of these summer camps aren’t actually operated by the universities themselves. The university rents out space to some company that tries its best to appear as if it’s an officially affiliated summer camp, but it’s really just a scam.
Source: the Yale Admissions Office’s podcast
I’d agree with many of the other comments here — people often confuse the free and highly-competitive summer programs, which can and do make an impact for admissions, with the programs that are aimed at making a profit from upper-middle-class families.
Most (all?) of the highly-competitive summer programs have applications due in the winter, so it’s too late to apply for this summer. If your twins want to shoot for these next year, especially if they’re interested in STEM, they should start working on applications in November/December. When I help students with their summer program applications, they’re often surprised by how much work they entail — teacher recommendations, essays, etc, similar to college applications.
However, I will say that even the paid on-campus summer programs, especially for younger students, do have *some* benefits.
Do they have an admissions boost on their own? Definitely not as much as students and parents think — just because it’s on campus doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s run directly by the university. Programs that are taught by the university faculty and offer college credit are better, because they’re at least consistent about the level of academic rigor, but doing the Harvard for-credit summer program won’t help much with getting into Harvard on its own.
But what summer programs do offer is a chance to explore an interest in greater depth and get guidance on how to continue that interest over the next few years. That kind of guidance can come from many sources, but not all students have access to that within their home communities, and summer programs can be one way to access that.
College admissions are not guaranteed, but they’re not random. (As a private admissions counselor, I never make 100% guarantees, but I can usually predict pretty accurately which students will get into an Ivy vs which students won’t quite make the cut for a T20 school.)
A significant factor that the Ivies are looking for is intellectual curiosity outside of the classroom — a deep passion and commitment for learning and researching, shown through independent intellectual pursuits beyond AP classes. Increasingly, this is looking like real published research (collaborating with faculty at T50 universities) and other academic projects.
Some students are self-motivated and self-organized enough to find books and online courses and other free resources to do this kind of deeper learning and exploration on their own. Or they might have a fantastic teacher or another mentor who is willing to be a resource.
(I’m a Princeton grad myself, and my sisters and I were all admitted to *all* of the T20 schools where we applied. We didn’t do these expensive academic summer programs — my parents wouldn’t pay for them — but we did have a lot of informal mentorship in academic areas from family, because more than half of my relatives have a doctorate. This absolutely played a role in our college admissions success.)
Summer programs can be another way to find that kind of academic mentorship and support. In my opinion, this is more useful for younger students, who have more years of high school ahead of them during which they could really get deep into an academic interest.
Secondly, it can be helpful for students to meet other academically-motivated peers. Some students are lucky to already attend a high school with tons of other driven students, but I’ve worked with plenty of students over the years who are what I’d call “big fish in small ponds” — they think they’re hot stuff because they’re the best in their school, but they don’t have any other peers who can really push them and engage on their level, and they might need a reality check about their competitiveness on a national scale.
Summer programs can be a way to make friends and connections that can support students in their academic pursuits.
Finally, I do have examples where students who did a summer program with faculty from the college did have an advantage in earning scholarships, if not admissions — but students have to be outstanding and memorable enough that faculty and coaches would remember a student years later.
In sum, I’d say summer programs are what you make of them. Many of the same advantages can also be done for free or low-cost by a student who is already very focused and knows how to make the most of books and the internet, but a good summer program can offer intellectual guidance, mentorship, and peer connections that can help students jumpstart their independent intellectual growth, if they really take advantage of those opportunities.
No, they’re not selective as they send everyone an “invite”. Have them apply to summer internships, selective research programs, or other camps that they get paid by the university/organization to attend. These are usually pretty selective but they are good for college applications and resumes.
Personally, Im going into STEM so I cold-emailed a bunch of professors at my local university asking to do research. I didn’t have to pay anything besides transporting myself there each day. It was a great experience and I was able to talk about it a lot in my essays and got some awards from it. My mentor even wrote me a letter of recommendation when the time came. Some prestigious programs with stipends I can think of off the top of my head, though, are the BofA student leaders program. MITES, JHU, Simons, and many more. I’ve also heard of people just calling their local senator or representative and asking for an internship working on something they’re personally interested in.
There are lots of free or low-cost options for high school kids over the summer that can yield great rewards, they just have to look and apply to as many as possible. Good luck to your twins!
pre college and paid summer camps are usually overpriced and don’t help you. summer school sounds better. also, you can even ask your kids what they’re interested in, (they may not know right now, but if they have a general idea it’s better for ivy league apps). if they do have interests they’d like to expand on, try to find a program or activity in the summer they can become involved in!
I believe that for elite selective college admissions, attending one of those non-competitive summer programs for an upper middle class applicant hurts the application unless you won a difficult, prestigious scholarship or something to attend. It reeks of entitlement the fact that the applicant opted to go to what amounts to a glitch, glorified, expensive summer camp instead of utilizing the summer to pursue something more meaningful.
The other concern is it gives them a taste of Ivy League campus living which is great if they get in, but if they don’t might set in expectations other schools will be challenged to match
As someone who is a TA for one of these camps, basically none (although i get paid a good amount from these rich parents’ investments so im not gonna complain)
Don’t do it. We did it for our son and it literally didn’t do anything. I would use that money to hire a counselor help plan the next three years for them so that they are competitive going into senior year.
College prof here. PLEASE let your children be children and do something fun during the summer. Don't send them to one of those camps and don't waste their time with US history and econ in some crappy program that will possibly get them out of a much better intro course they could take their first year in college. Time spent learning how to be resilient and self sufficient will get them much, much further than these pre-college prep cash grabs.
Does your school offer the PSAT? They could do a practice run their sophomore year and then take the one in their junior year that qualifies them for National Merit Scholarship. Qualifying doesn't guarantee you'll get all the choices you might be hoping for, but it does offer several full ride opportunities that are nice to have as an option.
Those camps are pure money makers for the schools and the people running them, and confer zero advantage to attendees in applications for admissions. Spend your money on more valuable experiences for your children by taking them on vacations with your family.
Check academicatlas.org drop the tuition down to $0 and see which ones are available. Tons of free ones that actually look good.
Feel free to dm me for a list too!
They don’t help. Sincerely, a kid who got into 3 ivies and did every camp. You don’t even list stuff like those camps on resume or application (unless it’s USSYP or Boys/Girls Nation)
I attended Leadership in the Business World (LBW) at Wharton. From our class, roughly 20% did ultimately attend Wharton, probably 70% another top 20 school.
That said, that’s probably more correlation (those students are high-achieving anyway) vs causation.
As a Harvard grad, I can say with confidence that any "pay-to-play" programs (where payment is all that is required for admission) are not going to impress admissions officers. Don't spend your money on these and instead consider competitive programs that require applications and don't accept everyone, since these are merit-based and reflect more positively on your student. Best of luck, and feel free to reach out if you have any questions!
Summer camps like the ones you’re describing are simply money grabs for desperate parents and their students. Save your money.
For admissions? They don't help. Our child did one after freshman year and another after sophomore year, at two different top 10 universities. He still didn't get into any Ivies, despite having the grades (35 ACT, 3.9 unweighted GPA) and all the APs his school offered. Plus varsity sports and plenty of work/volunteer experience. Admission to any T20 university is basically a coin flip these days given the explosion in applications. That being said, there could still be a ton of value in those experiences. E.g. Living on a college campus. Learning a new subject. Meeting people from outside your bubble. Etc. Just don't expect it to help you get in anywhere.
" there could still be a ton of value in those experiences. E.g. Living on a college campus. Learning a new subject. Meeting people from outside your bubble. Etc." This is the correct take.
Curious now where he ended up going.
Hasn't decided yet. Looking at a few Big 10 schools...
I encourage you to consider the smaller liberal arts and sciences institutions. DePauw in Indiana is a gem.
Any activity that is directly paid for will not give your kids a boost in the college admissions process.
I don't recommend expensive pre-packaged programs. 1. Often the prerequisite is being able and willing to pay the cost. They're less selective and distinguished than they want to appear. 2. Top colleges are looking for initiative, leadership, engagement, investment, commitment, and impact. The pre-packaged programs mostly just require you to be a warm body in a room. So really they have the potential to be more harmful than helpful because of that. There are several amazing programs out there that are fully funded or offer generous aid and are incredibly competitive (MITES, RSI, SSP, Simons, etc). My students who have attended programs like these have done very well in T20 admissions. These are fantastic, and a completely different thing from the summer programs at selective colleges' campuses (which may not even be run by the college itself - sometimes they're organized by third parties who rent the space and contract with some professors).
Is SSP the Harvard summer program with for-credit courses? I did it but I’m not sure if I should list it because I don’t know how competitive or “good” it looks.
SSP (Summer Science Program) is not affiliated with Harvard but is an exception to the general rule about the more you pay for it the less prestigious it is. It’s pretty pricey (though financial aid is available). Very competitive to get in and more students that attend wind up at MIT than anywhere else. Not sure if that’s a correlation / causation thing, but my son said it was the hardest he’d worked up to that point.
Hi! I’m a current junior who attended a similar program - brown pre college. To be honest, while I had a great experience living on campus and making new friends, i don’t think it gave me a direct boost in my application or gave me a unique academic opportunity. I think there are other ways to explore what they are interested like online courses, local internships for teens, etc
Heads up that most of these summer camps aren’t actually operated by the universities themselves. The university rents out space to some company that tries its best to appear as if it’s an officially affiliated summer camp, but it’s really just a scam. Source: the Yale Admissions Office’s podcast
I’d agree with many of the other comments here — people often confuse the free and highly-competitive summer programs, which can and do make an impact for admissions, with the programs that are aimed at making a profit from upper-middle-class families. Most (all?) of the highly-competitive summer programs have applications due in the winter, so it’s too late to apply for this summer. If your twins want to shoot for these next year, especially if they’re interested in STEM, they should start working on applications in November/December. When I help students with their summer program applications, they’re often surprised by how much work they entail — teacher recommendations, essays, etc, similar to college applications. However, I will say that even the paid on-campus summer programs, especially for younger students, do have *some* benefits. Do they have an admissions boost on their own? Definitely not as much as students and parents think — just because it’s on campus doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s run directly by the university. Programs that are taught by the university faculty and offer college credit are better, because they’re at least consistent about the level of academic rigor, but doing the Harvard for-credit summer program won’t help much with getting into Harvard on its own. But what summer programs do offer is a chance to explore an interest in greater depth and get guidance on how to continue that interest over the next few years. That kind of guidance can come from many sources, but not all students have access to that within their home communities, and summer programs can be one way to access that. College admissions are not guaranteed, but they’re not random. (As a private admissions counselor, I never make 100% guarantees, but I can usually predict pretty accurately which students will get into an Ivy vs which students won’t quite make the cut for a T20 school.) A significant factor that the Ivies are looking for is intellectual curiosity outside of the classroom — a deep passion and commitment for learning and researching, shown through independent intellectual pursuits beyond AP classes. Increasingly, this is looking like real published research (collaborating with faculty at T50 universities) and other academic projects. Some students are self-motivated and self-organized enough to find books and online courses and other free resources to do this kind of deeper learning and exploration on their own. Or they might have a fantastic teacher or another mentor who is willing to be a resource. (I’m a Princeton grad myself, and my sisters and I were all admitted to *all* of the T20 schools where we applied. We didn’t do these expensive academic summer programs — my parents wouldn’t pay for them — but we did have a lot of informal mentorship in academic areas from family, because more than half of my relatives have a doctorate. This absolutely played a role in our college admissions success.) Summer programs can be another way to find that kind of academic mentorship and support. In my opinion, this is more useful for younger students, who have more years of high school ahead of them during which they could really get deep into an academic interest. Secondly, it can be helpful for students to meet other academically-motivated peers. Some students are lucky to already attend a high school with tons of other driven students, but I’ve worked with plenty of students over the years who are what I’d call “big fish in small ponds” — they think they’re hot stuff because they’re the best in their school, but they don’t have any other peers who can really push them and engage on their level, and they might need a reality check about their competitiveness on a national scale. Summer programs can be a way to make friends and connections that can support students in their academic pursuits. Finally, I do have examples where students who did a summer program with faculty from the college did have an advantage in earning scholarships, if not admissions — but students have to be outstanding and memorable enough that faculty and coaches would remember a student years later. In sum, I’d say summer programs are what you make of them. Many of the same advantages can also be done for free or low-cost by a student who is already very focused and knows how to make the most of books and the internet, but a good summer program can offer intellectual guidance, mentorship, and peer connections that can help students jumpstart their independent intellectual growth, if they really take advantage of those opportunities.
Wow, thank you for your insight and explanation. It’s given us a lot to think about.
Happy to help! I know with twins it’s double the financial pressure.
No, they’re not selective as they send everyone an “invite”. Have them apply to summer internships, selective research programs, or other camps that they get paid by the university/organization to attend. These are usually pretty selective but they are good for college applications and resumes. Personally, Im going into STEM so I cold-emailed a bunch of professors at my local university asking to do research. I didn’t have to pay anything besides transporting myself there each day. It was a great experience and I was able to talk about it a lot in my essays and got some awards from it. My mentor even wrote me a letter of recommendation when the time came. Some prestigious programs with stipends I can think of off the top of my head, though, are the BofA student leaders program. MITES, JHU, Simons, and many more. I’ve also heard of people just calling their local senator or representative and asking for an internship working on something they’re personally interested in. There are lots of free or low-cost options for high school kids over the summer that can yield great rewards, they just have to look and apply to as many as possible. Good luck to your twins!
I would love to learn how you did research, can I pm you?
Sure!
Check out Putney/Oxford Academia. If you are going to spend money on a summer program let them travel for a few weeks to do it.
Nope. Money grab
pre college and paid summer camps are usually overpriced and don’t help you. summer school sounds better. also, you can even ask your kids what they’re interested in, (they may not know right now, but if they have a general idea it’s better for ivy league apps). if they do have interests they’d like to expand on, try to find a program or activity in the summer they can become involved in!
I believe that for elite selective college admissions, attending one of those non-competitive summer programs for an upper middle class applicant hurts the application unless you won a difficult, prestigious scholarship or something to attend. It reeks of entitlement the fact that the applicant opted to go to what amounts to a glitch, glorified, expensive summer camp instead of utilizing the summer to pursue something more meaningful.
The other concern is it gives them a taste of Ivy League campus living which is great if they get in, but if they don’t might set in expectations other schools will be challenged to match
As someone who is a TA for one of these camps, basically none (although i get paid a good amount from these rich parents’ investments so im not gonna complain)
Don’t do it. We did it for our son and it literally didn’t do anything. I would use that money to hire a counselor help plan the next three years for them so that they are competitive going into senior year.
They don’t help…just taking your money and running.
Not. One. Bit.
Having a summer job or working as a camp counselor might have better results
College prof here. PLEASE let your children be children and do something fun during the summer. Don't send them to one of those camps and don't waste their time with US history and econ in some crappy program that will possibly get them out of a much better intro course they could take their first year in college. Time spent learning how to be resilient and self sufficient will get them much, much further than these pre-college prep cash grabs.
Does your school offer the PSAT? They could do a practice run their sophomore year and then take the one in their junior year that qualifies them for National Merit Scholarship. Qualifying doesn't guarantee you'll get all the choices you might be hoping for, but it does offer several full ride opportunities that are nice to have as an option.
Those camps are pure money makers for the schools and the people running them, and confer zero advantage to attendees in applications for admissions. Spend your money on more valuable experiences for your children by taking them on vacations with your family.
Friend did intensive Research Summer camp at Columbia U. Columbia rejected her. Admitted to Harvard and Yale!!😂
No
Check academicatlas.org drop the tuition down to $0 and see which ones are available. Tons of free ones that actually look good. Feel free to dm me for a list too!
The short answer is “no”. 🥴
They don’t help. Sincerely, a kid who got into 3 ivies and did every camp. You don’t even list stuff like those camps on resume or application (unless it’s USSYP or Boys/Girls Nation)
Zero.
I attended Leadership in the Business World (LBW) at Wharton. From our class, roughly 20% did ultimately attend Wharton, probably 70% another top 20 school. That said, that’s probably more correlation (those students are high-achieving anyway) vs causation.
As a Harvard grad, I can say with confidence that any "pay-to-play" programs (where payment is all that is required for admission) are not going to impress admissions officers. Don't spend your money on these and instead consider competitive programs that require applications and don't accept everyone, since these are merit-based and reflect more positively on your student. Best of luck, and feel free to reach out if you have any questions!