<p>I am thinking of sending my girl (aged 12 and in grade 7) to CTY in the coming summer. We’ve never been to US. Which CTY site is the best in terms of safety and security? How about Loyola Marymount University in LA? Any advice will be very much appreciated. Thanks!</p>
<p>We sent our S to CTY at LMU for three years (2006-2008.) We also live in the LA area. The residential area that surrounds the campus is known to be pretty safe. We never had concerns when he attended LMU. </p>
<p>In case it’s relevant to you, there was a strong contingent of Asian students at CTY/LMU, including some from Asian countries such as Hong Kong, Taiwan, Korea, Japan and India.</p>
<p>Our S is now a freshman at Northwestern U, in the Integrated Science Program. The CTY courses he took were Electrical Engineering, Probability & Game Theory, and Fast Paced HS Physics.</p>
<p>ETA: Per the post below, there are no major streets on the LMU campus, just campus access roads. Most of the summer housing is clustered in an area close to the building with the cafeteria. Yes, students are escorted around. BTW, the athletic facilities are excellent, in case your student choses his/her off time to use the pool, etc. There’s also a good location on campus to view some of the local area fireworks (for the first session that includes July 4.)</p>
<p>Another good thing about LMU is that it doesn’t take much time to get there from LAX.</p>
<p>cty is very protective of the students. my kids have been going every summer for years . they complain that they cant even cross the street by themselves!! you may want to look for a campus with no streets in the middle (dickinson has a street) because kids have to group up to cross from one area to another. lafayette had no street crossing. at hopkins security was very tight and the kids felt safe. there were a lot of security rules and when i would visit the kids walked in groups with their advisors and id’s were checked.</p>
<p>All the sites are very safe and the youngest campers are watched very closely.</p>
<p>What’s CTY?</p>
<p>[Center</a> for Talented Youth - JHU CTY](<a href=“http://cty.jhu.edu/]Center”>http://cty.jhu.edu/)</p>
<p>They run some really great programs for gifted kids. My two kids have gone to the summer programs, and have loved them.
Admission to the programs is via scoring well on standardized tests such as the SAT in seventh or eighth grades. There is also a “baby CTY” program for younger children. DD went to that in the summer between sixth and seventh grades and loved it too.</p>
<p>There is a similar program called CTD at Northwestern, in a safe suburb north of Chicago. The program is for all ages of students, and offers more for high school students than CTY, such as a number of AP classes. [Summer</a> Program :: Summer Program](<a href=“http://www.ctd.northwestern.edu/summer/]Summer”>Summer Programs | Northwestern Center for Talent Development)</p>
<p>I think they are all very closely supervised, so I would not worry much. My D goes to college on one of the campuses they use, Dickinson, and it is a very beautiful campus if that makes any difference :)</p>
<p>You might want to ask about what happens if student gets ill. The swine flu scare hit CTY (and many summer camps) pretty hard two years ago. Some students were sent home.
Since you are overseas, you’ll want to know what provisions/policies are in place. </p>
<p>I agree with other posters that students are well protected and well supervised. And they still manage to have fun.</p>
<p>For the last six years I have been sending a child to CTY (S1 4 years, S2 for last two sessions) at LMU. Very easy to get to from the airport and I have had no concerns about safety. Neighborhood is good (not far from Marina Del Ray) and the teachers and staff are very concerned and helpful. One instructor even wrote a recommendation letter for S1. The experience was great. S2 is very picky and has strong likes and dislikes. With great argument we persuaded him to go to LMU for the first year he was eligible and told him we will not force him to go the next year (2010). Early this year I asked him if he wanted to go again and I was very surprised that he said yes. </p>
<p>For people around the west coast this is the only nearby center (unless they want to go to Hawaii). For CAA they have center in Santa Cruz but S1 who had been to one CAA camp liked CTY much better, felt classes were more challenging. Don’t worry too much, it is a very good experience. In fact your children will have so many activities that they will not be homesick and before you know it, they are back. PM if you have specific questions.</p>
<p>I have had several friends who have gone to LMU for CTY. And all of them have enjoyed it immensely and returned for at least one additional year.</p>
<p>And after going to Johns Hopkins U. for CTY a few years back, I can assure you that I felt very, very safe even when Baltimore is not that safe of a city. I can only imagine that for younger kids, security will be even tighter.</p>
<p>I suggest that you send your child to CTY! It is SUCH a great experience and you meet amazing people.</p>
<p>My son went to the Lancaster site for five years. It is on the Franklin and Marshall College campus, in Lancaster, a small town in the middle of Pennsylvania Dutch country. It’s a very safe area and the kids were closely monitored. I did not have any safety concerns at all. I did make sure my son’s vaccinations (including meningitis) were up to date.</p>
<p>My son went to a program that’s quite similar, called Summer Institute for the gifted (or something like that). He went to Amherst and had a great time. That campus is wonderful and he felt very safe.</p>
<p>Thank you so much for all the quick response and invaluable advice. I guess my worry is really unnecessary. Yes, one of the main reasons why I am considering LMU is that there is a direct flight going from Hong Kong to Los Angeles International Airport. So even if I am unable to accompany my girl to US, she can probably manage it by herself as there will be a student shuttle service taking my girl from the airport to LMU. This is also the reason why I opted for CTY over the other gifted programs for her first summer in US. Anyway, thanks for all the input! By the way, on a completely different topic, I wonder if any of your kids also did the online courses as well. Did they find the online courses useful? I understand that many of the schools (eg. CTY, TIP, CTD and EPGY etc.) also offer online courses. Are they all more or less the same? Thanks!</p>
<p>CTY will arrange to pick up you kids at the airport, there is a fee for that. I would guess that they will pick from the international terminal also or make arrangements as there are international kids attending. They will also drop off at the airport and my son was dropped off, but that was domestic, international should not be much different. Contact them but I am sure they will pick them up.</p>
<p>S1 did do two online courses with CTY, one was good, one he did not like (Computer programming).</p>
<p>My son took the online “Crafting the Essay” course and thought it was quite helpful in improving his writing.</p>
<p>S went to CTY camp for four years: took philosophy courses, adored it. He also did one online math course, which was fine. There is no comparison between the two, of course. One is a complete experience.</p>
<p>He went to a campus that they are no longer using, but my observation was that they really knew what they were doing in terms of taking good care of 12 yr olds and making sure that a positive experience is had by just about all. (There’s always going to be someone who doesn’t like it, of course.) Regarding safety, even on S’s very safe suburban campus, kids were not allowed to go for a run alone, for example. I would imagine that they observe the same sort of precautions everywhere.</p>
<p>Given your location, the California site sounds like the best choice.</p>
<p>Hi,</p>
<p>I work with The Association of Boarding Schools (TABS for short), a non-profit with more than 300 member schools in both North America and abroad. I recommend checking out TABS at <a href=“http://www.boardingschools.com%5B/url%5D”>www.boardingschools.com</a> when searching for CTY summer programs.
The TABS Guided Search tool lets you refine your search by gender, specialty, grade levels, and location. You can even add more targeted criteria including courses, arts, and athletic interests. Its perfect for those who know what they wantand helps those who dont to figure it out. </p>
<p>Check it out at [Find</a> the Right Boarding School For You - The Association of Boarding Schools (TABS)](<a href=“http://www.boardingschools.com/find-a-school.aspx]Find”>Find A School Tool | BoardingSchools.com).</p>
<p>My S took two online CTY self-paced math courses, one in Linear Algebra and one in Multivariable Calculus (jr and sr years of HS.) Disclaimer: My H is a math professor, so he had live in help. Doing math on line at that level is not a piece of cake, and the tests are quite lengthy, as CTY also expects learning to go on during the “take home” tests as well.</p>
<p>So it was difficult, but S go solid As in both classes. Now that he’s at Northwestern for his first quarter, he can say two things: 1) He’s back to liking math again now that he has a live professor (my H tried to fill in but it’s just not the same.) 2) He got the two highest scores on the two mid terms in the Integrated Science Program math class.</p>
<p>Was it worth the effort? Yes.</p>
<p>ETA: It would have been much less expensive to take the classes dual enrollment at a local CC. However, the logistics would have been a nightmare because we both work, he had an after school EC, he didn’t have a driver’s license until mid-senior year, and we didn’t want him taking a night class.</p>
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<p>Not sure what the relevance of this posting is to this topic. CTY and similar programs are summer or online programs that are targeted at giving more or different opportunities for kids identified as gifted. It has no direct connection as far as I can see to boarding schools.</p>