The Summer Institute is a summer enrichment camp. It is a place for kids who are interested in different subjects to go and learn from some of the best teachers in the area. It is open for rising 9th graders and is a three year commitment. There are no tests or any homework, just a lot of hands on projects that further kids' interests in school. Lots of activities and field trips make this a great place to go.

My favorite class last year was physics. We got to shoot off rockets and figure out the velocity and angle that they went up on. We got to use alka-seltzer as a fuel and used a film container as a rocket for another experiement. We used little toy cars for an experiement involving gravity.
Another great class last year was chemistry. Every day we had a different lab that was real fun. We made asprin and hollowed out a penny that we got to keep. We did some Chromatography also. The first lab we had was one where you had to figure out the substances, it was actually pretty cool. This year we have down a lot of stuff with bacteria and titration. We have been trying to make the bacteria glo with proteins. I think that everyone was successful.

The teachers at The Summer Institute are all very experienced. Teachers come from Durham Academy, , Northern, Southern, Hillside, Chapel Hill, and Orange High Schools. Many have been nominated for the teacher of the year award for the area. They are all dedicated to their work. They want you to understand and have fun. They don't see a point in making the class so boring that you lose interest in the subject for the rest of your life. The want you to enjoy their own passion in life. They are all very well educated in the subject that they teach.

The field trips are just as much fun or even more than the in class activities. The first year kids went to Falls Lake, Eno River, a gold mine, Emerald Pointe, a ropes course, and a couple others. Except for the ropes course, you have a few labs to do at this places, but they don't take to long and so you can have the rest of the day to play around. At the ropes course, Triangle Training Center, you learn to trust you classmates through mingboggling problems that take your whole team to figure out. You also get to climb a thirty foot wall and trust your classmates to catch your rope if you fall. It was pretty intense!

For all these reasons and more, the Summer Institute is a great reason to spend your summer.I hope to see a lot of new people this next year. You will all benefit from it.

Made: June 1999