<p>Right now I have two options for this summer. I currently live in the US and I'm considering some top colleges. I was wondering what summer option would be better to stand out on my college app?</p>
<p>1) Do one of those 3-4 week summer programs at a college in the US/England (UMich or Cambridge or maybe UPenn)</p>
<p>2) go over to Europe (Britain) and get an internship with their government for 2-3 weeks</p>
<p>Which looks better</p>
<p>This has around 20 views, so could someone just say which one is better in their eyes?</p>
<p>Hi Patriotsfan1,</p>
<p>it depends on what you want to do with your life.</p>
<p>If you want to work for a top firm after graduation, you should definitely go for the working experience…and if you want to do a PHD or are interested in research, you should go for the summer schools!</p>
<p>Last semester, I had asked my friend the same question. She works for the HR department of DB and she told me that firms only look at three things:</p>
<p>1) GPA
2) Working Experience
3) International Experience</p>
<p>If you are able to participate on an exchange program/study abroad program of your current uni, I would suggest you to do this instead of a summer school.</p>
<p>Hope it helped,
Laila</p>
<p>Whichever one you want to do - that is, what interests you most - is the one you should do.</p>
<p>@Laila, lol, a summer program in high school won’t help you get into grad schools. PhD programs do not care about anything you did prior to entering college. </p>
<p>The internship is probably somewhat more impressive, since basically anyone can get into those summer college programs as long as they can pay. From what I hear from my friends who’ve done the program at my school, the summer classes are also not the same rigor as those offered during the academic year, so it doesn’t really give you prep for college either.</p>
<p>So would it be best to</p>
<p>Serve a week in a foreign country (already have about 150 hrs of service in my state and unpaid internship with community sports team)</p>
<p>Or</p>
<p>Go to Britain and do a two week internship with a government official (kind of like a senator)</p>
<p>Which will stand our the most on an undergrad application?</p>
<p>Thanks guys!</p>
<p>I think you should do the internship in Britain. I also read somewhere that if you’re looking for a job after graduation, extracurriculars aren’t really looked at, since many students can lie about them. Whichever one you do, make sure you make it something important or gain some recognition for it.</p>
<p>It’s worth a read:
[Study</a> Hacks Blog Archive Dangerous Ideas: College Extracurriculars Are Meaningless](<a href=“http://calnewport.com/blog/2008/07/23/dangerous-ideas-college-extracurriculars-are-meaningless/]Study”>Dangerous Ideas: College Extracurriculars Are Meaningless - Cal Newport)</p>