I had a menial job as a grocery checkout for a week when I was in HS and I hated it. I also subbed ONCE for my sister as a babysitter when she was sick - the parents came home much later than promised and way underpaid me - please shoot me first! I don’t see the merits of summer jobs unless you need the money. My commission based jobs were much better and I did learn from those.
The summer programs my kids went to weren’t for college admissions, but because we and they thought it was a good way for them to explore some areas that they might not get a chance to explore at school, and to potentially help them find some direction of interest before spinning their wheels in an expensive college while living in a campus environment with like minded peers. I see too many kids who never found themselves because they never looked. Before you know it, they are seniors locked into a major that no longer interests them, have have no sense of life direction.
I’m not saying kids need to know exactly what they want to be when they grow up, but some sampling of a broad range of areas over summers seemed far more valuable than serving ice cream at minimum wage or wiping noses at sleepaway camp.