hello , my daughter got into BU RISE internship track for electrical engineering. Any alumini willing to talk to us about it ?
thank you
Congratulations. When do you receive the notification? My daughter applied ME but still in the matching stage.
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@Wei_Huang We received it on April 2. We did get the matching notification first a week prior and then got this.
Has anyone received match confirmation notice?
We’re still waiting. The 2022 RISE thread indicates many had to wait until May 20, with some closer to June. Unfortunate.
Hello we received the admission after matching first week of april. If anyone else has been accepted and would like to chat please let me know.
Finally heard back yesterday, May 16th, that my daughter didn’t match. Unfortunate, but glad they finally ended the waiting so we can plan the Summer.
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My daughter got rejection too. Now we don’t need to waste SSP deposit.
Is it worth participating in the RISE Practicum program? It doesn’t seem very prestigious. Any feedback and comments are welcome.
Do you have any better option?
I can also work as an intern in a professor’s lab in a university (rank 100+).
If I cannot find a match in the internship track, will I be rejected or could I be moved to Practicum track?
RISE - both practicum and internship are competitive but also expensive. Colleges know this. Writing down RISE or the vast majority of summer programs on your applications won’t get you into competitive schools. It’s not getting into or participating in the program that matters - it’s how you explain what you got out of it and how this compliments other aspects of your application that will sway admissions. Same goes for research at a lab. You ultimately have to ask yourself what you hope to get out of your summer options to decide - I don’t think most of us can tell you which is more prestigious for application purposes.
My son participated in the internship program last summer and both enjoyed it a lot and got a lot out of it - regardless of whether it helped in his college apps. I got the impression both the internship and practicum folks for the most part enjoyed their experiences.
He showed me a somewhat informal tally of where people attended from summer of 22 and where folks were accepted to from '23 and it was a pretty impressive list of selective schools. The 2 lists were not comprehensive but he told me it captured the strong majority of internship and a smaller but still large number of practicum students. I don’t have the list but I recall thinking that almost everyone was accepted to USN top 35 schools and more than half were accepted to top 20 schools, including a large number of Ivy+. Internship students did seem to do a bit better than Practicum but there were Practicum students accepted into Ivies and MIT. My son’s 5 closest friends at RISE are all attending an Ivy or MIT next year. But they didn’t get in because of RISE - it only complimented their already strong profiles. We know someone who attended a more competitive summer program who was denied from all the Ivy+ schools. So again, attending these programs is not an admissions ticket.
You have 2 great options either way for the summer. Attending RISE can compliment your profile but so can doing research in a lab. If money is an issue I’d take the lab.
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Thank you so much! Great points!
Hello, your son attended this program so we thought you might be able to offer some tips. We’ll need to purchase a fan, pillow etc; we were wondering if there is a way to pre-order and have it ready to be picked up on the check-in day. It looks like there are Target, Barnes and Noble nearby but it is not clear if they have this option. How did you manage it? Any other general/helpful tips you can provide will be much appreciated. Thanks!
I talked to my son and the below is what he shared and what I can recall from a year ago for his internship experience:
The fan is a must as the rooms don’t have AC and Boston summers aren’t the most pleasant. There is a Target and some other retail stores within walking distance or very nearby and you can have Amazon packages delivered as well to the front desk. My son went to Target to buy anything he might need that he didn’t pack so I wouldn’t worry too much about forgetting some things. I think BU had some extra fans around as well but I wouldn’t depend on that. Even if you don’t have everything by day 1, you can get anything pretty easily.
Try to sign up for the weekend activities as its a good place to mingle with others and see Boston. Sign up in advance for the really popular programs like Red Sox games as those go fast. There was some lounge area that had AC in the new computer building next door that was a good place to mingle as well. My son remains very close to many of his RISE friends and has arranged to see them since the program ended.
I’d consider signing up for Lyft or Uber in advance (I think they allow for under 18 now if linked to parent account) just in case they decide to explore the city a bit further. Public transportation is pretty good in Boston so the kids mostly rode the T.
For the Internship, lab assignments and mentorship is based on some luck. Try to come prepared and eager but for my son’s lab, rarely did his grad student mentor show up before 10 am and so my son sometimes adjusted his schedule to stay later. That could be an issue to make dinner in time but there’s plenty of paid eating options open late. While the lab’s principal investigator/professor was very good and friendly, she wasn’t around too much and was obviously very busy supervising the work of others. We got lucky in that his grad student was very good and they developed a great rapport. The grad student wrote my son a LOR which we think helped with admissions. One of S24’s friends had a bad experience in that he got very little mentorship and felt on his own a lot and another ended working less on science than hoped but helped write a bunch of research grant proposals. Again, this is luck of the draw but try to make your own luck.
Don’t sign up for the full meal plan. 14 was plenty for my son as the kids often went out on weekends to eat and my son (and most kids) usually skips breakfast as it is. Plus while the food was fine/good you get tired of eating at the cafeteria. Most kids signed up for 14 meals and the ones who signed up for 19 thought it was overkill. I think you can get a packed lunch for the cafeteria if you decide to work on campus through lunch.
Hope this helps.
Thank you. That was helpful!