<p>How prestigious is Breakthrough Collaborative in the eyes of an admissions officer and how good does it look on the application?</p>
<p>I heard it was ranked in the top 10 for internships and that its selectivity ranges from 10-15%.</p>
<p>Anyone at all?</p>
<p>Never heard of it.</p>
<p>northstar, let me educate you: Breakthrough Collaborative (formerly known as Summerbridge), a national non-profit, has an excellent track record of recruiting middle school students and “is devoted to preparing high-achieving middle-school students, most of whom are of color and from low-income families, to enter and succeed in college-preparatory high school programs. Breakthrough also recruits and trains outstanding high school and college students to become Breakthrough teachers and build an interest in careers as educators.”</p>
<p>OP: My daughter is in her second year of teaching with BT. It has been life-changing for her and helped her land a school-year paid internship with Americorps teaching in a pre-literacy program. </p>
<p>Other teachers she worked with went on to some excellent schools such as Stanford, Cornell, Northwestern and Davidson. The interview hiring process was lengthy and about 1 in 5 applicants were hired at her location. Not everyone does it for a resume-builder. (My own D attends our state’s flagship.) </p>
<p>For her, it has been a great experience.</p>
<p>Sounds like a wonderful program. I doubt, though, that many people here have heard of it, so the OP probably isn’t going to get many replies to their post.</p>
<p>I imagine, however, that many college admissions officers have heard of it and respect it as a way of identifying strong low income applicants and applicants of of color.</p>
<p>That’s too bad since it’s such a successful organization, and professionally run too. I have heard that some locations have better programs than others, so maybe it’s a regional thing.</p>
<p>Edit: Just looked at their locations map and see three programs here in Texas and nine from DC up to New England. Zero in Chicago and few in the midwest. Most kids don’t work in their home town though.</p>
<p>And yes, the Princeton Review consistently rates it as a top-ten internship, whatever that means.</p>
<p>I’m a teacher at BT rather than a student but thank you for the replies.</p>
<p>I thought it might be prestigious because I am a part of the Hong Kong branch (also known as Summerbridge Hong Kong), which is excessively selective. I am one of only 4 high school students comprising the 90+ teaching staff. About 60 or so of the 80 college student teachers at BT/SB, are from top 20 universities (Ivies, HYP, Amherst, UChicago, WUSTL etc.).</p>
<p>The only issue I have, like you said givings, is that it is more useful to people who are trying to build a career as educators. I’m, on the other hand, trying to get into a great b-school. I only joined it because it seemed interesting when they presented at my school and I had no other meaningful activity to do over the summer.</p>
<p>Some branches are definitely better. I checked the reports by BT and found that Summerbridge Hong Kong was rated highest out of all the 34 branches.</p>
<p>Well, I would think most ad coms at T20 universities in business programs or otherwise would have heard of it. Also, don’t think that just because you’re not interested in teaching that you aren’t benefitting from it. It shows that you are able to organize (lesson plans) and communicate, especially under pressure. D is up doing parent-teacher conferences this morning…talk about stressful.</p>
<p>It’s quite tiring to be honest. The other day I saw there was this really amazing moment that I witnessed, which I might write an essay on. In my class there’s this student who got burned during an accident and her face is all scarred and she has no hair. She stands out and so she feels really shy. Also, her English isn’t very strong either so even when you ask her a yes/no question she won’t nod - she’ll just stare back at you. However, the other day another student had just got his results from the Hong Kong exams and he came in looking very sad. The shy girl all of a sudden started talking so much in an attempt to console the guy. She talked to him about what subjects he liked and how it didn’t matter because there were more exams coming up and how his parents wouldn’t be angry.</p>
<p>Actually BT gave D lots of essay material. The common app prompt about discussing a person who affected your life…she wrote about a student, too! I thought it was her best essay. </p>
<p>But the hours BT demands really are horrendous. Hang in here, though, and good luck. Sounds like you’re ahead of the game already!</p>
<p>I hope so… I already have something for my personal statement though, as well as the short answer on the CommonApp. Will I get an opportunity to talk about my BT experiences in some supplemental essays?</p>