<p>Adcoms never see the grades. They can sometimes decipher the grade is the professor put "did not live up to expectations" or something, but that's as explicit as it gets. </p>
<p>Is there anyone else on CC, especially from California, who made it into MITES last summer?
There was about seven people from California. Some are on CC, but they've only had 1 or 2 posts. Latindude did do MITES, but he's hardly ever on as well. </p>
<p>Please keep sharing about your summer experience and about your experience of your successful application process, not your stats, but what may have been in your essays or interview (if there were interviews) that worked in your favor.
For the first essay, I talked about my passion to reach my goal of becoming an engineer and go into innovation (pretty standard). For the volunteering and service one, I addressed how I've taken what I learned and spread it to children at a younger age (through coaching some robotics teams). The cultural/ethnicity question, I wrote about how my mom was a refugee and the "American Dream" that I have to live up to. Lastly, the obstacle I adressed was my inability to speak English at an early age, but because I found some inclination towards math and science, I found that school became much easier. </p>
<p>Knowing what you know now about the MITES experience, what would you have done differently while at MIT, especially to avoid getting a D or F in a class? Do the professors and/or any TAs offer additional assistance to you?
For future MITES students, my first piece of advice is to get to know everyone on the MITES and MIT staff as much as possible. The director of the MITES program is now the assistant dean of admissions. Although he wasn't around as much during the summer, I wish I would have talked to him more to do the "networking". </p>
<p>Secondly, do not guess on your placement exams. I did pretty well on my physics placement exam (I only took a basics class in 9th grade), and was placed into Electricity and Magnetism (comparable to 8.02 at MIT). Needless to say, you should put a hard courseload on yourself, but not one in which you have no background in. Make sure you get enough sleep. I fell asleep in my first class of the day (bio) a lot...</p>
<p>Professors will have office hours once a week, but your TA's are actually "RAs" as well. They help you at whenever time (of course probably until 12 AM at the latest) </p>
<p>Are you still in touch with your fellow MITE'ers?
We actually still have our MIT email addresses (only a matter of time until they terminate), so we keep in touch through the email list serve, as well as through AIM and the phone. I keep in touch with many people. </p>
<p>Does MIT offer any followup to the summer program, or are they pretty much done with you forever?
Considering that many MITES students apply to MIT EA, that's pretty much the followup. You might consider it a boost to your MIT application (although I was deferred). </p>
<p>What do MITES attendees do on weekends?
MITES gives you the freedom to pretty much do anything, just as long as it's not crazy and you're not going to get hurt. We went out to Boston and Harvard a lot, thanks to the good ol' T. </p>
<p>Can you summerize any pros and cons of your MITES experience?
Pros: People were down-to-earth and awesome, the independence as a "college student" </p>
<p>Cons: Very little sleep, its only 6 and a half weeks! </p>
<p>As for an RSI and MITES rivalry, we were kind of jealous that RSI had more time on their hands for play and sleep, but other than that we were cool, although both programs hardly EVER spoke to each other...</p>