Cambridge Summer Course for High School Students (What it’s really like)

Elizabeth (Mentor) Immerse Education, Queens’ College Cambridge – Week One

Immerse Education offers Cambridge summer courses for high school students. In this blog, Elizabeth describes her first week as a mentor on the Immerse programme in Cambridge.

Sunday was alive with excitement from both staff and students arriving at their new home for the next two weeks. It was difficult to find any student who wasn’t grinning from ear to ear as they began to explore Queens College, Cambridge, and start to settle in.

Lessons began the following day after arrival, delivered by world-leading Cambridge tutors – and the students were not disappointed! Annastacia, currently studying Law with Immerse, said that:

“The class sizes are small, so everyone has a chance to participate.”

Annastacia, Immerse Law Participant, Cambridge, 2022.

Another student, Gabriella, pointed out that, in her International Relations classes, “everyone feels welcome to express their own opinion.”

From lab visits for Medicine to building robots in Engineering to writing their very own play in Creative Writing, each subject pushes students to be as creative and engaged as possible.

After a busy first day of lessons, sports activities, and a quick trip into the city, the students settled down into Fitzpatrick Hall with their mentors for a cosy “Fireside Chat”. We, mentors, loved answering everyone’s questions about life in the UK, adulthood, university, and all things Cambridge! We gave reassuring and realistic takes on applications and interviews, settling into independence, making friends, and the Cambridge social scenes. We were all really impressed by how attentive all the students were. Annastacia said she “loved that the mentors talk to us like adults”.

Our busy Tuesday was concluded with a fun-filled board games tournament. Students were playing head-to-head in mentor family groups, each of which was assigned a costume theme. The students got very creative with the “Snakes-and-Ladders” and “Monopoly” themes, with caps designed to look like snakes and costumes made entirely of Monopoly money.

With a packed schedule, they are “busy in the best way”, as one student puts it, and Wednesday was no exception. Our students took to the streets of Cambridge in their family groups to complete a scavenger hunt, which resulted in fantastic family selfies with landmarks, porters, and the city’s best-known spots.

The day was topped off by a trip to Christ’s College for a formal dinner. Students were dressed to impress and enjoyed exploring a new college for an evening. The dinner began with the traditional gong and Latin grace read by one of our mentors and ended with many smiles and students trying out the scholar style by putting on the mentors’ gowns for a fancy photo shoot.

The highlight of Thursday was the punting tour on the River Cam. Students packed into the boats and were led on a tour of the many colleges which span the river, including Queens, King’s, Trinity Hall, Magdalene, Clare, Trinity, and St John’s! With a mixture of fun games, challenging competitions, and relaxed excursions, ‘there is something for everyone, one student says.

Viktoriya loves that ‘there is a lot of team-building and team spirit in mentor family competitions, and Friday’s sports day showcased this teamwork at its best. Each team came together and, with the help of a supportive group and some tribal face-paint, we encouraged each other to push for the gold. The exciting mixture of sack races, egg-and-spoon races, three-legged races, and tug of war had all the teams working closely, battling for the win. We also battled the heat with the fun addition of water pistols, water balloons, and ice creams under the shade which cooled us down for the walk back to college!

We are so glad the students (and staff!) are having so much fun, not only during activities but in their classes too. Here’s to another incredible week at Immerse in Queens College!