A question to all SUMAC past attenders

Colleges & Universities Stanford University
1

<p>Hi! I just got accepted to Program 2 of SUMAC. This will be my first year attending. I have three questions:

  1. What research is conducted at SUMAC? At the end of 4 weeks, will I have enough of a paper to submit to contests like Seimens or Intell? Or is it more of an “exploration”?
  2. How strict is SUMAC on the “no laptop” policy? I know last year PROMYS had a no-laptop policy, but almost half the kids (and all the second years) brought one. The counselors were generally very chill about this. Is this the case with SUMAC? Or will my laptop be confiscated?
  3. How strict is SUMAC on the “asleep by 11” rule? At PROMYS last year, it was pretty much “sleep whenever your eyes close”, and most students stayed up well past 3am doing problem sets/hanging out</p>
2

<p>russian, I did program 2 of SUMaC a few years back, and here were my experiences in relation to your questions above:</p>

<p>1) We worked on the research components of the program to the extent time permitted Mon–Thurs, when there were a.m lectures, afternoon speakers and p.m. problem sets, and most of Fridays, which were entirely devoted to research. Some people worked on their research on the weekends as well. I don’t think there is usually sufficient time to develop a paper for submission to Seimens, etc., though it is possible, I guess. But if you spent every free minute doing research you’d miss out on trips and some of the other fun aspects of being there.</p>

<p>2)As far as I recall, no one brought a laptop, but there are computer clusters in Synergy and everywhere else on campus, so it was all good. I think the reason they discourage laptops is to make the environment more conducive to socializing. I thought that was a good call, because there were people from many countries there, many of them very interesting to get to know. I seriously doubt anyone would confiscate a laptop if it were brought, though.</p>

<p>3) The sleep policy wasn’t strict at all, but they did want everyone staying inside the house by about 11 on weeknights, and sometimes midnight on weekends. Yeah, people def. stayed up doing psets and hanging out till all hours, usually in one of the huge triples, or in the common rooms downstairs.</p>