<p>I figured a bunch of you MIT people might know something about Mathcamp.</p>
<p>So my question is... assuming I get into USA/Canada Mathcamp, would it be worth my time and $3800 to go? I love math and everything, so I should be able to get a lot out of it. But do colleges such as MIT look at it favorably? I can also find some local internships, since I live in the Bay Area. Let's share experiences :)</p>
<p>It should be pretty fun, but I’m sure you can learn the same amount of math on your own. There are a lot of books available on pure math, and you don’t need mathcamp to teach you that. If it’s hard financially, I wouldn’t go.</p>
<p>I think you can demonstrate to MIT that you love math other ways than paying $3800 to math camp. Like participate in AMC, tutor HS students in math, create a math club in your high school, teach math classes… plus those things might bring money IN, not out.</p>
<p>Mathcamp '04 alum here.</p>
<p>Would it be worth your time to go? Depends. Should you go to impress MIT? No.</p>
<p>Mathcamp is an amazing experience in the sense that you’ll be able to get exposure to a wide range of math that’s not available in high school (I must admit being exposed to abstract algebra as a froshie was quite…interesting, to say the least). If you’re into the AMC series of competitions, Mathcamp has classes tackling USAMO problems, so your AIME ability will get a huge boost after you come back. Other than that, Mathcamp is a place full of rich traditions (quite eccentric from the outsider’s perspective, however) and a gathering of usually the best minds in high school competitive math. It’s also just a great time in general - while at Mathcamp, I learned how to play Mafia, Settlers of Catan, Mao, Crazyhouse Chess, Food Tongue (a constructed language originating from Mathcamp that comprises completely of food words), participated in the Puzzle Hunt (a scaled-down version of MIT’s Mystery Hunt, but still extremely awesome), went hiking on Mt. Washington, and did a mini-research project in topology using the ridiculously convoluted hallways of the dorms at Colby College (and even did a poster presentation on it! lol).</p>
<p>Basically, Mathcamp is filled with people who love math - those who are so passionate about it that they don’t mind doing math, playing with math, and breathing math. I thought I was a strong math student in high school, until I went to Mathcamp and finally saw who the true ‘math beasts’ were. Granted, I am totally unlike those extremely hardcore people and I probably understood less than 15% of all the lectures I had at camp, but I still had a great summer and I enjoyed everyone’s company. Truthfully, it’s just like being at MIT, in retrospect, and a lot of Mathcampers did ultimately end up at MIT (except it’s a LOT more fun (well, you don’t have grades : P) and everyone is a lot more math-nerdy (but I don’t live in Random here, so that’s probably why - we had a pi memorization contest at Mathcamp where everyone was in an auditorium and you sat down as soon as you ran out of digits, and these two guys dueled it out past 500 digits. i was dead after 25 digits. i still only know 25 digits -___-|||)).</p>
<p>So after all this, does it seem appealing to you? If so, definitely attend! You might be able to apply for finaid if the price tag is too steep - they’re generally pretty good about it. But I think the bottom line is that you shouldn’t go to it if you’re just aiming at impressing colleges. I don’t think it’s particularly worth your energy unless you really want to experience Mathcamp. Like everything in the college application process, DO WHAT YOU LOVE! This is the aspect that will truly shine through in your applications.</p>
<p>I kind of skimmed through oasis’s post, so sorry if I repeat what he said.</p>
<p>Do not go to math camp to impress colleges. Don’t do anything to impress a college (other than study for the SAT). Do whatever you love! If you love math, etc… then MIT will probably see that through what you have done in your high school career and look positively on that. </p>
<p>In the end, doing what you love with benefit you the most in your college applications.</p>
<p>oasis thanks for your very detailed post. Although I would definitely consider going to Mathcamp, luckily, I got accepted into a research program at Texas Tech, and it was an opportunity I can’t pass. But I’d definitely be hanging around this forum a lot for the next year… so keep an eye out for me :)</p>