Summer Honors Program

Academic Competitions

For the last two years, the Summer Honors Most Outstanding Student award winner has earned an NGCSU scholarship worth nearly $4,500. With so much on the line, competitions become very important. Summer Honors has long prided itself on exceptional acadmic sessions taught by the finest NGCSU faculty. These sessions offer unique opportunities not available to most high school students. Key points and relevant information from each of session is tested both indivdually and in team Quiz Bowl sessions. Classroom leadership sessions are also part of the academics and form a part of the academic competition. Quiz Bowls cover include topics from the novel Ender's Game, the novel around which the leadership discussion is focused.


Counselor Lane demonstrates tying a figure 8 knot.

"We have so many outstanding participants that giving awards is tough," says Summer Honors Director Robb Sinn. "But it's a good problem to have. We have team awards, leadership awards, essay competitions, academic awards and a counselors' award. Some academic programs shy away from awards, but these competitions really motivate participants to work hard and get the most out of the program." The award categories from recent years are listed below together with the criteria on which they were chosen, and the linked article tells about the Summer Honors 2007 awards winners.

Most Outstanding Student. The 2006 and 2007 Summer Honors Most Outstanding Students were awarded an NGCSU scholarship worth $4,400. Because part of the curriculum of Summer Honors is leadership and classroom sessions and essays focus on that topic, it is difficult to seperate excellence in academics versus excellence in leadership. The Most Outstanding Student is likely one of the top five students in both the "Best Overall Leadership" and "Best Overall Academics" categories. This award represents someone whose name repeatedly appeared near the top of the list for all the other camp awards including Quiz Bowls, eassy contests, ropes course, Leadership Reaction Course, and Camp Olympics. We are awaiting word about funding for the scholarship for Summer 2008.

Best Overall Academic Performance. The top male and female performers across all academic disciplines and competitions are given this award. They typically place high in the essay competitions and in the individual academic competitions. Their teams generally do well in the Quiz Bowl and the problem-solving and brain-teaser events at Camp Olympics.

Best Leadership Essays. These events are described more fully on the leadership awards page, but Summer Honors invests hours of instructional time and allows time for student planning. Hence, this essay competition is a good measure of overall writing ability. Scores in this competition do influence the top academic awards.

Most Involved Academically. It's summer. To be quite blunt, some participants let their minds wander a bit. This award is given to one male and one female who consistently work hard in each academic session and ask relevant questions. "Involvement does not always equate to quality," Sinn says. "But we've found that with the high caliber of participants we attract, they all have more than enough talent to succeed. Often, who wins awards does depend upon hard work and persistence, and we like to reward those talented kids who have also learned to give maximum effort."

Quick Links

Academics
Photo Album

Brochure

Application

Quote

"NGCSU summer honors program has been a great experience for me. It was defiantly a cultural and academic learning experience for me. The sessions were both interesting and eye opening. The friendships that we make here are ones that will last a lifetime. You really get a sense of family and belonging here. The campus is beautiful. The counselors treat us like adults and are great role models. I would definitely come back again or encourage others to participate in the summer honors program. "

Jonathan
Summer Honors 2006