YouTube Deep Summary

## Intro: Why Summer Strategy Matters [00:00] Hello everyone. Welcome to today's webinar training on summer classes and activities on what to take and why it matters. Uh if y'all haven't already planned out for the summer, uh this is the right session for you. Uh you all should be thinking about what kind of summer enrichment, whether that's the activities or the um courses that you need to take. So we're going to cover all those different things. So for today, we're going to talk about why summer programs matter. Uh whether you should consider doing academics versus extracurriculars. uh we're going to talk about some types of activities and uh ways to think about it on h what will boost your application, how to get into summer programs and then at the very end stick around for some more resources, recommendations on summer programs that you can apply to. So we curate a list and if you don't have it already, we'll share it with you. Uh quick housekeeping, uh if you don't mind, uh just sharing what exact graduation year that you're in just so that I know who to cater the audience to. And also throughout this entire session, feel free to drop your Q&A in the box and then uh we can be able to uh answer it ## Academic Rigor, Summer Slide, and Personal Growth [01:30] uh at the very end. And also replay notes will always be available at the very end. Awesome. I see some 2028s, 2027, 2026. Great, great, great. And uh for myself, if you haven't met me already, uh I'm Coach Victor with Eagle. I used to be a former UC Berkeley's admissions outreach coordinator and instructor teaching a class on how to get into graduate school. going to all these sorts of different high schools across California on how to get into college. And also, fun fact, I was a full ride UC Berkeley scholar for undergrad and graduate school. So, didn't have to take out a single loan thankfully. And also in terms of my background, I worked in K through2 education policy, worked in edtech, and now also as an admissions adviser. So, that being said, uh super excited to be able to share this webinar with you and continue to stay engaged throughout this entire time. So, pop quiz uh for in the chat. Do top tier universities care about what you do over the summer? Yes or no? What do folks think? Uh, do they care or not? I see one. Yes. Any other ideas? Yes. Okay. Yes. I'm guessing people are like, uh, oh, is this a trick question or not? So, uh, the answer is yes. Of course, they want to know. And, uh, let's let's understand why, right? because the summer time is really the only time where you can differentiate yourself. Generally speaking, all the the entire academic year, you're typically doing the same kind of things, the same courses and maybe similar uh activities or clubs that that are on campus. But aside from that, the summertime is the way to differentiate yourself. So, we're going to talk about why summer experiences matter. And as I mentioned, differentiation, uh that's kind of the main goal here is what is it that you can do over the summertime that can stand out in comparison to your peers. Furthermore, thinking about uh personal learning as well. Uh the whole point isn't necessarily just to look good for college applications, but really think of it as like a way to uh learn more about yourself, learn more about the particular field that you're interested in, and especially being able to advance your uh your academic learning. And so uh that's the first bullet point here in terms of the academic rigor taking harder courses or more enrichment opportunities where you can get to the next level. Again what colleges want to understand is can you handle the amount of rigor expected at a university and they determine that based off honors courses, AP courses, AP test scores, dual enrollment and also any enrichment of programs that you've participated in as well. Secondly, preventing summer slide. There is a known uh scientific study where students tend to uh get lower grades in the fall because they haven't practiced their academic skills. If you haven't done math for 3 months, it's more likely that you might forget some concepts. So that's why it's really important to keep fresh, especially for those who are doing like SATs maybe in the fall. That's something that you want to be careful about. Third, exploring potential college and career interest because when you apply to colleges, they always want to know why do you want to do this? Uh why do you want to study this particular field? And also, if you're applying to private schools, they're going to ask you, why is it that you want to apply to this school specifically? So, what better way to do it than just fly out there or go out there if you can with your resources that are available and just check it out. And lastly, increases motivation ## Dual Enrollment vs. AP—Which One Gives You More Credit? [04:45] for the school year. Okay? Uh, if you are a parent and you're here representing your child, but your child isn't here and you struggle with like, how do I encourage my kid to be able to take college admissions more seriously? Well, the summertime is the best time for that because you think about it, it's the only time where they can kind of take a retreat away from school to really self-evaluate what do they really want to do in the future, right? And this is where exposing them to as many different things as possible to see what's pos uh to see what's out there like possible colleges, possible careers, and being able to get them to reflect on all those exposure activities will be able to hopefully uh propel them forward. And so uh let's talk about academics versus extracurriculars. What is it that you should be uh considering? So when we come to academics, right, what we're talking about here is one like courses like dual enrollment. That's typically the main thing that we really focus on which is taking courses at the community college. The reason why this is important is because it's smarter and faster. And what I mean by that is you don't have to take an AP test in order to get college credit. So, for example, calculus AB is a fullyear course and you have to get a four or five on the AP test in order to qualify for college credit. But you could just go to community college and take calculus one and that is already fulfills the uh the calculus AB requirement. And also the thing uh to think about is if you take the same courses as everyone else, you're going to look like the same as everyone else. So, the goal is to diversify your academic schedule so that you can appear differently. So, taking a dual enrollment course, especially at the community college, is going to be super helpful. For those who uh uh didn't attend my webinar on how I was able to get a full ride scholarship to Berkeley, I also talked about how I did dual enrollment way back in the day. This was like 200 like 9 or 8 or something like that. And being able to take like uh like calculus over the summer time was also one of those things that I did. Second thing, enrichment, research opportunities or pre-ol programs. uh is it really required to like really participate in these summer programs? Not really, right? But at the same time, we want to show that you are taking steps further advanced. And uh the thing about the colleges, we recognize and understand that this isn't supposed to be like a pay to uh play kind of like uh process, right? Um even if you don't have access to these enrichment programs, you could still be able to kind of do your own self-study or your own self-ressearch. So for example uh some people might be doing their personal project and that is a form of uh academic enrichment itself as well from that like a formal institution but actually just doing it yourself um even at home and that's where we talk about the personal projects um and that kind of relates to the extracurriculars as as well actually. So going to extracurriculars, uh some examples of what this might look like is career oriented events like so for example uh doing like an internship over the summer to be able to get exposure to work uh work experience uh being able to shadow somebody uh and maybe even doing like a project for that particular company if you can. The goal is to be able to understand what exactly are you learning from school and how does it apply to the real life work experience because think of it this way if you're able to write in your uh personal statements or in your personal insight questions about hey I can see that this particular skill ## Extracurriculars That Actually Impress Admissions Officers [08:00] that I want to learn in college is going to help me to be able to achieve this particular job or be able to make this particular impact because I saw it myself by through an internship. you have shown a lot of maturity in that uh in that personal statement because you understand about how the skills connect directly to the careers. Second thing is leadership and services. Uh so for example volunteer programs, fellowships going out and serving the community in some type of way. Uh what the colleges look for is really to understand will you benefit this uh this college community? Will you be an asset to your community and help it grow and help it flourish? And so that's why they seek out people that do volunteering. It's not just because it looks good on the college admissions process because it fits into the culture of the college. And the colleges want to know are you just going to go through school and just like focus on academics or are you actually going to try to contribute back to our college uh campus? And lastly is passion based whether that's arts, sports, music or just doing something right. Uh ideally, you know, the the goal is to be able to do kind of more of the career oriented or leadership service, right? The passion base is still very much uh important. If you're not doing any of the career or leadership service, at least the passion base of doing art, sports, or music or whatever it is is still fine, too. The most important thing is thinking about what did you learn from those experiences and how does it help you understand what you want to do later on in the future, whether that's in college or your career, and what is it that you want to do with this particular like uh activity. So um at the end of the day the kind of recommendation here is to do both. Uh it's not about doing just academic or just doing extracurriculars or trying to decide like which one is the best. The way to think about it is summer experience should be additive to admissions. What I mean by that is uh it never really looks bad on admissions if you do something else, right? Like they will do a comprehensive review where they will review everything that you've been involved in and everything that you do is like a building block to be able to say like this is what builds this particular profile. So in ways there isn't necessarily something bad that you can do um unless you talk about it poorly. But but what I mean by that is uh even if you think about like just the capacity of a student, okay, uh a lot of parents have told me like, hey, I'm really worried about can my kid actually handle uh a internship while also doing um a dual enrollment course. Well, the way to think about it also is like uh how many hours does it really take to really be able to take a class, right? Or how many hours is an internship really uh for this particular summer experience? Most high school summer experiences, they only go for about 5 hours to 10 or in rare cases 10 to 20 hours when you're doing a lot more hours. But even then, you still have like the rest of the entire week to really be able to uh dedicate yourself to either the academics or the um the summer uh opportunity extracurriculars. And also the last thing to consider is what is energy generating to students. Remember, the whole point about activities is to be able to demonstrate to universities, what is it that you're doing right now that is encouraging you or motivating you to continue to go to college. And I would suspect that the activities that students are doing, ## How to Choose Based on Energy + Motivation [11:20] they're doing it because they want to do it. It's not because they have to do it, but it's because they want to continue learning and exploring this particular field. So in ways instead of thinking about like how extracurriculars can like take a toll on students in reality that's what students might love to do. If anything uh the extracurriculars could be actually a lot more enjoyable more than the actual academics itself. So that being said don't limit your kid to just the uh academics. Give them the opportunity to explore the extracurriculars because that gives them energy. And on that point, right, I want to uh kind of uh there's this diagram that I was able to find about the uh power of full engagement. Okay, in most uh cases, a lot of parents and students tend to limit their uh their days based off time. You're trying to time manage something. You're trying to make sure that you get the best bang for your buck. And the way to do that is like by saying like, "Hey, how much time should I dedicate to each thing?" And the thing is time is fixed, right? Meaning that there's only certain number of hours each day. And so therefore you're gonna like kind of problem solve and try to see what you can fit uh within a given week. But the thing is there is a concept of can you find energy generating activities where energy is not fixed where you can find the particular things that students love to do in their extracurriculars that give them more energy to do more things. And by being able to do that, you actually increase their happiness. You increase their uh alertness and performance, and they just start feeling connected to what is it that they're doing on a day-to-day basis. A lot of parents have asked me in the past like, "How do I get my kids motivated to do something?" Well, the first thing is figure out what are energy generating activities that they can do. And then you attach that with something else that they can explore. So for example, if they really love to play sports, then great, like have them play sports and then uh if they want to explore some type of career or some type of uh other academic study with it, then see if you can kind of pair it together whether uh maybe you playing basketball at the particular college itself uh or uh I don't know having that particular activity accessessible to the other activity that you're trying to associate with each other. Uh for those who uh attended my habits um webinar in the past, we talked about habit stacking. Try to attach something that they enjoy with something that they're trying a new habit that you're trying to create. And then that's a habit stack right there. And then you're able to kind of uh make that an energy generating activity as well. So that being said, the kind of takeaway from here is doing both academic and extracurriculars and being able to see that the extracurriculars are a way to generate more energy so that way they can uh self-retain themselves in the academics. All right, I digress. Let's go to the next part which is how to choose the right academic courses which a lot of uh students and and parents come to our office hours to be able to ask. So remember that there are three pathways into admissions that we talked about or communicate here. The first pathway is computer science and engineering. Second is STEM and business. And third is everything else. Depending on which pathway you decide to go to, that's going to determine your competition and what exactly they look for. So, first off, computer science and engineering is the hardest pathway. So, let's talk about what exactly it is that you need in order to get there. So, during the summertime, consider taking uh math courses. Usually, math is the biggest differentiation here for this particular pathway. So, calculus 1 and calculus 2 are equivalent to calculus AB and BC. Remember what we talked about is that at the uh high school, typically you might take calculus AB and BC in two separate years. Or if you're lucky, then you can skip all the way to BC. But if you take calculus AB and BC in two separate years, that's two years worth of taking courses. So, instead of doing that, go to dual uh take a dual enrollment course, take calculus one for ## Three Admission Pathways: Engineering, STEM/Business, and Everything Else [15:10] one semester, calculus 2 in a second semester, and you complete it in half the time. and then go to calculus 3 which is multivariable calculus. Generally speaking, a lot of students or a lot of schools do not have access to that. So, uh remember that you're going to be compared against your school and your geographical location. So, the way to think about it is how do I differentiate myself more? Cuz if you take the same course as everyone else, you're going to look like the same as everyone else. So the goal is to be able to take that course that gets you further ahead because calculus uh multivariable calculus and also linear algebra and differential equations. These are college level courses that you would typically take in undergrad. And remember what the universities are looking for is can you handle the amount of rigor at a university. So that's why you would go for those particular courses. Second of all, uh you should also be completing AP physics 1, 2, and C on UC Scott. If you are um uh if you have AP physics at your school, right? Typically, you might have only like one physics course or two physics course depending on what type of resource school that you have. But generally speaking, not a lot of uh high schools actually have all three of them. And so if you don't, this is actually a good thing. This is where you can actually strategize. as it makes it easier for you to choose because let's say your school offers AP physics 1 and AP physics C. Great. Take AP Physics 2 on uccout.org because that is going to get you further ahead because you are taking a course that no one else at school is taking. Third, uh complete AP computer science principles and A on UC scout as well. Uh sometimes some schools might only have AP computer science principles. So in that case take AP computer science A. And so that is the kind of way to think about it is what is the courses that students generally tend to take and what is it that you can take that is different from them. Furthermore, remember a grade is always better than saying that's in progress. A lot of students might say, "Well, I'm taking that in 12th grade." Yeah, sure. But remember that if you have a grade level already attached to it, that gives you a boost up because you um have shown that you have proficiency in it. When you're enrolled in it, that just says that okay, they're enrolled in it. they're in the process of taking it, but I don't know how they're actually going to do. And so, you give a you give the readers more certainty if you have that grade attached to it. All right, the second one is STEM and business. So, remember that there are um uh this is al also really looking at math as well. So, STEM and business is really interested in the math and sciences. It's not as highly rigorous though as the computer science and uh and the engineering pathway because there's usually a lot math for that. And I I know that some parents uh will say, "Well, isn't STEM engineering?" Well, yes, but then we separate engineering out because the uh engineering and computer science fields just tend to be more competitive generally. And so for STEM and business, you just you can just get to calculus uh 3, which is multivariable calculus, and you'll be pretty good there. But also uh the other classes that you should focus on instead is the AP biology, AP chemistry on UC Scout, especially for those who are in the premed route, right? Uh getting those courses done is going to be really crucial. And if your your high school does not have these courses, then great. That makes it easier for you to be able to choose this. And yes, you can do at your high school as well. There's no uh there's not like necessarily like a significant benefit between like taking under high school or UC scout, but at least by taking on UC Scout, you're able to show to them that like, hey, I am actively trying to go out of my way to learn more on my own time. So, it does show that you're taking initiative. Lastly, is the dual enrollment courses on general education courses. So, every single uh state has their own kind of uh general education requirements to transfer from a 2-year community college to a 4-year university. So, for example, California, it's Calgati, formerly I get Texas has the Texas core curriculum. Washington has a direct transfer agreement. Every single state has their own kind of name to it, right? So, figure out what that is and then just take those courses. Usually, we recommend taking courses like uh like psychology or sociology just because they tend to be easy for students to pass the first time. So, if it's your kid's first time uh to take a community college course, that might be the easiest one to take uh at the very moment just because they tend to do really well. Uh furthermore, if you want to take an easy course, remember to work smarter, not harder. You can look up ratemyprofessors.com to see if uh these professors are easy to take because students are rating them. And again, the goal is to get the easiest professors possible. Don't try to make it harder for yourself by taking like a difficult professor. So, look up what those requirements are and then any of those requirements are going to look good. Meaning that since the general education requirements are for a four-year degree, it doesn't matter which major that you decide to go into. Uh the courses are still going to look good no matter what. And uh if uh sometimes we get the question too like what can I take ## Finding the Right Summer Courses + Instructors [20:00] business courses? Yes, you can if you're trying to major in business, but also consider what's actually transferable. Uh so each state also has a website where you can check if the two-year um community college course can transfer to that four-year. And so for California, it's like assist.org where you can see if the business course that you're taking actually transfers to a required course over at the at the 4-year university. And this is important because you don't want to just take any course at the dual enrollment. You want to take courses that are actually recognized by the 4-year institution that this is a qualified college credit course. So don't just take anything on a on a course catalog. Take the ones that actually apply to these particular requirements. All right. And the last one, everything else. So if you're like a humanities, social science major or anything that's not STEM, business or computer science or engineering related, uh in this case, right, just taking general high rigorous courses. So by completing online AP courses and taking the dual enrollment courses is the strategy here. So there's not much of an emphasis about trying to get as high much possible in terms of math uh because you're not trying to compete for those really rigorous like STEM uh majors but you want to still be able to differentiate yourself by taking more dual enrollment courses uh that other students don't have. Okay. So that's the kind of academic recommendations there. So next is about the extracurriculars. How do you choose the right summer programs? So, uh before you we like, you know, just go straight to a list and think about, hey, this one sounds good, this one sounds good, and like uh this one is um I don't know, aligned to my major. You want to ask yourself first, what is your actual learning objective? What is the actual challenge that you're trying to be able to accomplish this coming summer? So, usually when it comes to students, right, there are three types of issues that you generally will see. There's an awareness issue, a skills issue, and a motivation issue. So, we're going to dive into each one about what it exactly means. So, first off with awareness issues, right? Awareness issues is where you don't know what careers or majors are out there. Uh, and generally speaking, it's it's the kind of quote that you tend to say, I don't know what I what I don't know, right? And the thing is, you just don't have enough exposure yet. You don't know what possible routes are there. you don't know like anything about the workforce or about what majors even exist and this is where uh programs or experiences can be really helpful for acknowledge for addressing the awareness issue. So for example, one is career exploration programs. So going to career fairs, shadowing, you know, and when you're shadowing, it doesn't have to be a perfect alignment to what you want to do. Uh it's okay to try something out and just know that you just don't like it. If you don't like something, then that's fine. That's great information for yourself to be able to continue onward. Second is like pre-ol programs. So going to like Harvard pre-ol, Stanford summer sessions. These are great exposure to be able to see what a college campus is like where you live on the dorms for uh like a week or two and you get to experience what's it like to be a college student. This can be very helpful especially for the students who maybe don't feel like they really want to go to college or they're not really sure because by being able to be on a college campus, you can imagine yourself there and then you can be able to feel motivated and backwards map what is it that you want to do. Third thing is informational interviews and job shadowing. This is something that is totally under underrated, but people need to do it way more often, which is instead of interviewing for like a job or or anything. You're you're interviewing somebody else uh about what is it they do, what is it that uh what's what's their like work life like? And the goal is to be able just to learn and understand more about what it takes to get to that particular career. And just think of it this way, if you are interested in becoming like a dermatologist, right? You can go to class, you can take all the courses relating to dermatology. You can uh you know take your bio, your science, and then work your way up until you finally get to the dermatology course uh in medical school. Or better yet, why not just talk to somebody? Why not just talk to a dermatologist yourself? You don't need to take all these courses to uh validate whether if this is the career that you want to go into. instead just find a dermatologist and then be able to talk with them about what their experience is like. Those informational interviews are pivotal because they help students learn much faster. So again, the goal is to reduce the gap between learning experiences and informational interviews are the quickest way to be able to understand what does a student really want. If you are a parent right now listening and you wanted to be able to uh get your kid to figure out what type of job they want to do, set up conversations with your co-workers or your friends with your student so that way like they they can be able to get more exposure and learning and teach them how to network as well like learn how to have a conversation with adults ## Awareness, Skills, and Motivation: What’s Holding You Back? [25:00] like just having something as simple as that. Uh fourth is industry specific workshops. So there's a lot of STEM boot camps out there. Usually these are more like local based where they might have like uh like a weekly experience where you can be able to have some type of enrichment. Those are also really good. And lastly, volunteering like working at a hospital, working for a nonprofit, city government, doesn't really matter. Again, the goal is just to be able to get them out there and expose themsel. And I always uh teach this to the parents I work with, which is you need two parts. Exposure and reflection. Exposure to try out as many things as possible. And don't forget the reflection piece which is what did you learn from that experience because that reflection is what helps you helps them understand whether it's something they like or don't like. All right. Next part is the skills issue where you don't have skills or experiences to actually do the job. So this is where maybe you're aware of yes I know that I want to uh be an aerospace engineer. I know that I want to kind of go down this path. And just so you know, you don't have to choose specifically what particular career title or job that you want to be when uh in your college apps. You just got to know your general direction. And that's why we talk about pathways because you don't always know what your major is. Most students t tend to change their majors anyway. But just think about if once you know what direction that you want to go towards, then the next step becomes okay, what skills and experiences do I need to be able to be successful in this particular route. And so very first thing uh is internships and apprenticeships. So being able to work for a particular company and getting the kind of uh fundamental skills, understanding what the workplace is like and also that gives you a lot of exposure to the people at the uh workplace. So you can talk to uh the engineers there, you can talk to any of the workers that are working at that same place. So that way you can do more informational interviews. Second thing is project-based learning and research lab. So sometimes uh just being able to create this kind of goes along with the personal project in a way where you don't necessarily need a summer program to really be able to uh enrich yourself. You can always work on something yourself. Uh for example, a lot of uh coders really love to be able to create their own application, create their own game and that's something that they could do at home whether by themselves with their friends or their family. And uh that's something that they are applying the actual skills to that project and that helps them understand uh what skills am I missing from that particular opportunity and then they self teach themselves to be able to problem solve it. Also being a part of research or lab is also effective as well. So being able to possibly uh research under a professor you can do the cold outreaching which is being able to email as many professors as possible saying like hey I'm very invested and interested in your research. I'm wondering if there's a way that I could participate in a research experience with you over the summer. That's totally possible as well. Third, hackathon and competitions. Uh there's a lot of students uh in our program that are part of DECA Science Olympiad. So, being able to participate in those uh freelancing and gig work if uh you're if you are a student and you want to learn how to make money already, uh there's a part maybe a particular skill that you already have and you just need more practice with it. And so you can potentially uh do some freelancing work and get people to pay you. Especially like let's say for example you're a graphic designer. That is something that you could be able to uh outsource and potentially get money for it. And lastly uh online certificate courses. So just taking online like skills courses on like Corsera Udami. These are things that are just like kind of structured learning if you're like kind of a studious person. But also to remember that for this particular online study, make sure that you try to apply what you're learning as well because the application is what's really important for the admission side. Lastly is motivation, which is I don't feel like doing anything this summer. This is where uh students here, they might not really be that interested in college, right? And that's that's okay. You know, that happens to a lot of different students. And and the reason why uh motivation is just not there is just because there isn't a strong sense of vision about what they actually want to do or what they really want to see for themselves in the future. And so just by being able to do more like exploratory enrichment kind of programs would be helpful in this case. So, for example, travel and cultural exchange programs by going to a different country and seeing like other cultures that are not just the ones here in the US is also effective because it lets them see like the world in a different light and that can give them much more perspective. Usually, motivation is an issue of perspective where you just don't see certain things the way uh other people have seen it and what what encourages them. Second, sports and outdoor adventures. Just being able to get more physically active is really going to be helpful as well. Uh because uh that will increase their endorphins and be able to apply it to um think more further ahead. Creative arts and media programs getting ## How to Apply for Summer Programs the Smart Way [30:00] just very creative just generally speaking service learning and mission trips by volunteering and uh being able to give back to the community. And lastly, mentorship and coaching programs. So if you notice a lot of this is very relational based. It's not very much it's not career based as much but that's okay because uh at least you are getting out of the house and being able to try something out and just by having fun that opens the brain opens the mind to be able for new experiences and uh to talk about college. It's possible that a lot of students are just not ready to talk about college and that's just because like they haven't necessarily uh open their mind enough to really think about it just yet. And so sometimes just taking a retreat will be able to help with that. All right, so next part is finding and applying to summer programs. Okay. Uh what is like an effective way to be able to figure out what are the right summer programs? And to be quite honest, if you're right now still trying to figure out what your summer programs are in April, it might be very difficult to be able to do that. So you might not really be able to apply to any specific program because usually a lot of deadlines are like either now or they already passed. But if you're lucky, you'll be able to find some. Uh so first off, the most effective way is to network with the winners. Meaning like talk to other families or other students. And if you're part of our coaching programs, you can always ask our staff directly in our uh chatting uh service where you can be able to figure out what are some relevant summer programs that relate to X or Y, right? And just being able to talk to people, you'll be able to uh see what either what they experienced or what their kids experienced or what have their other friends or connections have experienced as well. By being able to just kind of get a referral is going to help you go a long ways because if you can find somebody, if you know somebody who went to college and ideally maybe your top college choice, you can ask them like, "Hey, what did you do while you're in high school? what was the summer experiences that you've uh done to get you to Harvard or Berkeley or whatever. So in this case, right, um just being able to connect with your networks or older like siblings or cousins will be effective like first start. Secondly is online research. Uh what do online communities including Eagle recommend? And so just even through a simple Google search is honestly going to really be helpful as well. If you just Google search like summer program for I don't know San Jose, California, that's where I'm based at right now. uh you can be able to find things that uh that like pop up and you never know what is it that you can find and also even Reddit as well. Reddit is a really great place to be able to find some uh new information. And again um I wish there was like a single data database or source of truth for all the summer programs. But generally speaking, when it comes to summer programs, there's so many that are coming up every single year and sometimes they don't always do the same thing every single year either. So most of the stuff that you find in databases will tend to be outdated anyways. So that being said, the kind of summer experiences that I might have had would probably be very different from what it is now. All right. And uh so let's talk about applying. And um the the most important thing is that when you apply, right, the goal is to be able to fit the profile that they are looking for. And so before you just go in right away and try to answer the questions and uh send in your resume and all that such, you want to make sure that you get different sources of information, understand like what they're looking for on their website. Uh review some testimonials of other students that have uh completed the program. try to talk to alumni using informational interviews and also maybe apply uh or join a few of those webinars because sometimes they haveformational sessions that you could be able to learn more from the uh program officer like who are they looking for? Uh in this case like uh like for example for myself when I applied to like fellowships back in the day I was like uh LinkedIn profile looking across all the people who got into this particular fellowship. I tried to understand what kind of uh people they tend to accept. I tried to network with two or three alumni of the fellowship program. I also even went to career fairs to try to talk to the fellowship coordinator. Like I did all those different things before applying and that actually got me into that fellowship that I was very fortunate for which was the city halls fellowship which is a postgrad thing. That's not something for high school per se. But um what what I did there though is that I'm trying to be able to understand what is the profile, how can I fit, what is exactly is it that they're looking for. And so usually you can kind of pair it down to just being able to understand what are the kind of core attributes, right? So for example, if you're applying to like Cosmos for example, which is a very popular program, right? Uh they're usually looking for STEM students or people who are very interested in the kind of the engineering fields. And um it's possible uh and I'm just making this up. It's very possible that uh what you discover by talking to a few people who actually went through the Cosmos program is that they had a uh very strong like engineering project that they have done previously. Like they are part of some ## Common Mistakes Families Make with Summer Planning [35:00] engineering classes and it's possible they're very high rigorous in math and it's possible that they were able to compete in some competitions or something of that sort. Uh again just making this up. This is just an example just for like for teaching purposes. And again, the goal here is be able to identify what are those like kind of uh key points that you notice at least for the alumni or the people that you've done research for to be able to understand okay like how do I mirror that? How do I communicate the same type of attributes that they're looking for and that to show that there is a connection between uh me as an ideal profile for this particular program. And in fact, anyways, you're kind of doing the same thing right now, right? trying to be able to apply to college admissions. Uh what are what is the idea of uh profile of college admissions? It's it's very similar at the same time. And so when you're talking about this in your uh in your resume or in your application, there's a very helpful uh framework called the STAR framework to be able to talk about the experiences that you've had. So the goal is to be able to communicate your value that you bring to this particular program. So the way to do that is bring up examples. You always want to bring up examples of what have you done that is related to this particular program. So first off is ask for situation where you introduce the situation or the challenge. This is setting the context or setting the stage of what exactly happened. The task is what were you required to achieve? Describe the purpose like what was the goal of this particular activity you're doing. It's possible that you were part a part of a club. you're part of uh some type of community and you were required to achieve a particular like outcome like this an event to be successful or some type of uh project to be successful. Action what did you do to overcome the challenge? This is where you walk us through uh step by step what did you had to do to achieve the particular end result of the outcome of your actions. And so and and the results is very uh important to also expand that on that a little bit more. And one thing I'll add to the the question of results is why was this important? Why is this result so important for this situation? And you're showing like a sense of maturity of like the underlying reason um that you are trying to accomplish this particular goal. And then later on you can also connect it to the uh the mission and the purpose of the summer program that you're trying to apply to. So again trying to connect the dots here right uh the attributes you know the attributes they're looking for. So try to describe a situation that speaks directly to that attribute and remind them as well at the very end uh based off this I could based off this particular uh event or situation. this is why uh I think that I deserve to be a part of this program because this program will help me be able to expand on X Y and Z. And then uh also uh to consider as well for letters of recommendations if they are required. Uh something to consider is uh can your recommener talk about uh these particular attributes and some things to consider as well right it depends on the summer program that you're trying to apply to whether it's like a extracurricular career based versus like academic based. So you want to understand do I need an academic or professional reference is it better to have a teacher or is it better to have like maybe a previous employer um or somebody who can speak to my extracurriculars. Uh, also to consider is what's their sentiment level? Do you actually feel close to this person that can write your letter of recommendation? How long have you like known them or worked with them? And lastly, what's their confidence in their writing capability? Something to always make sure about, you can't assume every single adult can write a strong recommendation letter. You want to be able to give them a brag sheet or give them things that they can work with so that they can be able to be successful. So, if you um were part of my letters of recommendation webinar a few weeks ago, remember that the important thing is to be able to create talking points for your recommenders. So, that's easy for them to be able to uh write about you. And then lastly, discuss with them prior to understand if this is something um if you can answer all four of these kind of questions here. And last thing I'll just cover real briefly is the ré writing. I'm not going to go through a whole resume workshop because that could take really long. But simply just being able to do some research on the company, what exactly are they looking for? Try to keep it clean, keep it simple, and uh you you can use the situation, action, result kind of framework. Uh you might not necessarily need the task in there, but use the I guess SAR framework there in that case uh to be able to talk about your experiences. Um update your work experience to reflect the specific qualifications they're looking for. Remember, if you can identify the attributes, try to backwards map it. And it will be great if you can use exact specific keywords from the application into your resume so that it's like a onetoone match. And then speak to the results of your actions, which a lot of students tend to forget. It's not just about doing it, it's about what was the result of your actions. And lastly, mult uh proofread it with multiple pe uh people because you never know if your writing uh doesn't sound as good as you think. All right. So, last thing is some common mistakes and how to avoid them. Uh, one is where you're just a general applicant. You're not actually connecting directly to the attributes. If I were to copy and paste your uh summer application to any other company or any other summer program, would it would it sound the same? Right? That's a kind of a litmus test to see if this actually um is connected to that particular uh profile they're looking for. Second is lack of clear goals. Uh you're not really sure about what kind of summer experience you want. You're just kind of throwing anything uh onto the wall and see what sticks. But you want to be very intentional whether what particular issue are you trying to address here. Uh waiting too long. Uh so don't just wait to apply. Uh try to be able to look at summer programs on a like daily basis or weekly basis of what's out there. So maybe some folks are going to be looking for summer programs right after this call. Uh but try to keep that a consistent habit to see what is actually out there for yourself. Uh not proofreading. Uh so the way that you might read an application versus somebody else could be totally different. If you're a part of our program or community, uh consider being able to use our college essay service uh where you can actually submit your summer apps to us and we'll review it and give it back to you within 72, 48 or 24 hours depending on which program you're part of. So, know that you can rely on us to be able to review um your essays and your applications. All right. Now, let's get to the final part of some resources and then we'll go into Q&A. Okay. Uh so, if you want the recording, um please text this number 9497750865. Text us notes and replay and we'll get that to you within uh 24 to 48 hours. Uh access to our summer program ideas. Uh we do have a curated list of a whole bunch of summer programs that you can consider. Uh note though that a lot of the uh admissions might be already passed due. Um but it could still be helpful. So text programs to 9497750865 and we can get that to you uh uh shortly. Also, if you are a 2026 uh junior and you are needing to finalize your summer applications, uh remember if you're not a part of our program just yet, uh we do have a workshop at the beginning of summer, one at the end of summer, and the goal is to get you finished with your sum with your college applications uh before everyone else. So, if you want to register, check it out on collegeappointensive.com. And if you haven't already, uh, and you're not part of our community, uh, schedule a free 15-minute coaching assessment call. Uh, that's where we will give you free advice and recommendations on what exactly that you should do to improve your chances. And don't worry, nothing's going to be for sale on this call. You can't buy anything if even if you wanted to. So, if you want access to that assessment, text uh, coach to 949775865. Uh, and our uh, and our newsletter if you haven't already. Um, every single week we do send out a weekly newsletter that includes like kind of like a tip of the week and what is it that uh some lessons that we have and also you get like up-to-date insider information whether it's about scholarships or college admission trends. I think within this past week we had a admissions letter about appeals. So, if you are a senior right now or sorry, uh yeah, a senior right now and you want to learn more about appeals, uh check a uh take take a look at our uh our newsletter to be able to see what are the tips on how to approach that. And uh for our families, if you are a part of our coaching families, we do have our own research or internship program. If you didn't know about it, this is an additional paid service. Uh, sorry, this is my only advertising here, but if you are already part of our coaching programs, we you can purchase another program um as an add-on uh to get to a re to get a research program. And the research program, the way it works is the goal is to pair you up with a professor uh one-on-one who will mentor you on how to complete your own independent research paper. And that will give you exposure to how to conduct research. And this will also help you stand out in the admissions process as well. And because you're going through kind of a rigorous kind of uh curriculum in a sense of how to do research, uh you're going to receive credit from UC San Diego extension. You can you actually have to purchase this unfortunately uh separately. This is not from us. This from UC San Diego um so that you can add it onto your college transcript. So if you want that additional points on your application process, text research and then we'll be able to schedule that call with you to be able to learn more and uh the internship program as well. So if you want work based experience and you you'll get a real world project that you can deliver to the company and usually it's with a virtual startup. So you there's not a specific location to it. You'll get paired with an employer that fits your interest. So, if you're interested in AI, we'll try to find an AI uh uh startup to be able to work with. If you want to uh look into any type of type of software or whatever, we can pair you up and try to find you the right one. Our goal is to be kind of like a intermediary uh matchmaker where we'll be able to find your interest and then be able to find an employer that can work with you. Also, you can get a letter of completion by the company and potentially a letter of recommendation if you do well. So if you don't have a summer activity yet or summer experience yet, you can text internship and we can be able to set up a call where you can learn more about this part particular program. Again, if you are interested in any of the resource Oh, so sorry that number is wrong. Uh so text this number with any of this here programs, projects, uh intensive, coach, news, internship, and research. Okay. All right. So, now we're going to go into our Q&A. All right. So, I see a lot of questions here. Uh, I'm going to look from the Q&A box first. Hey, Coach Victor. I'm looking for ideas for summer activities for someone who's interested in engineering. Uh, text programs to us. You'll be able to find some engineering programs there. Uh, but usually the number one thing that people are very competitive is like Cosmos. That usually tends to be the one. If you're based in the Bay Area, something to consider is like trying to reach out to like local startups and uh seeing if you could be able to network your way into one. What are your thoughts about online pre-ol courses like what USC offers? Uh it's they're not as like helpful as as I would say. Uh yes, taking those online courses, but they're the thing is they're not college credited. And that's that's the issue. Uh to be quite honest, a lot of these private schools will have a lot of cash grab uh cash grab kind of summer enrichment programs where you have to pay like thousands on thousands just to be able to experience what college is like. And especially if it's online, that's even like kind of worse, I would say. Uh so so I would say to just look for like accredited experiences. I like accredited um like that's why dual enrollment is so important because it's already accredited by the university. So, if it's doesn't have any college credit, then I wouldn't consider it. Uh, is the summer before ninth grade too early for pre-ol? USC says ages 14 and up, but application asks for high school courses taken. It's not too early. Uh, there's I mean, every single summer is worthwhile. So, I would say to go for it and it it doesn't hurt to uh be able to um participate in that in 8th grade. Where do high schoolers find internships? Most of the ones we see are for college age. Yeah, high school internships are hard to find and that's because a lot of employers don't want to hire high school students and I'm sure y'all can imagine why. Most high school internships are typically um through networking I would say. So, as someone who taught a lot about career exploration and helped a lot of students get internships in the past, a lot of it tends to be from like internal networks and knowing uh people who are willing to teach a high school student. Uh, is it a bad idea to do an internship for a parent if a student wants to uh I think there's a typo here. Go to the same field of graphic design. Uh, for a parent if the student wants to go is a bad idea for internship for a parent. Okay, sorry. Uh, maybe you might need to re retype that question. Uh, I think that was there's like some words missing in there. Uh, some other questions. Do colleges look more closely at every at students who do more expensive summer sessions at their colleges? For example, KPOL has some summer programs where you live on campus, take classes for a few weeks, and it's a few thousand. Seems expensive. Uh, does it give you extra points? Not necessarily. No, not at all. I mean, it helps with like the supplemental application on things what to write about, but again, remember that it's not like require it's it's not like everybody experienced that that got in. So, I would say it's don't feel like as if you got to go to the summer program just just to get into that school. So, I wouldn't say it's necessarily worth it. If you take uh if you take math courses over summer and finish the community college math offerings, is a good idea to take more math a local CSU or UC? For a student who's looking at competitive engineering programs, would this be a good way to demonstrate use summer and possibly differentiate themselves? Yes. If you do find that there are some available CSU or UC like math courses, enrichment courses, those are good those are good ways as well. Uh and again something to consider is how do you balance yourself as well. Uh I think a lot of students and parents tend to go for the academia but don't forget too much about like the extracurriculars about how can they apply the math towards something. So try to create something out of it. So it's a yes and uh yes go to those uh particular courses and uh and try to see if there's a way that they can apply those skills. How about work lifeguarding certain instructor? Yeah, work is great too. Um the only thing is that sometimes it's not really a learning experience. Like for example, you can it looks I remember college admissions is additive. So it's always going to look good in a sense of you have something at least for the summer. But the thing is it's not really too related or unless I don't know unless they really want to go into aquatics or something in the future. I don't know. But like uh usually for those type of part-time jobs, there's not much learning that that you can get from there. So I would possibly consider any other opportunities as well. Other questions? Uh is it a bad idea to do an internship for your own parent? Example, father works in graphic design at Adobe and son likely wants to as well. Okay. Gotcha. Uh, no, it's not a bad idea. I mean, also it's like you're just don't put in the application like, oh, uh, I got an in I had this internship experience with my dad or something. Uh, try to say like I did this internship experience with, uh, with Adobe, uh, doing X, Y, and Z. So, trying to be able to Yeah, just just don't talk about your parents in your applications. That's that's that's the kind of takeaway. Uh, my son is a junior and has a eight-week 40hour week summer internship and three dual enrollments, but also needs to work on essay apps. Is it too much trying to convince them to drop a dual enrollment, right? Uh, that does sound like a lot of work. Uh, yeah. Uh but anyways again the the thing is um uh students know their own capacity and something to consider is like dual enrollments there is a drop deadline so you can try it out and then there's usually like a particular date where you're allowed to drop it without like having anything negatively impacting your transcript. Usually that's about 2 weeks out from the start date of your uh summer classes. So just use that as a proxy. Like you can look at the rubrics together and you can determine like hey there's this much homework, this many midterms. Let's map it all out. Do you think you can handle this with your summer internship and that is a kind of a good conversation to have because it makes it feel more practical and more actionable about what exactly do you have to work with. So, I would say like it's okay to do all of it at once at first and just bring the syllabus or syllabi for more than one uh put together and then you can be able to make that decision. All right. You're welcome. Any other last questions in the next few minutes? I'm just scrolling up to make sure I don't lose any questions. When looking at the course catalog, what does 9 hours mean? I'm not sure what that means. I'm looking at self sociology for my son and it says nine hours. I'm actually not sure myself. I'm not sure if it's like nine hours total of classes. Uh could be. I I think you need to share a screenshot or something to be able to understand. Uh yeah, that's probably a better better thing. Uh it seems like a communication issue from the community college. Okay. Last minute, last call for any last questions. All right. All right. Thank you everyone for joining our webinar. If you really enjoyed it, then uh then join us for next week and we'll be able to give you some more insight. Thanks everyone. Have a good night.