<p>masha, I definitely agree. I did a 3 week mini course at the Brown Precollege program, and did end up getting in ED. I think the program gave me 2 advantages: </p>
<ol>
<li><p>Since I was at Brown over the summer and had a feel for the school, I was able to write my “Why Brown” essay pretty easily. Well, not that easily! But I was able to write truthfully and from experience. </p></li>
<li><p>My course covered physics, which is what I plan on majoring in. Like you said, this (hopefully) showed my commitment to physics. </p></li>
</ol>
<p>So advantage #1 was Brown-specific, but advantage #2 would have applied to any summer program. The moral of the story? Do whatever you want over the summer, anything that seems cool and worthwhile. Just do something.</p>