imperial global summer school

hey! just wondering if you decided to apply in the end?

yup, and i got in

yup, and i got in

yup, and i got in

Could you share your feedback on this experience? Was it worth the price? Did you learn anything new? Did it help you choose your path? What are the good and bad aspects? Thanks!

was not worth the price at all tbh, i did the engineering course, we basically just got taster lessons for each engineering type. we get to do some practical things but i dunno it was very minimal. some lectures were so boring too. i was interested in aeronautical but that was just half a day and the lecture was literally just them talking about the faculty like they showed us around. basically the lectures were explaining/giving tours of each field. i’d say the only thing that was nice was being able to talk to your mentors. aside from lectures, you have like social activities after class, that you pick during the day. and they also have some more fun nights eg boat party and on the last day formal dinner plus party. you’re so limited, as in you have to be w a mentor, you can’t go anywhere without them, i remember i had to go to the bathroom during class and a mentor had to follow me there, they are particularly strict on this. it didn’t really help me choose a path, i already knew i wanted to do aerospace before, some other people may be different. overall it was fun but def not worth the price. they’re also so so cheap like for lunch we were only allowed 8 pounds any other we have to pay ourselves and yk london is quite expensive. btw w 8 pounds you’d probably still be hungry, you’ll only get a small sandwich plus a drink. it’s unbelievable that they make us pay so much but we don’t even get a decent amount of lunch money.

was not worth the price at all tbh, i did the engineering course, we basically just got taster lessons for each engineering type. we get to do some practical things but i dunno it was very minimal. some lectures were so boring too. i was interested in aeronautical but that was just half a day and the lecture was literally just them talking about the faculty like they showed us around. basically the lectures were explaining/giving tours of each field. i’d say the only thing that was nice was being able to talk to your mentors. aside from lectures, you have like social activities after class, that you pick during the day. and they also have some more fun nights eg boat party and on the last day formal dinner plus party. you’re so limited, as in you have to be w a mentor, you can’t go anywhere without them, i remember i had to go to the bathroom during class and a mentor had to follow me there, they are particularly strict on this. it didn’t really help me choose a path, i already knew i wanted to do aerospace before, some other people may be different. overall it was fun but def not worth the price. they’re also so so cheap like for lunch we were only allowed 8 pounds any other we have to pay ourselves and yk london is quite expensive. btw w 8 pounds you’d probably still be hungry, you’ll only get a small sandwich plus a drink. it’s unbelievable that they make us pay so much but we don’t even get a decent amount of lunch money.

I kinda feel the same. I went in already knowing i was going apply for Biomedical Engineering so in that aspect it was not much help. However i did find it fun and i also enjoyed getting to meet so many people from all around the world. I met a lot of people who i still talk to everyday and we have bceome quite good friends. I think the worth depends on what your expectations are. I went with the expectation of getting a feel of what the university is like and being able to talk with current students (the mentors) about the reality of what its like to study there (also to get to know London a bit). I also found the masterclasses quite useful (some more than others) especially the PS and interview ones. In the end i agree with jerrik279 with how it was too strict but i did end up having lots of fun and remember it quite fondly.

That's very interesting, thank you so much for the detailed feedback. Were you able to envision yourself applying to Imperial? In the August session, is there the same diversity of students? If you could have chosen another program instead, which one would you have picked?

Thanks for your time again, and congrats as I understand you will join Imperial as an undergraduate student! Would you say that attending GGS helped your application in any way? Yes I meant alternative summer programs (not Imperial) but if you have a comment about the most interesting stream between physics and engineering, I'm interested too 🙂 Do you also confirm the allocated budget of 8 pounds for lunch? What about the other meals? And about the freedom ? What surprises me is that each year, participants express the same reservations, and nothing seems to evolve from one year to the next to improve the academic benefit in particular. Thanks a lot !

tbh since applications for GSS were quite early i did not even look at any other summer schools (especially since i got an answer quote early) i have friends that went to the cambridge and oxford summer schools. From what I heard physics students had it so much worse they practically only coded and they were very stressed as they had to complete a whole project while engineering only had taster sessions for several types of engineering.
I can confirm the 8 pounds for lunch however that was only for 5 days i think and the point of the vouchers was that you were meant to (eventually) go to all the different cafeterias on campus so you could try everything and see the variety. The only moment when i had to spend my own money on fod was to get treats or stuff like that (not actually food). Other meals were all at the canteen and there has quite a lot of variety and i have to say it way quite good (maybe biased from my horrible school food) usually the best option was the vegetarian (so u know if you eventually end up going). I have to agree with the freedom part, it was quite restricted but it also depended on which mentor you had (based on luck) my mentor was quite chill and did not care, we were allowed to go practically everywhere without them. However I know this was my mentor specifically some were quite unbearable (they were ven trying to mentor students in a different group). There was also the suspicion going around that the reason for the bright orange hoodies (they give you a hoodie when you arrive) was so they could be able to see us clearly.