<p>Would taking a summer school/program at Harvard, Stanford, Cornell, etc. benefit your application? Or is it just for the experience?</p>
<p>just for experience !! i went to the yale summer session for college credit and took intro to stats, and comprehensive general chem</p>
<p>i didnt get into Yale, although I aced my classes </p>
<p>hmm look at my results so far!! i cant say what they are looking for! what ever it is a summer program just helps you!
it certainly helped me in my ap classes i aced them and hope to get a 4 or 5 in the test this may. good luck let me know i can help you out.</p>
<p>Accepted: Ohio State University (dont want to go there)
Villanova University (not sure)
Northeastern University ( LOVE IT, AMAZING CO-OP + ITS IN BOSTON)
Boston University (didnt get into the program i wanted but im in)</p>
<p>Rejected: Cornell ED, Brown, Yale, U Penn, Dartmouth, Columbia, Lehigh (what the heck), Wash univ in st louis, northwestern univ.</p>
<p>Deferred: Univ of Michigan Ann Arbor</p>
<p>Waitlisted: Johns Hopkins University (WILL STAY IN IT)</p>
<p>WAITING FOR : NYU, Univ of Notre Dame, Princeton</p>
<p>Colleges are a business. As a business, their facilities are under-utilized in the summers. If they can make a lot of money by offering classes to high school students in the summer at a couple of thousands per head, they will do it.</p>
<p>Taking a summer program at Harvard will not help you get into Harvard anymore than any other summer activities. It is still a summer program and it will help in that sense, but volunteering somewhere or taking courses at the local community college are just as good for admission purposes.</p>
<p>In my own opinion, there may be a slight negative connotation because of the money. It is a little like writing your essay on how much you learned touring Europe with your Mommy and Daddy. (This is only my opinion.)</p>
<p>Well there are some college programs that are out there that can help with addmission. The program i know dosent cost anything and you actually get a stipind for doing it. U-doc program <a href="http://depts.washington.edu/omca/UDOC/%5B/url%5D">http://depts.washington.edu/omca/UDOC/</a> </p>
<p>When I was in the Alaska U-Doc a adcom for Dartmouth actually came up and talked about how good the program was and how much colleges looked up to it. Just got my acceptance from Dartmouth today so i think it helped.</p>
<p>Summer schools like those at the Ivies are mainly for the purpose of enrichment and experience. Prestigious programs like RSI may improve one's chances (very slightly, if any) in going to, say in this case, MIT.</p>
<p>Are you freaking kidding me? If you have RSI you are practically guaranteed for MIT. There are RSI alums with 1200 old SAT who get into MIT. Of course, getting into RSI is less than 1 in 20, so I think the idea is that if you qualify for RSI, you qualify for MIT, but, yeah.</p>
<p>^ Well, I used to say that RSI is an automatic shoo-in for MIT, but then someone said that there were Rickoids that didn't get into MIT.</p>
<p>yea there were a couple who didn't get into MIT this year. I think we could go in circles debating whether RSI helps in MIT admissions or whether Rickoids had what it takes to get into MIT before RSI. To answer the OP's question, many of the summer programs at these prestigious colleges are cash cows. They're ridiculously expensive, and attract students solely on the basis of their name. If u do it, it should be more for the experience since they hardly help in terms of college admissions.</p>
<p>Don't do it just to get into college. Have a normal kid-life and go to camp or something.</p>