MIT Women's Tech Program
Are you strongly interested in STEM and curious to spend a rigorous and rewarding summer working on projects? MIT offers this selective program for rising seniors. It’s a terrific way to explore different aspects of STEM, including through team-based projects. It’s also a nice way to connect with other female students who are seriously interested in STEM. NOTE: the 2020 Summer Program was cancelled due to COVID-19. Check the program website (link below) to confirm future program dates and specifics.
The MIT Women's Technology Program (WTP) is a rigorous four-week summer academic and residential experience where high school students explore engineering through hands-on classes, labs, and team-based projects in the summer after 11th grade.
We especially encourage students to apply who will be the first family member to attend college, who come from high schools with limited access to STEM classes and activities, or who are from backgrounds historically underrepresented in STEM such as African American, Hispanic, or Native American.
Students attend WTP in either:
Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS)
or
Mechanical Engineering (ME).
How do I get started? Click here.
How do I expand this narrative arc? Are you keen to know more about ways to expand your STEM exposure beyond the classroom? Consider one of these interesting projects, which will engage some of the core skills that you developed and strengthened in the Women’s Tech Program.
Join a global collaborative learning adventure to create a vessel that creates zero emissions and zero waste with Project Z-Nev
Build green technology at one of the intensive and highly rewarding summer programs at Cooper Union
Design a nature-inspired solution to a climate change problem in the Biomimicry Institute’s Design Challenge
Try to win big at Toshiba Exploravision
Check out the MIT BeaverWorks Summer Institute, where you’ll learn about engineering and designing autonomous systems in a variety of applications including cybersecurity, hacking, race car design, autonomous air vehicle racing, game design with AI and more!!
IMPORTANT NOTE ABOUT SUMMER PROGRAMS: College admissions officers are very adept at identifying “resume padders”: expensive, one-off programs paid for by your parents which do not mesh with your narrative arc. Therefore, make sure any summer program or course you consider falls into one (or more) of these four buckets:
Highly selective/competitive
Totally unique + linked to your narrative arc
Evidence of adulthood (long hours, multi-year commitment or simply hard work)
A jumping off point or expansion for an authentic narrative arc.
If none of the above apply, a program could still have value to you if it allows you to test a potential interest. However, if it does not end up being a jumping off point for further interests, then you may not want to mention it in your high school resume