I know it’s a little early to be thinking about next summer, but I’m hoping someone could give me some advice. 
I’m a high school junior. My DREAM school is Barnard College, but obviously it’s very selective and I’m not sure I have very good chance of getting in. I know Barnard does summer programs for high school students, and I think attending one (in addition to being a great experience and making me fall even more in love with the school) could help me a lot when I apply by demonstrating interest in the school (and of course summer college programs look nice on resumes even though they’re probably not going to be the “hook” that gets you admitted). Another option I’m considering is volunteering abroad, preferably at a wildlife conservation although I’m open to any kind of volunteering. I’m wondering which you guys think would look better to college and improve my chances of getting into Barnard (or any school) more? Basically, all other things are equal: both would be incredible experiences, both are pricey, etc. Any advice or information is appreciated!!
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Many summer programs at universities aren’t even hosted by the unis themselves but by for-profit groups who rent classrooms and dorms and hire the college’s instructors. Their marketing plan is aimed at people who think like you think. Colleges don’t care. Barnard won’t care. It’s simply a sign that you have lots of disposable income – not about some great academic hunger which will make them happy you applied to them.
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What about wildlife conservation abroad is attractive to you? Is it a particular animal breed or region of the world? You say you’re open to any sort of voluntarism. Take the money your parents would have paid for this proposed conservation trip, give it to the local food bank or soup kitchen – and work there all summer for free. Or deliver Meals on Wheels. Or work a battered women’s shelter. Or volunteer at a senior home or the Humane Society. Or your place of worship.
You’re 15-16 years old. There are some serious issues to learn about or academic subjects to study. Why don’t you explore those things – maybe a place as sophisticated as Barnard will be searching for young women who value those things rather than resume adornment.
volunteering abroad will help a LOT in getting into colleges that like full-pay students. More than just not checking the box to apply for financial aid, it shows your folks have money to burn. As for selective colleges, many will figure you spent the summer on vacation no matter how laudatory the title the program uses.
I would call and ask if Barnard professors actually teach the classes. If the answer is yes, then I would apply. If the answer is no, then I would not bother. The fact that the program accepts students on a rolling basis means it is not really selective. Good luck!
It’s well possible that Barnard profs are instructors – they’re 100% free to take gigs from these for-profit companies that wish to cash in on the base university’s reputation. But that doesn’t equate with any admissions advantage for later
My daughter was part of the Barnard Young Women’s Leadership Institute this summer and it was an AMAZING experience. Her professor was a Barnard Political Science professor and it was a pretty intense 10-11 days, but she loved every minute. They wrote 3 papers and had amazing experiences inside and outside the classroom. I’d highly recommend it! They accepted around 1/2 of the students who applied to it.
Some people get very cynical about the summer college programs like ones at Brown, Barnard, etc. It is my opinion that while yes, they are expensive and can be seen a rich kids summer camp (Which actually isn’t true because places like Brown and Penn, two programs I have attended, have many kids offered full rides simply because they are good students who basically got “merit aid”), the programs actually have a lot to teach you. Seeking out summer courses that are academically rigorous in subjects that interest you can demonstrate that you want to learn and actively seek out opportunities to do so. While a program at a specific college may not give you a boost in admission to that college, it can help you learn about what type of college environment you want to be in, and help you make connections that will be very useful down the road.
I think you should choose the opportunity that you are most excited about.
If the university accepts the summer school credits for their own undergrads, and if faculty teach them, then I see nothing sub par about it.
Rather than joining a summer college program exclusively for high schoolers, most of which are just summer camps for rich kids (not all but most) - consider taking a a real summer session college course at the most prestigious college that you can commute to from home.
For example, UC Berkeley allows high school students to apply for admission to take summer courses with the rest of the actual Berkeley undergrads. It’s the real classes, not a high school program. I suspect that getting a good grade in one of those courses would be more meaningful than a summer session for high schoolers.
I could be wrong, though. I’m no expert.
As money does not seem to be an issue for you, my suggestion is that you back up and re-think your whole approach to college admissions and how you spend your time and resources next summer.
Both summer programs and volunteering abroad are (as other posters have pointed out) typically seen by AdComms as fancy summer camps- typically. IF you have a ‘true’ reason for doing it, however, it will fit into the narrative arc of your application. Is the course or volunteering an extension of a genuine and long standing interest? Then you might be able to sell it as more than just beefing up the college application.
However, you will make everybody’s favorite senior year class (writing college essays…) easier for yourself and possibly more likely to bear fruit if you back up and think about something that is true about you- and look for a way to explore that in more depth next summer. It is quite a gift to have the time and the financial backing to pursue something you are generally interested. Don’t waste the opportunity.
Go and volunteer abroad! My philosophy in life for myself - and for my kids - is that if you have a chance to travel abroad TAKE IT! Traveling is best education for life and you will enjoy it more than studying at a summer program. Most volunteer abroad programs are a couple of weeks long, so you have the rest of the summer to get a part-time minimum wage job to help pay for the trip, and you will still have time to hang out with your friends.
As for what looks better on an application, a trip and part-time work looks much better than a summer program at a college (in my opinion).
Thank you for the responses I’ve gotten so far. They’ve been helpful. However, I’m seeing remarks like “as money does not seem to be an issue for you” and “your folks have money to burn.” You should know that the majority of either going abroad or to a summer program would be financed by my own money I’ve earned through working, AND if do get into Barnard it would take a significant amount of financial aid for attending to be a possibility. So please hold off on comments like that because, honestly, you’re a little quick to assess my situation. Thanks.
In that case, I would recommend saving your money for college (where you’ll definitely be able to take classes, and possibly also go abroad) and looking for free things to do over the summer.
No point in having the money for a prestigious college if my resume isn’t strong enough to get into one…
The most prestigious colleges aren’t the ones you need to worry about affording. And whatever you did to earn the money is probably a better EC than the ones you’ve asked about here.
I’m just saying there’s only so many private colleges that are actually worth the tuition when there’s perfectly fine public schools (SUNY Geneseo, honors colleges within public universities, McGill…), so the ones that are, like Barnard, are quite hard to get into and are worth investing resources into improving chances at being admitted…
- Thanks for the heads up. The programs are through the Barnard website and seem pretty legitimate, but I’ll do more research. When reading through threads about admission to Barnard, several applicants admitted ED attended summer programs there so that’s where I got the idea to attend one and why I thought it would help. And this is maybe a little beside the point, but just for your information, my desire to attend a summer program there actually is based on an “academic hunger.” I’m the kind of student who gets graduation requirements like health out of the way in summer school so I can fit more history courses into my school schedule. And this is also (hopefully) reflected in my extracurriculars which include competing on my school’s mock trial team since freshman year (coming out of a genuine love of mock trial despite the load of extra work), placing first in several state academic competitions, and being president of my school’s Amnesty International. Again, I know colleges won’t know that my involvement in these activities (among others) is based on actual passion, but it’s important to me that you know it is if you’re going to offer such helpful, condescending advice.
- Yeah, I understand where you’re coming from with this. But what’s attractive to me about wildlife conservation abroad in a place like Africa is that it’s a career path I’m seriously interested in pursuing. A snippet from the description of one program at a national park in South Africa is, “The research, monitoring, tracking and data collection carried out throughout this project is aimed at understanding the reproductive, territorial, hunting, and social behaviors of the lion and leopard populations, and plays a vital role in the ongoing conservation and protection of Africa’s big cats.” That’s something I’m genuinely interested in and the closest I can get where I live is volunteering at the local SPCA (which I do) and watching Big Cat Diary on Animal Planet.
So, in summary, sorry if I didn’t make this clear enough in my initial post, but I value these opportunities first and foremost for the enriching experiences they would be. As I said, /all other things being equal/ it makes sense to pursue the opportunity that would give me the best shot at being admitted to a place where I’d be among people who also value these things.
I’ve got a friend who works with big cats in Africa, nearly every year, and it’s hard physical work and very routine, not so much the glamorous side we see digested for us in media. You need to really vet any program. Many, many of them depend on the money volunteers bring in for these short “exposures.” Not all programs have an educational component that allows vols to “see it all.” Many just give a flavor, in return for your fees. Many times, only the seasoned vols, like my friend, get up close. See if you can get behind the marketing words.
And no, doing this isn’t a tip for top colleges. They know the range of what kids can do, at home, how they can stretch, and it isn’t always about something attention-grabbing. This is not what makes your resume “strong enough” or gives you a “better shot.” They often prefer to see the long-haul ways you took on challenges, responsibilities, had some impact. That shows a lot about one’s thinking.
More than that, the time to vol in this sort of faraway conservation may be once in college, with more academics/qualifications behind you, a longer program that takes college kids and really depends on them, where you live and work with their staff, are expected to have some impact. And where expenses can be lower or the college offers course credit. Some colleges have scholarships to help with unpaid internships.
What can you do locally, that you haven’t yet thought of? Are you working with the vets at SPCA or a vet surgeon? What are you doing where you really roll up your sleeves and dig in?
if you can get a scholarship to some summer program, maybe ok. But lots and lots of kids are going to specialized summer programs and what matters can be the in-between, the longer commitments. Don’t shoot the messenger, but sometimes even a summer job says more than just what kids explain as “passion.”
Good luck.
Apologies for mis-reading your post and not realizing that you would be using your own, earned, money for either of these summer options, and thanks for clarifying that the volunteer program abroad was not a random choice.
As @lookingforward indicates, short term overseas volunteer programs for high schoolers have built in challenges for the people who run them. You get rolling batches of teenagers in, all of whom have to be taught how your place works, and how to do any task that you want done. They have to be fed regularly, housed, and kept safe from the environment and themselves. You have no way to vet which ones you get, and you can be pretty sure that some of them will be a challenge to manage, some of them will be useless in practice and even once you figure out who the useful ones are, you can’t get show them favoritism or the others will complain to their parents- who are usually the one footing the bill. And your regular staff has to manage all this while still doing all their usual work. It’s the money from the fees that makes it worthwhile for them to have the ‘volunteers’ in the first place.
I am certain that Barnard AdComms would be the absolute first to tell you that paid-for summer programs are not necessary to get a ‘strong enough’ resume. At this point I have heard senior AdComs/Admission Deans from just about all the tippy-top colleges say some variant of ‘we don’t care what you do- we just care that you do something; what we care about is how you process whatever you have done- whether it’s babysitting or working in retail or building something in your basement or having a fancy summer experience’.
So, knowing that money is tight, I am doubling down and saying save it for college. Or, at least only spend it on something that the payback from doing it is completely, no doubt about it, worth it even if you don’t get into Barnard or any of your reach colleges. Don’t do it b/c you think it will help you in college admissions.