Prestigious College Summer Programs

Prestigious College Summer Programs July 21, 2013 Dont spend your summer surfing. But also dont spend it at a college summer program. Its lame (photo credit: Shalom Jacobovitz). We wrote a few days back about prestigious college summer programs and about how popular these university summer enrichment programs were becoming nationwide. If youre reading this blog to find out which programs are best, to learn about whether the Harvard summer program is better than a similar program at Cornell, then youre reading the wrong blog. Because we at Ivy Coach think that prestigious college summer programs arent prestigious at all. Theyre a cash-cow for universities. Theyre designed to encourage students and parents to think it will improve a students odds of getting admitted to that college (or another prestigious college). And its just plain wrong. College summer programs are not so different from sleep-a-way camp or teen tours. Do you think that sleep-a-way camp or teen tours looks good on college applications to highly selective colleges? If you do, you might want to rethink that big time. These prestigious college summer programs, like sleep-a-way camp and teen tours, says to college admissions counselors at highly selective colleges that mommy and daddy can afford to send you away for the summer that you dont have to work, etc. Parents and students, we encourage you to stop paying thousands of dollars for these college summer programs. Again, they will not improve a students odds of getting in. Its not impressive that you went to a summer program at a highly selective college. It just plain isnt. Get over it. Get this out of your head. Be more creative with how you spend your summer, and do something that sets you apart from all of the other college applicants.   In the end, its those creative students who are accepted at the highly selective colleges and universities.