What to do with your summers

In this post, I want to help you brainstorm about what you might do this summer.

I know it may seem a little early, but at ServeWell Academy, we’re all about getting ahead of the curve. I won’t expect you to solidify any plans right now, but I want you to think about what you might want to do. That way, if opportunities arise, you’ll be ready to act.

If you wait until the summer to start thinking about it, there may be opportunities that pass you by.

Since you’re old enough to work now, if you wait too long to get your act together, there will be college students who get out of school before you who swoop-in and grab all the best jobs.

IMPORTANCE OF SUMMERS

At this point (as a sophomore), you only have two summers left to work with.  If you use them strategically, you can take your application to the next level. You have this summer coming up and next summer to make all the magic happen. That’s it.

Choose your activities wisely.

Summers are valuable because they give you the time and flexibility to do longer-term projects that would be impossible to do during the school year. You get to demonstrate to colleges, service academies, and ROTC programs what you really care about — as opposed to what you can squeeze in during the school year.

This is a potent weapon because colleges care about what you’re passionate about, where you direct your energies, and what motivates you. It can add a lot of color and dimensionality to your application — if you do it right.

I like to see sophomores sit down with their parents and map out their next two summers.

Ideally, you would do different things each summer to highlight different parts of your personality or interests or passions.

CASE STUDY

My twin sons were very motivated early-on to attend the Naval Academy or to get Navy ROTC scholarships. They had to think about what activities they could do each summer that would turn them into highly-qualified candidates when it came time to apply.

How could they spread those activities out over the coming summers?

Step #1: remember the Big 3.

1. Academics, (2) Athletics, and (3) Leadership

What can you do over the summers that would fall into these three buckets?

What are some activities that service academies and ROTC programs actually give you extra points for doing?

SUMMER AFTER FRESHMAN YEAR

My sons’ goal was to find an opportunity to work overseas as manual laborers. They weren’t sure what they would do, or where they would do it, so they began to ask around and network with family and friends.

After a few weeks of investigation, they figured a way to get a job as day laborers on a cocoa bean farm in Brazil. This was not a fancy, chaperoned, pay-to-play opportunity organized by some large corporate entity.

Instead, they found a family friend who owned a farm in Brazil, and they asked him if they could move down there to work for a month. They really wanted an international experience.

Obviously, the military’s mission is overseas, so if you can demonstrate experience living overseas, this can enhance your profile. In fact, ROTC applications specifically ask you about any time you’ve spent overseas and for what reasons.

Apparently, overseas experience matters to them.

My guess is that when a selection board sees that you have lived, worked, played, or traveled overseas, they probably feel as if you have some maturity about you because you’ve been outside of your bubble to see how the rest of the world lives and works.

My sons also wanted to do manual labor.

They wanted to see what it would be like to work 8-10 hours a day, in the sun, with their hands, in a very physically demanding job. Their job was to pick coffee beans from trees, spread them out to dry, collect them, and transfer them onto transport trucks, for 10 hours a day in the baking Brazilian sun.

In preparation for the trip, they studied Portuguese (the language spoken in Brazil) in the hopes that it would reduce the language barrier even a little — which it did not. In the end, nobody on the farm spoke any English, which as you can imagine, was challenging.

You need to have a passport to travel overseas, so this is a good indication that you know how to jump through some administrative hoops.

In the end, it was a transformative experience for them, mostly based on overcoming struggles — physical struggles, language struggles, social struggles, nutritional struggles, cultural struggles.

As difficult as it was, they learned, grew, and matured.

In terms of the selection boards, this type of experience revealed a lot about who they were and what they were up for.

SUMMER AFTER SOPHOMORE YEAR

Both of my sons planned to spend this summer (1) completing their Eagle Scout projects and (2) studying for the SAT. As we’ve discussed many times before, SAT preparation is a critical part of this summer’s schedule.

Their Eagle Scout projects were time-consuming and needed a lot of attention, coordination, and leadership. Similarly, they had to make sure that they had at least a full month of deep study for the SAT with no distractions.

These were the key milestones for them to complete before they started their junior year.

SUMMER AFTER JUNIOR YEAR

For those of you who remember the COVID pandemic, this threw off a lot of students’ summer plans. My sons were no exception.

Before the pandemic hit, my sons planned on attending Navy Summer Seminar, Boys State, and interning for a company that ran Navy SEAL-inspired Boot Camps.

Lo and behold, all of these activities were canceled due to COVID, so they had to come up with a plan B.

Plan B included taking several online academic classes, reading two dozen books on military leadership, working out to max out the Candidate Fitness Test, and learning to spearfish and dive for lobsters — all on their own. The country was in a total lockdown during the summer and nearly every in-person program was canceled.

This was an unusual summer to be sure and hopefully one that we will not see again.

WHAT ARE YOUR PLANS?

Obviously, these activities were very specific to my sons’ goals and ambitions. Your job is to create a plan that matches your own.

What are some things that you might want to consider for your next two summers?

Remember, it matters what you did last summer, too. Maybe you don’t want to repeat what you’ve already done? Maybe you want to try something new?

Academic experiences

• Navy STEM Camp (available after sophomore year)
• Extra academic classes (online, community college)
• Reading
• Khan Academy
• SAT or ACT preparation (this is an absolute given this summer, and we’ll talk a lot more about this in a few weeks)

Sports

• If you’re an athlete: camps, showcases, invitationals
• Work on skills, strength, endurance
• Prepare for the military fitness tests

Military leadership experiences:

• Navy Summer Seminar 
• Summer Leadership Experience (West Point)
• Air Force Summer Leadership
• Coast Guard AIM program
• Boys State
• NOLS (National Outdoor Leadership School)
• Outward Bound
• (most of these would be after your junior year, but it’s good to put them on your roadmap)

General 

• Get a paying job (lifeguard, camp counselor)
• Manual labor
• Volunteer or community service
• Tutoring
• Internship
• Travel locally, or internationally
• Entrepreneurship, starting a business

So, as you can see, there are a lot of options.

Your job is to map out which of these options (or others that I haven’t suggested) suits you.

The timing is important, too, because some of these programs or projects are tied to certain milestones in your life. That’s why I want you to break out a calendar and a piece of paper now and literally sketch out what you plan to do and when.

It will be tentative, of course, but still very helpful.

Once this roadmap is in place, you know what to do, you’ve made sure that you’re not missing anything, and you’re setting yourself up for success.

We’d love to hear what you have in mind.

Jot down some of your ideas below so we can be inspired…