Engaging Summer Options for 16 year old that aren't prohibitively expensive
We are looking into summer options for our daughter, who will be 16 years old in June. She found what looked like a great program in NYC to learn about journalism, but it was close to $5k for 2 weeks, plus airfare and lodging. There are a lot of web sites out there, but how to know they are legitimate and of good quality? She's open to traveling and learning- other options she discovered include Poland, Costa Rica, and France (she is studying French). She did see something that is on the BPN site from 2011, but the link doesn't go to a live website. While we'd love to go somewhere with her, we both work and can't afford much time off...anyone have recommendations for good programs for a teen - either fun, local learning programs or something that involves travel? Thanks in advance!
Parent Replies
My parents found a wonderfully engaging summer option for me at 16-17-18. It was called "work." I was a camp counselor, I interned at a friends business and I also worked at a newspaper immediately after high school. It didn't cost my family anything and most of what I earned went towards college costs.
I can't comment on any academic programs, but our family has had a fabulous experience with a hiking-based summer camp program. The Teen Leadership Camp at Camp Woolman, in Nevada City, is a program for 15 and 16-year-olds and the teens spend 8-10 days hiking on the Pacific Crest Trail (the rest of the two weeks are spent in camp, and the teens have their building separate from the rest of the camp). Their program is reasonably priced, and our children have gained a lot of confidence and learned new skills being out on the trails. The camp focuses on values such as justice and sustainability. Their website is: http://camp.woolman.org/teen-leadership
how about ... a job?
PLEASE steer her away from journalism. It is a horrible, frustrating life and there are fewer and fewer jobs every year. That program sounds like a total rip.
There are so many summer job opportunities for 16 year olds in the Bay Area. I am very happy that both my kids started working in the summers once they were in high school, one as city summer day camp junior counselor and the other as teaching assistant in a middle school academic summer program. They loved these jobs, gained employment experience and skills as well as money, and jobs working with younger kids look good on college applications too. There are many other types of youth summer employment and internship programs that your kid could take advantage of while still living at home in an urban area. (after HS my older kid went on to work leading the hiking trips at the teen hiking camp referenced above, which i also recommend, but we didnt pay - he got paid.)
NOLS is a great program, but very expensive. Lots of colleges offer summer study programs but they too are expensive. ATDP I'm sure has a class that would be interesting, and although still somewhat expensive, is local and therefore a lot less than going across the country. A lot of people have suggested she get a job, but, having 3 teenagers myself, I can attest that it's difficult to find jobs where you actually earn any money if you're under 18 other than babysitting, dog walking, watering people's plants when they're on vacation, etc. The camp counselor jobs mostly require that you pay them for several years to "train" your child, and only after several years do they let your child work for free or pay her - the whole camp counseling thing is kind of a racket if you ask me. There was a yogurt shop that one of my kids was going to work at, but the manager was pretty inflexible about working my child's working hours around other activities, so he ended up not doing it.
There was a commentary in the New York Times a year or so ago titled In Defense of Nothing about how parents should not plan their teen's summers and just wait to see what the teens come up with themselves. I was sure my teen would spend the whole summer on the couch watching Netflix but she proved me wrong, finding several valuable experiences all on her own.
Community College classes are free for teens (except for the books). Be mindful of deadlines and prerequisite tests.