Webinar Transcript: Last Minute Summer Plans

Anthony Su: Hi everyone. Really appreciate you guys joining us this evening. We'll be talking a little bit about summer planning, and what we can still do to really make sure that our students can do something fruitful over the summer – and something that hopefully they also enjoy – as part of this process.

Today Katie and Sarah will be with us introducing these different options, programs, and really just debriefing this entire process of how to plan out a summer. So we'll be talking a little bit more about that, and then we'll go through all the different options we have available.

So, Katie, can you introduce yourself, and then Sarah?

Katie Young: Hi everyone. My name is Katie Young. I’m the associate consulting director here at ILUMIN education. I graduated with a bachelor's in English from USC, and recently went back to school to get my master's in counseling from San Jose State. And I've been doing education consulting since about 2008.

Sarah Yiu: Awesome. My name is Sarah. I'm a new consultant on the ILUMIN team, but previously I was working in a different company in Hong Kong, as well as heading the college counseling department in an international AP high school in Hong Kong. I am based in Austin, Texas, and I'm really excited to meet every one of you and discuss some of these summer plans!

Anthony Su: Awesome. Again, really appreciate both of you joining us.

We'll be talking a bit about this broad picture of how to plan a summer, first, and then we'll go through the nitty-gritty – give the families at home a few options to take a look at, and specific programs and specific things like that. Of course you can use the chat box Q&A and let us know what's on your mind or what are some things you're hoping to also hear about. We'll try to get to those at the end.

Great! So let's just start with this first question. Typically summer break is just: “Okay, we get three months off!” As a student, why is it so important that we also think about, “Hey, we need to do something this summer,” or, “We need to think about doing something this summer instead of just letting it go to break time.” How would you answer that?

Katie, do you want to talk about that?

Katie Young: Yeah, sure. Well, summers are the only time of the year where you really have autonomy. You get to make a lot of choices about how you spend your time, how you spend your day, and what you prioritize each day. And what that does is it gives some insight to colleges about what really matters to you – what's valuable to you.

The same way as when you go to the library and you get to choose a book, it says a lot about you, the type of book that you choose to read when you have that choice. What do you watch on Netflix – that says a lot about you! So you want to make sure that your summers speak to the kinds of things that you like to do and the interests that you have.

Summers are also a good path to distinguish yourself from other students at your school. A lot of times schools have very similar students, because they're taking the same classes, following the same paths. joining all the same clubs. During the summer you can do something different – something that nobody else is working on! So it can be a way to try to stand out or differentiate or add something unique to your profile.

You can also give colleges insight into your family life or your responsibilities. So, for example, a lot of my students need to get a summer job because they need to help support what's going on in their own lives. So, for example, do they want to buy a car? Do they want to go to prom? Their parents aren't forking over money for that stuff, so they're going to work.

That gives me insight into the kind of family life that they have – I get to understand: what are your responsibilities. Did you serve your community? Did you spend time advocating for a cause that was important to you? It just gives me an idea, when I look at someone's résumé and how they spent their summer, what their lives are all about: their lifestyle, their family life, their community – all that stuff wrapped up into one.

And then it also gives you a chance to develop on a personal level. It gives you a chance to challenge yourself. Let's say you go to a program – which we're going to talk about later. You get to build your knowledge or build a skill set. Let's say you take a class for fun. That's a great way to develop on a personal level – by doing something exploratory or new or outside of your comfort zone! You can develop your character, and develop some social skills that maybe you're lacking.

So I guess, in general, why are summers important? Summers are important because they say a lot about who you are and what you choose to do when you have the freedom to do that.

Anthony Su: Yeah, so absolutely. It's part of that autonomy – the idea that you get to communicate something. Typically you have a lot more time compared to the school year. You get to do things that you are interested in doing – and at the same time, hopefully, productive to that admissions process a little bit later on!

So, Sarah, can you debrief a little bit on what would it take to make a summer valuable? How would you go about helping a student think through that?

Sarah Yiu: Yeah. So, adding on to what Katie and Anthony shared, in summer planning really there's no one formula for all students! You can make it valuable by doing what interests you and something that's unique to you.

I would say summer is a good chance for you to, perhaps, explore an area of interest you have or accumulate activities or experience in that area. Do a project that you can talk about in your future college essays and in your résumé. You can consider, currently in your profile: what are some areas that are lacking? Choose activities that help you fill in those gaps.

So, for example, if you're currently a grade 9 or 10 student, and you're still figuring out what major to pursue, I would say a great idea is to address that and try different things that you're interested in. If you're interested in biology, take a biology course. Or if you're interested in coding, maybe take several community college courses in coding or even an online course in coding – to learn different skills and get a taste of what studying those for four years would be like by doing something hands-on.

If you are a student who is already decided what major you want to go into, perhaps the focus should be to go deep in that major and build experience that's related to that, so you can talk about it in your college apps – you can share with colleges how you've pursued this interest in the past and what insights you've gained from it!

Here are several ways you can add value to your summer. You can – like I said earlier – explore and develop an interest. Perhaps you have an idea; perhaps you don't. You can make a list for yourself to narrow down on perhaps two to three areas that you can develop interest in.

Another way is to grow and get out of your comfort zone. Perhaps try something new. Challenge yourself. Life lessons are also very, very valuable in college applications. And not just for colleges, of course, for your personal growth as well!

Perhaps taking on a part-time job that is different. Perhaps volunteering and doing something you've never tried before, but has always been sitting on your list somewhere. It would be a good time to try. And perhaps you can also create a project for yourself or conduct research. If you're interested in science or economic research, you can do this research during the summer, because you have a little bit more of an extensive time to work on it. Some of these programs could pair you up with mentors or researchers. You can do it more extensively. You can also share those research conclusions and experience later on in the essays,

For students who are interested in, perhaps, working on their academics, you can also take different online classes. Both online high school, or, perhaps, AP classes or community college classes. Those could help you learn more in the academic field, perhaps previewing a course for next year. Or they could also boost your GPA and increase your rigor on your academic profile. So that's an option for students who want to focus on that.

Another way that you can add value to your summer – perhaps not right now, but in summer – you can visit different colleges’ campuses. You can attend, perhaps, admission webinars, or events that are particular to that college. Because in college applications, a lot of times, there is a supplement essay that would ask you: “Why do you want to choose this specific college?” And they're not looking for you to tell them about how highly they rank – but they want you to have an understanding of what you will be experiencing if you get admitted and get to go to this college. They want you to have a pretty good insight into what this college is about. So spend your summer perhaps researching colleges, that would help you prepare for college application as well.

Anthony Su: Continuing that note on that autonomy, freedom that comes with more time; we can definitely talk about it. Again, we'll go through a bunch of different options: volunteering, online courses, college courses, research, things like that. We'll get to that in a bit, but to preface it all: is there an option that you would say is particularly better for this admissions process? Should we think, “Oh, we must do an internship by X time”? What do you think about that?

Katie Young: Yeah. To circle back to the point that Sarah made, there isn't one particular path, but it's about filling in the gaps on your own profile, and developing out your own profile. When we're talking about a profile, what we're looking at is, “What do you look like on paper?”

The colleges for the most part are not going to meet you. If they do an interview, it'll be fifteen minutes, it'll be an alum, and it's not going to have a huge impact. They're not going to be able to watch a movie of your life. So when they look at a few documents about you, what are they going to see there? If they see a weak academic profile, and you spent your summer snorkeling in Hawaii, that's not really going to impress them very much. They want to see that you're working on those weaknesses and building things up.

So is there one option that's better than another? Yes. But it varies person to person. Where are you lacking? The most valuable thing that you can do is to fill in those gaps. So if you've already got a 4.0 and you're spending your summer taking more classes, is that the most valuable thing you could do? Maybe not. But if you have a 3.0, maybe so. It's going to vary by person.

And, sorry, you'll all notice that with these webinars, those of you who've been here before, that a lot of our answers are subjective and individualized. But I think that's good, because if we could just give a blanket answer to everybody, I wouldn't have a job!

So the short answer is no, there's not one option that's better than another. It's more about your profile overall.

The second thing is: colleges want students with personality, with pizzazz. They don't want a bunch of blank slates. They don't want a bunch of the same person. So doing things that interest you is important, because you're going to have to talk about this in your essays and interviews!

Just having gone to a program doesn't mean much to me. It won't stand out to me, unless you highlight it for me in an essay or explain what you benefited from. So it's always valuable to do something you're interested in talking about for the next two years, because if you're a sophomore right now and you're applying to a summer program, you're gonna have to talk about this summer program next year when you apply to another summer program, and then you're gonna talk about both of those summer programs when you apply to colleges!

If you're just rambling on about stuff that you don't care about, it's going to be pretty clear. But if you can talk about it passionately, and if it does something to improve your overall look as an applicant – and that can also vary college by college, but academic profile, extracurricular profile, and sort of personality profile are the things that they're looking at.

So are any of these options better than the others? To sum up, I think people feel like they have to have a program. Colleges do not expect you to pay $7,000 for a summer program. Nobody expects you to have that kind of money to invest in something like that! If you're able to go to a program, fantastic, but you're still a good person if you can't afford a program. There are lots of other things that you can do. And I know we keep saying this, but we're gonna get into some more specific ideas for this summer!

A program is good because it's structured already for you, so you don't have to do so much thinking. You just apply and show up, and then follow along. It's also nice because colleges have heard of those programs potentially before. so they might know, “This is a really competitive program – wow, that's really great!” Or, “We've never seen an applicant who went to this program before – wow, that's unique!” But they're not the end-all, be-all of what can be on your profile!

Anthony Su: Let's debrief these programs a little bit more, because some parents may know about Cosmos, or these other programs that are really well-known. A lot of students start really early with this summer application process. Is it like, “Hey. if the program is open right now, it's probably not worth applying and going to it”? Or how would you help students evaluate that?

Katie Young: Short answer, again, is no. If a program is still open, that doesn't mean it's not worthwhile. Because of the coronavirus, things are in flux. Some programs have adapted to be online. Some programs waited a long time to make that decision – so their deadline is pushed back. Because it's online, it can be bigger. They can incorporate more students. So just because it's still open doesn't mean it's not valuable. It just means it's bigger and later this year than it usually is generally, though, in a normal year.

I would say that the more competitive programs are due very early, which is why we are doing a webinar called “Last-minute summer planning”! Because that's a different ballpark. There are different programs open than you may have heard of before. So we're gonna highlight some of those in just a minute, but just because it's not full or it's not competitive doesn't mean it doesn't have value! Again, the value is defined by its context within your profile.

Generally what we're looking for when we apply to a summer program to assess whether it's competitive or not – and “competitive” can translate to value, depending on your profile – is how much is required to apply. Do you just have to type your name and address in on a form and click “Go”? Okay, then it's probably not the most competitive program in the world. Do you have to get three letters of recommendation and write 3,000 words of essays? Okay, it's probably a pretty competitive program!

The more criteria that are built into the application process means the more people they have to weed out of the program, so if you're looking at an application that's very simple, it’s probably a lower-key program – probably more accessible for a 9th or 10th grade student. If you're looking at a very complicated application, probably more accessible for a rising senior.

Anthony Su: Got it. Definitely, not competitive does not necessarily mean not valuable, right? And of course we can go through a situational case-by-case basis with students.

The second question, of course, pertinent with COVID as well: a lot of programs are online. Do you think, with an online program, is that also inherently less valuable or not as interesting or not worth it?

Sarah, how would you debrief that?

Sarah Yiu: Yeah. The short answer is definitely they're still worth applying for. They're still worth attending. Because, to be honest, 95% of summer programs this year are offered online. It just means, if you ever want to join anything, it's likely going to be online!

It's true that you probably will be missing out on the on-campus experience: touring the facilities and meeting the students face-to-face and the socializing aspect. And that is a sad part. But a lot of the research and projects will be done with teamwork online. You will have synchronous and asynchronous sessions. You still get a very personalized program with instructors, professors, and students. And most of these programs are designed to cover the same outcome both online and in-person

Colleges have made hard decisions to have to cancel some of the programs this year – because, for those that absolutely needed to be in-person, they've already cancelled them. So if they're offering them, it means that they are pretty confident that the delivery will be an equivalent experience for students to attend.

Anthony Su: So, again, that online format is definitely still comparable, and still going to be of that reputation for the similar programs.

We're going to transition a little bit. I'm going to let Katie go ahead and present slides that we prepared for each different particular option and scenario for students. Also, before we go a little bit deeper, I do also want to launch the second poll about grade level, just so we can also get an idea of who's in the room. So definitely please let us know, and we can try to cater it specific to your students and things like that.

Katie Young: All right. Hi, everyone. So the previous slide was just an intro. You didn't miss anything.

We're starting with experiential programs. And I want to say, before we get started – sorry, I should have said this on the last slide – we're going to go through a lot of programs that are still open. So this part down here that says “still open” means they're still accepting applications. We've put in deadlines where available. Feel free to take screenshots of this as we go along.

There are too many links here to provide them all in the chat, but if you have a specific program that you want us to follow up, we'll do our best to stick it in the chat before we leave today. But these should all be pretty easy to Google.

We're gonna go through different types of summer programs: what is valuable about those types of summer programs, whom they're best for, and what's still open. That's going to be the structure of each slide. So get your brain ready!

The first type of program that we're talking about is an experiential program. An experiential program is not typically an academic program. It doesn't end with a product or a paper or anything like that. It's more just to become familiar with a certain topic or discipline, usually a major-related discipline. An experiential program is usually hosted on a college campus or by a college. It's usually one or two weeks, maybe three weeks, long.

And students will have fun along with their academic accomplishments. This would be something that students who are not quite sure what they want to do could use to experience something new and gain different exposure, and then start to build evidence on their résumé that they can reference later. So these are great for younger students who are just starting out, just trying to figure out what they want to do.

And then you'll take a ladder up from here. So 8th graders. going into 9th grade, some of these will be appropriate for you. Or 9th graders going into 10th grade. Here are some programs that are still open and still accepting applications but are unfortunately online.

The National Student Leadership Conference program. This one has lots of different disciplines that you can choose from. There's cyber security and acting. So they have all kinds of stuff. And they're pretty fun! All my students that I've sent to these have been like, “Yeah, it was really cool. It's nice to meet people.” I haven't had any students go since it's been online, so I can't really speak to that. but I think it's a great intro step, and a pretty easy barrier for entry to get into.

Cal Poly has EPIC. Sorry, I should have spelled out what that is. EPIC is Engineering Possibilities In College. It gives you an overview of the different engineering disciplines that are available for students. And it’s just one day on each thing. It's a nice overview of what's available out there in engineering. Stanford EXPLORE is for biosciences. It's different lectures. And then Miss CEO is for leadership and business training.

So, again, these are still open as of now. They’re rolling, which means that programs are filling up as applications come in. So it's prudent to apply as early as possible.

Sarah Yiu: All right. And then we're moving to academic programs. These are some of the programs that are more like a course in a specific subject. It could be related to a discipline of study, or a very, very specific class. You can earn college credit, experience, perhaps, college-level coursework, and get evidence of interest to present to colleges in essays, telling them, “I have done a course in neuroscience and these are some things that I learned,” and stuff like that.

They’re great for students that are finishing up freshman year, going into sophomore year, and also going into junior year. The reason is a lot of these academic programs are only open to students that have completed their freshman year.

Some of the examples are UCSD Academic Connections. It has a range of different courses, like bioinformatics, computational bio or mechanical engineering. These different examples could be ranging from one week to four weeks, and you can choose, based on your preference, to earn college credit or not. But students who are interested, perhaps, in finding out a major, or want to deepen their understanding in a major, could sign up for one of these classes to do coursework in that field.

Anthony Su: Sarah, can I chime in here? I want to ask a question: how important is that college credit as part of this process? Would you in general recommend that over programs without it? How would you evaluate that?

Sarah Yiu: I think you can, at the end, request a transcript from these programs and send it along with your college applications. But I would say it's not a very important part. The grade, and you getting college credit, is not a very big part of college admissions. I would say the experience is definitely more important.

For students who are interested in a course but are afraid that they might not do well, I would say, perhaps, do pass/no pass as a way to have no pressure taking the course – learning the content, earning the credit, but not have the pressure to get an A in it.

Anthony Su: The interest is way more important.

Sarah Yiu: Definitely.

Anthony Su: And if you get college credit, it's nice, but when you go to college you'll have a lot of college credits.

Sarah Yiu: Right, so don't exactly get too worried about it.

Katie Young: And then the next type: research-based programs. We get a lot of questions about these. A lot of parents ask, “Do I have to have research? Is it really important to have research?”

It's great to have research. I think that knowing yourself enough to know what you want to research, and then being capable enough to contribute and accomplish that research – it says a ton about you.

There are certain subjects that you can study that there really isn't anything to research in the traditional sense. Say, for example, you want to study business. How do I research that, right? So there are majors that don't really have as many opportunities. But then, if you delve deeper. You'll see that with business there's like economics research, finance research, marketing analytics… There's all kinds of stuff going on that you can get into, and really build a niche for yourself.

Another good value of research is that it's unique to you. You're usually the only person or one of two or three people who are working on this given project. It produces a tangible outcome for you, so a paper – sometimes a publication, sometimes a poster that you're presenting and sharing and that you're able to share with colleges as well, and maybe enter into a competition. So there are lots of values here.

One that surprises a lot of people is just the ability to focus on developing these skills that you're going to need to be successful in college. You're going to meet these people. You're going to be accountable to these people. You have to work alongside these people that you've never met before and have nothing to do with and your goal – and may not even be reached! You may be super frustrated. You might not get the results that you're looking for. It takes a lot of character to get through a research program – so it's not for the faint of heart!

Do you need a research program to get into college? Of course not. Again, generally you have to pay to be part of these programs. But do they help you stand out. The more competitive the research program, um the more third-party validation you're gonna get. Sarah will talk about this for some of the programs coming forward as well, but “third-party validation” is basically, “Oh, these people liked this student. We know these people. We trust these people. So we should look more closely at this student!” So it helps.

But it's not everything, and there are ways to do research and projects on your own. For example – well, okay, really sorry, but before I do that… Research is best for rising juniors and rising seniors. And that's because there are usually requirements from the universities about who can research, and it's usually 16 and up. And a lot of the programs are very competitive, so they'll say, “Hey, we're not going to let you apply until you're a junior or rising senior.”

I saw in the chat somebody asked about ASDRP. That stands for Aspiring Scholars Directed Research Program. It's a Fremont-based program, independent of a college or university. It's great in that it makes research more accessible. There's not really a university near Fremont to go to, so it brings research to you. It puts you in groups with students, and makes you accountable as students to devise and figure out your own project. I think it's a great option – and an option that's still open at this point in time for applications!

Let's see. Pioneer and Polygence are two programs – and Lumiere – that are all constantly online programs. They don't have in-person options. And basically they will pair you with a mentor who works at or is a PhD student at a university, who will help you design a project of your own and then check in with you periodically as you work your way through it. So it's not technically like the formal research experience that one would expect to see, but it's still something that's unique to you, and it gives you this mentorship experience, this tangible outcome experience, and this practical experience – so it hits a lot of the same buttons, but it doesn't put you in that competitive applicant pool, and it might not be the third party validation you're looking for. But it's a very cool and new opportunity.

I'm gonna move on, so take your screenshots.

Anthony Su: And I was going to say, definitely know that these research programs are not just STEM! You can do law. You can do business. And all these different options, right?

Katie Young: That's actually a good point. I had a student last year do law, a student do genetics, and a student do artificial intelligence. So there's all kinds.

Anthony Su: Design. Anything. You can do research on anything!

Sarah Yiu: Speaking about third-party validation, joining a research mentorship project or program itself would not give you third-party validation. But if you produce a research paper of your own and you really want to submit it to publish in an academic journal or research journal, and if you got admitted to that journal to be published, that is in itself a third-party validation. That gives you an option to perhaps take your research project or research paper onwards and develop that into your own signature project as well.

Besides that you can also take on more project-based programs. I realized that project-based programs – the ones we listed here – are kind of similar to experiential programs… These projects are usually for students who are interested in taking on a hands-on project to learn about a career, or learn about an academic discipline. There would be a tangible outcome: perhaps producing a prototype of your own, or coming up with your own project or your own business idea that you can continue to develop throughout your years in high school. Or you can share that with colleges.

It also develops skills like working with a team of students to come up with the idea to work on that project. And communications, as well as time management.

Some of these programs are like Design the Future. It's a UX design course where students get to team up with other students in a small group, led by Stanford design instructors – to take you through the whole cycle of designing a product or an app. And you also will be paired with a mentor with a physical disability who would guide you through all the needs and wants of a person who would be using this product. It's a program where students get to learn how to do research, how to do design, and how do you code an app in just two weeks.

There's also BlueStamp Engineering – where students get to take on their own engineering project. If you choose their in-person program, you can develop your project there. But if you choose their online, remote program, they will send you a kit where you can follow along the instructions and build your own project. You can choose from 30 different engineering projects.

And if you are interested in AI, you can also take Inspirit AI. It’s not like, when you finish this project, you can graduate from machine learning or AI. But it's getting into this field, learning practical skills and practical projects from these programs, and then perhaps further developing these from these experiences in the summer and making it your own.

Katie Young: Okay. Programs are great. Programs help you get organized. Programs guide you through projects. But you can also do a personal project of your own.

This is something that we encourage students to do, generally – and, again, this is a weird year. Generally we have students who are like, “I don't want to work with other people. I just want to stay home and do my own thing!” But I feel like that's flipped this year; people are like, “Please get me out of my house and give me something to do and somebody to talk to!” So this would normally be something we would suggest to students who would prefer to stay home or work independently. It's good for everyone, though.

Especially if you can sustain your personal project over time, this is usually something that would be unique to you – an idea that you come up with on your own. You notice a problem in your community and you think of a solution to that problem. Or you notice a lack of information about something, or you notice a lack of accessibility to something, and you make it possible for other people to benefit from it.

So a personal project usually benefits somebody else – somebody in your community or somebody in your school. And, ideally, it relates to what you want to study. There are plenty of examples for this. I know Elton's classic example – and Elton is our CEO, those of you who don't know – he had a student interested in entrepreneurship. That student was just in his neighborhood one day looking around for problems, because Elton told him go look for a problem, and he noticed that the street numbers for the houses they paint on the curb were really hard to read, So he was like, “What if I start a business where I offer to to paint these curbs for people?” And he literally walked around, door to door, and said, “Hello, I'm painting curbs.” And got these people to donate money, which he donated to a non-profit organization – but, basically, he started a business.

He improved the beauty of his neighborhood, and he made things safer and easier, and it didn't take that much energy, right? It's not like building the cure to rabies. But it is something that's valuable within the context of the community. It's something that he came up with, and it took a lot of initiative!

I've had students start a blog. My student two years ago was just really interested in ethics surrounding medicine. and decided to start doing his own personal research on that, and built a blog, and turned that blog into a podcast. I've had students make websites or apps. When we had a lot of fires a couple years ago, I had a student make an air quality tracking app, because he saw that the ones that were available weren't specific enough to given areas.

You can organize a fundraiser or a service event for a cause or an organization that means a lot to you. So if you're not genius enough to come up with your own idea, that's okay. A personal project of yours could be to help out an existing organization. and then harness the power of the clubs and organizations that you're already a part of. If you want to run a fundraiser for an animal shelter in your neighborhood, and you're already part of Leo Club or Key Club, great. Call up Leo Club. Call up the president and be like, “I want to pioneer this fundraiser for the animal shelter.” And then you have a built-in team of people who will help you to plan and build the fundraiser.

So a personal project is basically you taking initiative to do something that's important to you. Ideally it shows some skills or interests that are relevant to what you want to do in the future. Hope that makes sense!

Sarah Yiu: Yeah, and adding to that, a good way to spend your summer or do your personal project could involve community service as well. Community service shows colleges that you are community-minded. You care about people. You want to help. You want to contribute, and volunteer your time and skills to help others in the world.

It could start from noticing a problem and doing your own non-profit to address that problem. Or you can sit at home and look on a website and see projects that you can help with, perhaps from the comfort of your home. If there's one thing that comes out of a COVID pandemic, it’s that the resources are all online, and you can take advantage of them!

It's good for everybody. You can start volunteering or doing community service from age five onwards – or age zero, depending on your parents! And you can do it all the way till you're eighty. So I would say you can definitely take advantage of some of these websites.

A good place to start, if you don't know where to start, is school. Like Katie mentioned, Key Club, Interact… There are a lot of school clubs that are focused on community service. You can also, if you are a member of your local church or member of a local community – they obviously would organize a lot of these community service opportunities as well.

If you really don't know where to start, a good website to start would be Zooniverse. It’s a website where you can just sign up to help do crowdsourcing tasks. A lot of times these are projects from research that need a lot of help for researchers to identify, perhaps, the number of cancer cells in a graph. They would show you very straightforward and direct instructions, and you would just follow the instructions, put in your time, and donate your skills.

You can also clock your hours within Zooniverse and use it to fulfill your school's community service hours. It could also be a springboard for you to learn about these different researches, and inspire you to do your own research, or inspire you to want to help even more – and you can contact the organizer and be like, “Hey, I've been working in your projects for a number of hours and I'm really, really interested in what you guys are doing. Is there any way I can volunteer in a different way, or is there any way I can be an intern at your organization?” Stuff like that.

VolunteerMatch is also a really great platform for anybody who is interested to help and donate their skills to find projects to help. You can just basically type in your location, whether or not you want to work virtually or in-person, specify what skills you can contribute, and your age, and then it will just populate the page with what's available and what organizations are looking for.

Those are great opportunities. For students who perhaps want to teach younger students, tutor. Or if you're really good at graphic design, you can help with social media marketing. Or code an app for a non-profit, right? Other opportunities could be to be a camp counselor at a summer camp. Or you can volunteer at a food bank or your local city government and stuff like that.

Katie Young: Yeah, and then the value of service, again, for all of these – the value will come out within your overall profile. How did you choose to spend your time? What do you care about? Because they can translate this to who you're going to be at their college, right? So if you're a community-minded person, and you express, consistently, that you care and you want to help, they love that. They want to see people who care and want to help. They want to see people who care about social issues and political issues and are going to be vocal and out there making things happen. So all of this – it might be small in your mind, but it's big in the larger scheme of things when they're trying to assess who you are on paper.

So, after community service, if you are burnt out on helping others, you can help yourself by getting a job or an internship! I get this question about internships a lot: “Internship” is kind of a tricky term. Kind of like “educational consultant.” There are some good ones and some bad ones! An “intern” can be somebody you know who goes and gets coffee and makes copies, right? Or an intern could be somebody who truly contributes to the workplace. So be careful with your internships.

I think colleges have a discerning eye when it comes to internships, so make sure that you can talk very readily and actively about what the company does, what the person you were interning for does, what impact you made, what contribution you made, and what skills you learned. Because, if you're just sitting there, there are more valuable ways to use your time! It's not going to go anywhere. It's just going to sit there on your résumé and nobody's going to notice it.

So that being said, an internship: it'll be practical. It'll be probably pretty unique, again. It'll require a lot of maturity, especially if you want to do a food service job or hospitality job – trust me, I did them for years! It results in a great letter of rec if you do a good job, because you're probably the only intern, or the only 16-year-old. I had a student last year get a job at Baskin Robbins, and he became a shift lead at age 17. So it's a lot of responsibility, and you have to be ready for it, But it was so great to see that on his application, because I very rarely see students do food service jobs!

So, obviously, you should consider looking for your own part-time job. Idealist is a great website. Idealist lists nonprofits that are hiring, and they actually have categories where you can select internship or volunteering versus going on a normal job search website. VolunteerMatch, also, if it's a regular volunteering opportunity. You can just call it an “internship”; nobody will know!

You could consider cold-calling some professors or some professionals. I've had it work well in the past. I've had it not work at all in the past. Don't call up Stanford and see if they're handing out internships, because they're not. Pick a different unit: a community college, or a smaller university. Something local to your home that you've never heard of before. All internships are good if you make them worth your while, and you actually contribute! All research, same!

There are some structured programs that are still open. UCSF PITCH. Sarah, what was this one about? I forgot what PITCH was for. Do you remember?

Sarah Yiu: For healthcare careers.

Katie Young: Healthcare careers. UCSF is – I should have known – a medically focused graduate school in the UC system. 

MYEEP is a San Francisco city-based program. Other cities have similar programs. They will get youth employment opportunities and youth internships. So if you sign up to be part of this program, and you make the cut, they will place you somewhere, and you'll be there for the whole summer. So look into your city's website and your local government's website.

And good luck – now's the time, if you're gonna start looking for a job or an internship for the summer! April/May is when people are building up their workforces and their staffing. So get started!

Sarah Yiu: Another way to add to your summer is to take preview courses. Perhaps a lot of you already know this path. It’s basically just taking a course ahead. If you know you're going to take AP calculus AB next year, and you want to prepare well for it, you take a preview course out of one of these preview classes. AJ Tutoring provides one. Harker School also has a list of classes that they offer for both students in Harker and also outside students. Khan Academy also has a list of different preview courses that you can take online.

It just helps you prepare for next year. It helps you to build confidence. And, if you're really stressed out about a course, if you already looked at all the curriculum, and looked at some of the questions ii might cover, it would perhaps help you take off the stress. So it's great for students perhaps getting ready to take some more challenging courses like honors or AP classes next year. This would be a good option for you.

Katie Young: Definitely. And, just to clarify, preview courses are not for credit. They're not going to get you ahead of your school. They're just to get ready for the more competitive classes.

Test prep. I know we're running out of time. We only have a couple more of these!

So, test prep. We did a webinar about test prep. You can find it on our website recordings. But, basically, testing is still happening. I know that this year it was optional. This upcoming year, for seniors, it's probably going to be optional as well. But TBD for classes after that. So, to be safe, you still need to prepare for the SAT and ACT.

Using your summer to do that can take a lot of the stress off during the school year, when you're already spending so much time studying at the computer and gaining new knowledge. You can also start preparing for competitive exams like the AMC or the USACO, which are math-based and computer-based tests. Doing well on those can be another source of third-party validation for your college applications. Those are not easy tests. They take a lot of studying – like whole weeks and weekends out of your life to prepare! So, definitely, I'm getting ahead. At least looking at the curriculum for those over the summer would be a good idea. The testing is usually in the spring, so you have a long, long lead up!

And then, again, for test prep – Khan Academy: great resource. There are organizations local to the Bay Area: Elite, AJ Tutoring. And then, for these AMC, USACO-type tests, there are lots of clubs and workshops, especially at high schools where lots of students work collectively to prepare for these things. So seek out if there's a community near you, that's already preparing, that you can just join in!

Sarah Yiu: Another type of class would be classes that you can take for credit at a community college, whichever local community college it is. Or online high school electives. When you take these courses. just make sure that they are UC-approved. That means it would just transfer over to colleges.

When you take the course, you might also have to get your school counselor’s pre-approval to take these courses. You can take a course to explore an interest. Because my school does not offer this particular class, I could take it at a community college or an online high school. You can also use these courses to earn credits, like we said, and boost your GPA.

Some of these outlets or avenues to do so are UC Scouts, online. BYU – Brigham Young University – independent study. Mission College. Foothill College. De Anza. All of these are available for you. Most of them are online. I think registration starts in April, but it could drag all the way out to June. It's usually for summer semester. You can also take these throughout the year as well. You just have to register for the specific semester that you want to take it for.

Katie Young: That's right. And these will be GPA boosters – good for those of you, when you're looking at your profile, if you're weaker on the academic end. This is a good strategy, versus a four-credit summer program, because the credit is not going to help you with your GPA. These classes will help you with your GPA, if they're UC-approved.

MOOCs and not-for-credit courses. I'm going to do this one really quick; I think everybody's heard of this. These are online free courses that universities have crafted and put together and post online for you to take for free. That's what a MOOC is. I don't remember what it stands for; it doesn't matter [it’s “Massive Open Online Course”]. But Coursera, EdX, Udemy – those are all good sources. You can take the course to get a certificate. That's like 40 bucks. Or you can just take it without the certificate, just for funsies.

There are also some courses that are not for credit that colleges are hosting. Brown, Penn, Wake Forest. Wake Forest, by the way, is a hidden gem school that not a lot of people have heard of in North Carolina. Good option – hey juniors!

Sarah Yiu: Students who are currently in junior year – or perhaps the early preppers in sophomore year – might want to spend the summer researching college. Some ways to do that might be go visit the college campus, or do virtual campus tours. You can also look online. Websites like Unigo or Niche would give you a lot of student reviews – actual reviews of what they think of the college. Or you can also join some of the virtual college fairs to learn about college admissions stats, as well as what's unique about them.

A fun fact is that most colleges still track demonstrated interest. So if you register for these admissions events or college fairs or like at your school, you are signing up to meet with a rep with your email address. They track you. And they would add that to your demonstrated interest. Because all colleges care about yield.

Another thing for perhaps younger students to do is to look at different careers. It would help you determine what major you want to go into. Some ways to do it could be to look at these websites – for example: Payscale. I know people do care about what are some of the top paying majors!

Or you can take a look at Career One Stop, which has videos and a simple description of what each major or each career would require – what type of schooling, and what type of daily tasks would you be doing? You can take a look at that and envision whether that is something you want to go into in the future and help you narrow down your list of majors.

You can also call up your parents’ friends. Or you can make a list of careers you want to look into, look on LinkedIn, and just reach out to people and ask them if it's okay to have like a 15-minute call with them to get to know what they do. That is actually a really helpful way to learn about careers, and how people get there, as well!

It's good for everybody. It's a good way to help yourself learn about different college majors, different college programs and campuses.

Katie Young: This one's gonna come out of left field, but spend your time reading and writing – if you don't have another plan, or if you've got some buffer time, or if you're traveling. Colleges will ask for – and this is not every college; don't panic – but colleges will ask you what books you read for fun during high school. And by the time I get a senior, they're like, “What is fun?” So I would recommend that you start doing some reading on your own time about topics that are interesting to you. It could be nonfiction, or just more classy fiction books that you're interested in. Maybe your Harry Potter novel is not the best one to talk about – even though I'll be the first one to say that I love that book!

So, reading and writing. It helps you develop your worldview, and your perception of yourself. It helps you understand more about diverse populations and how to relate to different people. It develops empathy. Critical reading will help you with your test scores. It will help you with more advanced English.

Colleges will see your writing. They will see your essays. And a lot of these essays will need to be creative and inventive in order to get their attention. So take a creative writing workshop. Learn how to write about yourself. You don't need to start writing your college essays right now – that's not what I'm saying. This is meant to help you practice.

If you are a junior – between junior and senior year – any time that you're not involved in a program or other project you should be spending working on your essays. It's important to get through as much as possible!

Sarah Yiu: All right, this is the last one. Take a break. You are free to take a break! Your career is not just to study, study, study, and join programs, right? It’s important for self-care as well to take time to take care of yourself. You can spend time with your family. You can spend time with your friends. Join local events, and do things that make you happy.

Some families ask me: is it okay to do vacations? Yes! (COVID permitted.) You can go travel. That is a great way to learn about different cultures. It's a great way to open your eyes and gain exposure. I would say that traveling itself probably doesn't help your admissions to college – but if you want to learn something new, I would say yes!

Here’s a personal experience. Last year in 2019, before COVID, I spent a year traveling to different countries. And my thing is to go to museums – history museums and art museums. If you are somebody who's interested in several things, I would say take your time to take a break to learn those things – to indulge in your interest. That is important as well.

Anthony Su: I know we're a little bit short on time, but we'll cover a few questions just before we head out for today. I had a question – it sounds like it's a rising senior going through the application process. It looks like she's hoping to get through with most of her essays. It looks like she has a draft of the main statement already. She's saying, like, “Given that I'm already also trying to do the essays over the summer, how much more helpful is it to do these summer programs and things like that?” How else can they fit on their particular application process at this point, going into senior year?

Katie Young: Any program that's available at this point will likely be more to build up your experience and your interest, and in a certain major subject. So if you've already demonstrated that you're already at a good spot, I would try to develop a more personal project or a community service project that's relevant to your major. I would spend a lot of time building out your college list and writing your supplemental essay drafts. Other than that, if you feel like you've got GPA or test score weaknesses, now's a good time to work on those things.

This summer it would be great if it could serve as kind of a capstone to your interests. So bringing together experiences that you've had in the past into a cohesive whole. If you had to share one item off your résumé, it would be this thing, because it covers a lot of other things under its umbrella. So, for example, if you've been interested in computer science and politics, how can you combine those two things into a project or a paper – or a class – that you could show colleges: this is where everything on my résumé is going? This is how it becomes cohesive, and then that can bleed over into your essays. I hope that that answered at least part of your question.

Anthony Su: The other thing is I'm noticing a lot of questions on comparisons between, “Do I look at this program or that program?” or, “Is research gonna be better in comparison to community college?” So definitely, please, book a free consultation. We can go over that as part of that particular process, right?

But I guess there's another question, from the parent perspective. What should be the rough ballpark for things like research programs that they're thinking about? If they're worried about costs or thinking about what's going to be actually helpful from that perspective? Do you guys have any advice in regards to looking at the cost of programs and things like that?

Katie Young: Sorry, I'm trying to type answers in the chat. Sarah, do you…?

Sarah Yiu: Yeah. Some of the shorter, online research projects could be um from a couple hundred dollars to a couple thousand dollars, I would say – I don't have the exact numbers – but I think, if you're interested in biomedical research, the Rosetta program – the real set of workshops – are reasonably priced. They're like a couple hundred dollars. But if you are joining one of those Horizon or Poligence programs, it would be a couple thousand dollars.

Anthony Su: And then one other thought: can MOOC help with admissions? The courses that are non-credit, or certificate courses – would you recommend students take those?

Katie Young: Definitely – especially computer science students. There's not a lot of the high school curriculum that touches on more advanced things like machine learning or data structures. I don't even know what the words I'm saying mean, but I've seen students take a lot of additional coursework there. And it's been impressive, because I've seen their college results and they do better than someone who's just taken AP, even though their grades are worse. So it shows a mastery of the subject matter.

In that case, if that's what you're using to make your case, and you don't have another big program, I would say spring for the certificate. Take the full course – like, really do it!. And, yes, I do think it will help, because you'll be able to talk about that experience within your essays.

Anthony Su: Yeah, definitely, of course MOOC can help, especially with those more specialized or more advanced topics as well. So, yeah, definitely.

Of course we'll have a recording of this. I know we went through a ton of information. There are five or six examples on every slide! So we'll send out another resource document to make sure that everyone can take a look at the different programs that we recommended, or the different options still open. Hopefully I can send out that email tomorrow morning.

But, yeah, definitely we'll also have this recording on our website, if you want to come back and take a look and reference it!

Again, Katie, Sarah, I really appreciate you guys joining me today. And, of course, participants, really appreciate you guys joining us. Feel free, of course, to request a free consultation. We’re happy to discuss this a little bit more in a little bit more detail, since we were just introducing the idea and the different topics today.

Okay, all right. Thanks so much, everyone. Have a good day.

Sarah Yiu: Bye, thank you!

Katie Young: Bye.