Summer program costs, selectivity, and camp vs internship

Pre-College Topics Summer Programs
1

I am applying/registering for a few programs for Summer 2016, to both enrich myself and build a resume for college.

  1. How much money should I pay for a summer program? If I pay too much for a summer program, will it figure negatively on college apps?
  2. When applying for a summer program, how selective should it be? (I plan to apply to selective colleges, with a 5%-40% acceptance rate)
  3. Should I apply for summer camps (high cost) or internships (low to no cost)? Which is better?

My interests are robotics/engineering, medicine, and science research.

2

Same questions ^^^ someone please answer

3

I’d say keep a ceiling at about $4000 to $5000? However, that depends on how long your camp is–if it’s three weeks, don’t spend way too much on it; on the other hand, an eight week program would probably cost more.

Keep a range of summer programs, from not-very-selective (~50%) to selective (~10% or under). Internships are almost always better than summer camps unless your summer camp is one of the “big ones” (aka TASP, RSI, MITES, MathCamp, SSP). In that case, it depends on what each program is on + your major interests + whether the internship is research-based (yay!) or clerical (boo).