The California State Summer School for Mathematics and Sciences, or COSMOS, is a rigorous program for high school students interested in a STEM field. Hosted by the University of California, students live on one of the UC campuses for four weeks. COSMOS offers a variety of “clusters”, each of which specializes in a different aspect of STEM, such as engineering, computer science, etc. Students can apply to one of the five participating UC campuses: UC Irvine, UC Davis, UC San Diego, UC Santa Cruz, and UC Los Angeles.
The program is considered to be generally competitive, at about a 20 percent acceptance rate, only accommodating about 160-200 participants. To get in, admission readers look at GPA, teacher recommendations, essays, and extracurriculars. If accepted, students learn topics related to their chosen cluster and take advanced classes in topics such as robotics, mathematics, physics, etc and hands-on projects, research.
A couple Granada students attended this summer and one of them shared their thoughts on it. Aadya Huddar, a senior, attended the UCLA cluster, which focused on artificial intelligence for speech and imagery.
Huddar said she wanted to apply because, “it gave me the opportunity to have real life experiences in my possible future career.”
She said the application process consisted of a letter of recommendation, supplemental questions, a transcript, and a list of extracurriculars.
Huddar said a day in the life consisted of “lectures in the morning, a two hour lunch (which was great) and about three hours of lab work after. We then had the freedom to do whatever we wanted till curfew, which was at 11 pm.”
When asked if it was overall a fun and educational experience, Huddar said “100%, I feel like I learned a lot and made so many friends who I still keep in touch with.”
Huddar also said that she would, “definitely recommend it to other students and would highly recommend at least filling out the application. Even though the application process can seem overwhelming, it’s worth it if you get in.”
Huddar’s biggest piece of advice to students who plan to apply to the next round is, “don’t leave it to the night before and ask for a letter of recommendations as soon as possible. You’ll be stressed if you procrastinate the application till the night before and some teachers have a limited amount of letters they’ll write, so ask right away.”
The next application round opens Wednesday, January 8, 2025 at 8:00 AM and closes Friday, February 7 at 5:00 PM. COSMOS has overall been described as a good opportunity to learn and make friends, and comes highly recommended by teachers and past attendees to give it a try if interested in the STEM route.
