Here’s why summer school is cool

If you’re studying in the U.S., you can use the summer break months to return home or to take to the road and see more of America. Or you can choose to go back to the classroom.

The reasons for summer study make a lot of sense.

Most U.S. colleges require students to take 15 credits every semester to graduate in four years. That means five three-credit courses, a load that can be hard to shoulder all four years. But summer study can help to ease it.

The summer session is short, and by taking a class during summer, “you can have more studying capacity for the harder ones you’re going to take” later, said Teri Albrecht, who directs the international office at the University of Texas at Austin. The strategy allows students to take 12 credits instead of 15 during one of the two semesters of the normal academic year, she said. 

Because some international students defray costs by working up to 20 hours a week in on-campus jobs, they appreciate the ability to spread the academic load out over summer. In fall and spring terms, many choose to work and also study. If they are taking one fewer course, it is more doable.

Summer classes are condensed into fewer weeks. They are intense, and the workload is heavy. However, the class size is usually small, allowing for more access to professors and a rich learning experience.

Here is one last reason to study in the summer — and it may be the best: It’s often cheaper. “Our summer program does not charge out-of-state tuition for summer courses,” said Susie Askew, director of the office of international students at the University of Nevada, Reno. “So that’s a huge savings.” Many other public colleges offer this same deal, and Askew says it makes thousands of dollars’ difference in a student’s budget.

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