<p>Miami, if your daughter is such a standout student, certainly a professor in her department would have a paid position for her to do research over the summer.</p>
<p>My son spent his summers from freshman year in high school selling concessions at our local Triple A baseball park. He wrote a great essay on how baseball is a metaphor for life. He was accepted to all the colleges to which he applied, including Ivies. He was valedictorian of his class but had average SATs (for these colleges, about 2100).</p>
<p>Students who can’t find summer jobs can volunteer for a local cause or nonprofit that they care about.</p>
<p>I don’t understand why work experienced would be valued. I worked for two summers at Target and it SUCKED. I had to wake up early, serve a bunch of housewives, and pretend like I cared about what they saying. Because at Target we stick with the three F’s: Fast, Fun, and Friendly :P</p>
<p>You can show up, take orders, fill out employment forms and deal with the public. There are a lot of people out there that can’t handle these basic things.</p>
<p>You learned to set your alarm, turn it off and not go back to sleep, get to work on time, deal with customers that can be rushed, unfriendly, rude… You learned to persevere through a job you did not like. You learned to take orders, follow directions. Maybe you learned how to handle and be trusted with money. Maybe you learned about stocking or customer service. You learned about team work, and working under an authority figure, one who may have been less educated that you, despite their age. You learned about the world of Target. What you learned in some ways was priceless and could not be learned in any school, Ivy League or otherwise.</p>
<p>When you are at work you can’t be a prince or princess.</p>
<p>I don’t think working at a summer job should take precedence over attending summer programs. If I had the money I would have gone to some of those expensive debate camps or science programs and I think those help more in college admissions than working. </p>
<p>A job teaches you skills you will need for the real world but college is not the real world. College is mostly about academic and social endeavors that have little to do with the things that occur at a job.</p>
<p>Most importantly, you learned how to treat people on the other side of the counter when you’re the customer. Y’know, noblesse oblige. :)</p>
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<p>I don’t serve housewives (though I work with some ex-housewives and ex-househusbands), but I have to wake up early for work, and sometimes I have to pretend to care about what people are saying when I really don’t care at all. So those skills are incredibly useful in real life, even at big important “real” jobs.</p>
<p>But why should colleges value those things? Especially the top colleges that are not career oriented. None of those things have to do with expanding your mind of intellectual endeavors, so why should they be valued? </p>
<p>I would be more impressed by a kid who went to science camp or debate camp than a kid who worked at Target 
Attendance at those camps shows a demonstrated interest in a academic subject, which is more applicable to college.</p>
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<p>There are some really,really smart kids out there who are very interested in science, debate or whatever whose families just can’t afford to send them to those camps. And there are some kids who work because their families need them to help with the bills.</p>
<p>Everytime this comes up, I reference this article …written a while ago, but still on the Harvard admissions website, by William R. Fitzsimmons, Dean of Admissions, Harvard College, Marlyn E. McGrath, Director of Admissions, Harvard College, and Charles Ducey, Adjunct Lecturer in Psychology, Harvard Graduate School of Education:</p>
<p>[Harvard</a> College Admissions § Applying: Taking Time Off](<a href=“http://admissions.college.harvard.edu/apply/time_off/index.html]Harvard”>http://admissions.college.harvard.edu/apply/time_off/index.html)</p>
<p>“Summer need not be totally consumed by highly structured programs, such as summer schools, travel programs, or athletic camps. While such activities can be wonderful in many ways, they can also add to stress by assembling “super peers” who set nearly impossible standards. Activities in which one can develop at one’s own pace can be much more pleasant and helpful. An old-fashioned summer job that provides a contrast to the school year or allows students to meet others of differing backgrounds, ages, and life experiences is often invaluable in providing psychological downtime and a window on future possibilities.”</p>
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<p>Because a significant amount of people feel that they’re above that type of work and/or can’t handle it. Being able to manage a hard workload, regardless of what field you’re in, is a good skill. A fair amount of employers look favorably towards employment at fast food restaurants because it means you can handle a demanding workload and stay at a fast pace. I don’t know if colleges interpret job experience the same way. Regardless, you can still come out of a crappy job with more than what you came in with.</p>
<p>I’m convinced that my d’s summer volunteer job was hugely responsible for her getting admitted to her first-choice school, as it was related to her academic interests. Not everyone can afford for their kid to volunteer during the summer, however, so I salute those schools that recognize that getting paid is valuable.</p>
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<p>I was one of those kids and I still don’t feel that working is preferable. I worked in order to get money to go to debate camp and for science fair materials. Work was just a means to an end, if I could have I would have just skipped working and went to the camps, which would have been a better use of my time. </p>
<p>I would have MUCH preferred to be working in a research lab during the summer program than working at Target. And given the affluence of the class here at Yale I don’t think too many people were working during their summers, so work experience can’t be valued that highly.</p>
<p>"I would have MUCH preferred to be working in a research lab during the summer program than working at Target. "</p>
<p>Of course. What bright kid wouldn’t prefer taking a summer program in their academic interest to working a low paying, boring job in a field that doesn’t interest them?</p>
<p>“And given the affluence of the class here at Yale I don’t think too many people were working during their summers, so work experience can’t be valued that highly.”</p>
<p>Work experience is valued highly in part because relatively few applicants to schools like Yale have the kind of work experience that you had. Most of the relatively few applicants who have worked are working so-called internships – cushy jobs arranged with relatives and family friends. Most of the applicants to places like Yale are middle or upper class and don’t have to work at all during summers or if they do work, they work cushy office or lab internships with relatives and family friends.</p>
<p>Relatively few applicants to schools like Yale are working doing things like working in stores, cleaning houses, working in family manicure salons, farms, restaurants and grocery stores. That’s why such applicants stand out. Admissions officers know such students probably not only need money more than do the students who don’t work, but also probably have a stronger work ethic.</p>
<p>Unlike what usually happens when one does internship for family friends and relatives, when one does the kind of work you did, one can get fired for not performing up to standards. One also gets schedules and duties that meet the employers’ needs and convenience, not your own.</p>
<p>Saying this as someone who did work cleaning houses and as a file clerk and a store cashier before going to Harvard and during my summer vacations while I was a student there.</p>
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<p>But isn’t that a little unfair? Should someone be penalized because they are making use of the opportunities available to them? I definitely believe children of poor families should be admitted over a wealthy kid when every thing is the same, but I don’t think working a job or not working a job should take precedence in admissions. </p>
<p>I went to a upper middle to middle class school and nearly everyone worked. From our val on down, regardless of whether or not they needed money. Even the kids driving BMWs worked at the McDonald’s their parents owned. Those kids didn’t need money, why should their experience be more valuable than the kid–with an equitable financial situation–who chooses to pursue debate camp?</p>
<p>"But isn’t that a little unfair? Should someone be penalized because they are making use of the opportunities available to them? I definitely believe children of poor families should be admitted over a wealthy kid when every thing is the same, but I don’t think working a job or not working a job should take precedence in admissions. "</p>
<p>They aren’t being penalized for taking advantage of opportunities available to them. Admissions officers know that it takes far more independence, creativity, hard work, and motivation to, for instance, find a job for oneself in Target or do the hard work of helping with a family farm or spend 20 hours a week organizing a volunteer project with a local nonprofit than to accept a so-called internship handed to one by family friends/relatives or to accept Mommy and Daddy’s money to go to Harvard’s summer school or to volunteer abroad with an expensive program.</p>
<p>The top schools also know that many students who do those kind of internships and expensive programs are being forced to do so by their parents or simply are passively accepting what their parents have arranged for them.</p>
<p>In addition, there are far more applicants to top schools who’ve been to expensive summer programs and have had expensive volunteer experiences than there are applicants who’ve worked ordinary jobs. Consequently, the applicants who’ve worked ordinary jobs are going to stand out in the pool for top colleges.</p>
<p>Now if a student raised money themselves – such as working a job – to attend an expensive summer program, they would stand out because they would have worked hard to get the opportunity.</p>
<p>Similarly, students who get into excellent programs like TASP – that are free, but have very high admissions standards including test scores, essays, interviews – would stand out. Such students get accepted into the programs because of their excellence, not because of Mom and Dad’s efforts.</p>
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<p>I agree with what you are saying here in general, but if one activity is seen as being more highly regarded than another, then that implies that those who participate in the less desirable activity are being penalized.</p>
<p>“I agree with what you are saying here in general, but if one activity is seen as being more highly regarded than another, then that implies that those who participate in the less desirable activity are being penalized.”</p>
<p>The rarer a productive activity that a student has participated in, the greater the likelihood that the activity could tip a qualified applicant into a top college.</p>
<p>That’s the way admissions works at those colleges. Those colleges could fill up their classes with NHS presidents, state Mu Alpha Theta champions, classical violinists and pianists, aspiring doctors, and students who’ve attended expensive summer programs. But those colleges want diversity of all kinds in their student bodies, so the relatively few qualified applicants who’ve worked relatively ordinary jobs have an advantage just like students who are plan to major in the humanities or are from low income families, rural areas, inner city areas or underrepresented states.</p>