USC Summer Programs residential pre-college in Los Angeles

Participants choose one college-level course and stay with it for the whole programme, earning three units of elective credit on successful completion. Courses are taught by USC faculty and staff across nine areas: architecture and design, business, spatial computing and engineering, global studies, communication and journalism, performing arts and music, pre-health and science, pre-law, and writing and critical thinking. Depending on the course, participants can expect group work, hands-on laboratory experience, field trips, guest speakers and a final project. Classes meet from nine in the morning until half past three each weekday.

A four-week college immersion on the University Park Campus for high school students who have completed at least the ninth grade and are pursuing a rigorous high school curriculum. Admission is on a rolling basis and classes fill quickly: applicants submit an essay of 300 to 500 words, a letter of recommendation from a teacher, counsellor or mentor, and a school transcript. International applicants must also show English proficiency by test score or an equivalent. Attendance is required from the first class meeting; late arrivals cannot be accommodated.

Residential participants live in USC residence halls, in rooms shared with other participants; roommate and floormate assignments are gender-specific, based on the gender identification given on the application, and roommate requests cannot be accommodated. For security, residential participants must be inside their assigned hall by ten in the evening every day, weekends included, with lights out at half past eleven. Personal vehicles are not allowed on campus.

Residential participants have a meal plan covering three meals a day in a USC dining hall. On class days with field trips in Los Angeles, meals may be taken out at nearby restaurants.

Evenings and weekends bring recreational activities created and supervised by residential advisors and programme staff: ice cream socials, game nights, movies on the lawn, intramural and field games and more. At weekends participants can also take day trips to local attractions such as beaches, theme parks and sports events. Free afternoons are spent studying in the campus libraries or at the gym.

The programme uses the University Park Campus. The USC Student Health Center provides medical services to all participants during regular office hours, and a residential advisor escorts a participant there if medical attention is needed. Participants have access to USC libraries, where they may use the reading rooms but not borrow books, and to public computers and printing in the campus computer labs and libraries; a personal laptop can be connected to the university's secured wireless network. Every participant applies for a USCard, the student ID that gives access to campus facilities.

Participants live as 'Summer Trojans' alongside academically motivated students from around the globe, balancing university-level academics with campus life. The programme is run by university staff on the main campus, and the course and the residential community are the two halves of the experience.