<p>The best candidates to Harvard tend to be the most academic through sophomore year (9th and 10th grades, no one cares about junior high but you should still be focused on your intellectual development), and then are heavily involved in community service and other ECs junior year while maintaining perfect grades and/or perfect/near-perfect scores. It’s not completely abrupt like that as people still do other ECs and sports freshman and soph year, but the out-of-the-box ECs (e.g., start a fundraising drive, or some program to teach inner city kids, some mashup of various examples) tend to be done junior year and the summer following it. But don’t worry about that now. </p>
<p>For now, foster your love of learning and try to go above and beyond what is required in class. In terms of summer programs, take a look at CTY. It won’t help to have it on the resume’ for Harvard per se’, but the academic preparation will. They have very intense 3-week classes that are the equivalent of honors high school and/or college classes. They are designed for smart 7th-10th graders and they are great socially too as you are with a lot of likeminded people. </p>
<p>There are more specialized programs in high school for specific interests, but you can ask around for that (i.e., math, robotics, etc.)</p>
<p>Having a goal of something like Harvard can be good if it keeps you focused on bettering yourself. But keep in the back of your mind that Harvard’s version of “better” ultimately may be different than yours (i.e., a different value system).</p>