<p>I did Crafting the Essay (personal essay writing), Critical Essay: Shakespeare, Crafting of Poetry and International Politics. </p>
<p>I loved ALL of them. My friends who were Logic also loved their class. </p>
<p>I highly suggest the Saratoga Springs or Carlyle campuses.</p>
<p>Those summers at CTY were, hands down, the most influential experiences in my life, before I got to college. They were so AMAZING and they shaped the learner I am today. I’m still close to many of my CTY friends.</p>
<p>@vaa</p>
<p>I’ve heard those same negative things about CAA. I would highly recommend CTY over CAA.</p>
<p>With regards to which campus to choose, I’d recommend ones with fewer students. CTY is really more about the experience and the community than the class, and that’s particularly true at sites with fewer students such as Saratoga Springs (my personal plug because it’s where I went).</p>
<p>I enjoyed Lancaster very much, but it does have a bit of a reputation. It is very liberal and has many quirky traditions. I recommend reading up on realcty.org when making your decisions. If you can avoid it, I would steer clear of classes like Fast Paced High School Insert Science/Math here. CTY should be about learning for learning’s sake, not necessarily getting ahead, and really experiencing the amazing community of CTY.</p>
<p>Actually, my S took both Fast Paced High School Physics and Fast Paced High School Chemistry because he could not contemplate a whole year of 8th grade science and wanted to skip Honors Chemistry. He was the youngest in his Physics class but made friends on his floor. He greatly enjoyed the Chemistry class and has kept some of the “goodies” that were distributed at the end. His roommate, however, was another story altogether. :(</p>
<p>Naturally I have never actually experienced any of the fast paced classes I just heard they were very study/test based rather than discussion based and therefore seemed somewhat pressureful. I’m sure opinions vary from person to person and I’m also sure they are very well taught.</p>
<p>D attended CTY at Lancaster, Carlisle and the dreaded JHU. Hands down her best experience was at JHU because of the amazing friends she made there. She took one humanities course at “baby” CTY but the remainder of her time took Fast-Paced Biology, Genetics, Genomics and Advanced Topics in Chemistry. Sure there were tests and quizzes but also discussion and presentations. Tests were more along the line of evaluating baseline knowledge and then “see how much you learned”! Every campus is different but one has to remember that the culture will change based upon who attends each site.</p>
<p>My elder son qualified for CTY but did take one CAA class (Engineering) but did not particularly like it and from then on took many science CTY classes and one year, took a logic class (Humanities). Younger son qualified for CTY math/science but only CAA for humanities but decided to take a math class last year and this year too (possibly), rather than take a humanities class at CAA. He had a friend that took a CAA class.</p>
<p>One fact pointed out to me is that cut off scores for TIP and other programs are lower than CTY programs, so a kid could take a TIP class but may not qualify for an equivalent CTY class. You may want to consider that.</p>
<p>Took Individually Paced Math Sequence. Solid class, suggest taking it.</p>
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<p>I’m not…Get out while you still can!!!</p>
<p>Just be careful, some kids complain about getting addicted to the site. I guess I’m lucky and whenever I have free time, check it out, not really having to look everyday. But I’m growing semi-addicted…</p>
<p>My advice would be to use CC sparingly (for questions like this) until you are a Junior in High School. And study hard and have a good freshman and Sophomore year in high school. </p>
<p>Good luck, I didn’t even read you post, just wanted to address this.</p>
<p>My S took Philosophy of Mind after seventh grade, then Ethics, Existentialism, and Crafting the Essay (not necessarily in that order). He LOVED the philosophy courses, and the whole CTY experience. He went to Loudonville, and had a blast every time. He’s still friends with many people he met there. I can’t recommend it too highly.</p>
<p>i wonder what make cty so popular? do cty kids go to good colleges (like HYP) later?</p>
<p>CTY is popular because for many kids - especially from smaller schools - may never have met kids with similar intellectual interests before. My older son did eventually meet some kids who were as good as he was in math in high school, but he never did find other computer programming geeks.</p>
<p>i wonder what make cty so popular? do cty kids go to good colleges (like HYP) later?</p>
<p>some do- but my D didn’t even think to put it on apps, I mean she did it when she was in middle school, she had done much more relevant things later</p>
<p>Yes, CTYers go on to do AMAZING things. Think about it, the inventors of facebook and google were CTYers as was Lady Gaga and those are just a few notable alumni. Off the top of my head I can name 3 CTYers who are now freshmen (out of maybe 20 I knew) at Harvard, 2 at Princeton, 1 at Penn, 1 at Wesleyan, 1 at Reed, 1 at Swarthmore. I know CTYers who went on to TASP and RSI. But what really makes CTY special is the people you meet there. The culture is nothing like any child would experience in school. If you have the opprotunity, I strongly suggest you attend.</p>
<p>I like CTY because of what they teach and friends I make. i haven’t been to any summer camp yet. i’ve taken reading and writing courses online. i really hope i can get into a good summer camp and maybe i’ll really be with some of my cty penpals. i don’t know if ctyers go to good college even though i’m pretty sure they do.
i wanted to go to the camp last year, mom didn’t want me to be there for 3 wks. i’m trying this year since i’m older.</p>
<p>My S (now a HS senior) took three CTY sessions over three summers: Electrical Engineering, Probability & Game Theory, and Fast Paced HS Physics. Each class ended up serving a good purpose in the end. He’s a math/science guy, yet the engineering class helped him to determine that might not be his path. The Game Theory class actually helped him with mock trial and rhetoric with his AP English Language class. Although we preferred CTY for enrichment, he convinced us to let him take the Physics class, since he enjoyed the smattering of physics he got in a MS science class. Taking this CTY class, along with already completing AP Calc BC, allowed him to take his HS AP Physics C class. He enjoyed it quite a bit and thinks he’ll major in physics, with an interdisciplinary focus on another science.</p>
<p>He is still FB friends with some of his CTY friends from the LMU (Los Angeles) summer site. CTYers do tend to end up at some very good schools. One of his FB pals at Berkeley consoled S on his Stanford rejection and suggested there are lots of other options. I know of two twin boys who went to lots of CTY sessions who graduated from Emory and both recently passed their qualifying exams at the bio department at Stanford. I know of another who’s a freshman at JHU itself. Another is a sophomore at Penn.</p>
<p>Son did 3 years of CTY.</p>
<p>5th & 6th grade were the “younger” classes.</p>
<p>7th grade he took Philosophy of the Mind. It was very reading intense. He is ADD and the evening homework combined with the fact he was 2-3 years younger than the other students was challenging. I mention the age difference not because he felt out of place socially, but because he did not have academic experience of plowing through so much critical reading. He LOVED the course so much that Philosophy may be his college major. </p>
<p>As a parent I always steered him away from AP like science & math courses. I view CTY as an opportunity to experince something the student cannot get at his/her school. </p>
<p>As to what makes CTY so special – Definitely finding other kids who are “normal” social and enjoy the academic challenge. There are just not enough magnet schools that allow kids to come together like CTY. Add that to the grades of most of these kids (most are 7th-10th) and I believe it plants a seed in the head of these kids that they can reach for the stars, do the hard work, apply to TASP, etc. Peer pressure at its finest.</p>
<p>No matter what you decide I have never heard of any student who was disappointed at CTY – You may not be one of those super excited best experiece of life kids, but you won’t be disappointed either!</p>
<p>smluza, do your parents still have concerns about sending you to CTY? You can reassure them that it is extremely well-supervised, and well-run. As a parent, I always felt my child was safe. The folks who run the program will be happy to answer any questions your parents may have in advance.</p>
<p>I’m not…Get out while you still can!!!</p>
<p>My oldest took a CTY class in 7th grade- writing correspondence course ( the internets was not quite so ubiquitous), this was just because writing was a strength and she loved it. However, we decided that her school offered plenty to keep her challenged academically and she didn’t take any more courses.</p>
<p>She also did not do academic programs in summer- she rode horses, and volunteered to take care of the ponies at the zoo until high school graduation.
While many students at her college ( Reed) had done more of CTY, I also think that the adcoms appreciated that pursuing your passion, doesn’t always mean hitting the books .</p>