Less than two weeks after Northwestern’s admission application deadline, high school senior Hala Simm said she’s so tired of waiting for an admission letter that she has found new ways to distract herself. She joined the choir as a backup singer for her school’s variety show and is considering trying out for the annual musical.
“I really need to keep my mind off of college acceptance for a while,” Simm said.
NU’s location and reputation drew Simm to spend six weeks last summer on campus taking an anthropology course, she said.
NU’s College Preparation Program allows high school students to take 100-, 200-, and some 300-level summer classes. It is the only program on campus that lets high school students take classes with college students while receiving college credit.
Many of last year’s 90 College Prep students said they applied to the program hoping to get an insider’s view of college.
Simm said she enjoyed the intellectual environment and the friendly students during the summer program, and NU quickly skyrocketed to the top of her college list.
Students experienced NU traditions such as painting The Rock. They also went on weekly field trips to Chicago, where they got a taste of White Sox baseball, The Art Institute of Chicago and Shedd Aquarium .
High school senior Max Petersen also applied to the program because he was considering NU for college.
“I really enjoyed the class,” said Petersen, of Mundelein, Ill. “By the end of the summer I was convinced that applying to Northwestern would be a good idea.”
Neither the School of Continuing Studies nor the admissions office tracks data on the number of College Prep students who apply to NU, but the program’s students and directors agreed that “most” summer students applied.
Julie Bettencourt, summer program assistant, said it seems the majority of college prep students who apply to NU are accepted.
“There is somewhat of an advantage for them, but it all depends on how well the student does,” Bettencourt said. “If the student comes to Northwestern and does well, then they’re probably in good shape. I would think the admissions committee likes to see a Northwestern transcript with good grades.”
But Dean of Undergraduate Admissions Carol Lunkenheimer said the admissions committee doesn’t give preference to applicants who have already taken classes at NU.
“Students may have taken a course here and gotten an ‘A’ during the summer, but that doesn’t dictate a (university) admissions decision,” Lunkenheimer said. “What really matters is how well they did in four years in high school.”
A handful of high school students who attended the summer program didn’t apply to NU, Bettencourt said.
Some students said they were accepted to other schools early, and others realized NU wasn’t right for them.
Ashima Gupta, a high school senior from Plano, Texas, considered NU because of its proximity to Chicago. After six weeks on campus this summer taking a Communication Studies leadership course, she said she’d had enough of the school.
“I enjoyed the program, but the school didn’t appeal to me,” Gupta said. “The campus was pretty, the students were friendly, Evanston was nice, but there just wasn’t much happening on campus. The environment didn’t draw me in.”
Instead, Gupta is waiting to hear back from the six other schools she applied to, including Harvard University, the University of Texas and Emory University in Atlanta.
Simm applied to four other schools as well, including Illinois Wesleyan University in Bloomington, Ill., and Loyola University of Chicago, but hasn’t considered where she will go if she is not accepted at NU. She said she is worried about NU’s admission decision, especially because friends from the College Prep Program applied early decision and were rejected. For now, she is doing everything she can to not think about it.
“I’m trying to stay focused on senior year,” Simm said. “I just want to leave high school with a bang.”
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