The process has 7 stages, all centred around a Spark. The Spark has sometimes been called a “spike in U.S. university admissions, and that’s a good preliminary way to think about it. But more accurately, a true spike is not just one amazing extracurricular activity accomplishment, but an entire profile that centres around a core theme that’s unmistakable to the admissions officer. Furthermore, the goal of Brightspark is not just admission to a top program at a top school, but real discovery of a career path and enjoyment. The Spark is the theme of the students profile that is developed over the span of high school, and is developed according to the following stages:
Student candidate profile evaluation, interests discussion with Brightspark Founders, mentor pairing, Spark profile report(sent to students), Spark timeline report(sent to students), academic schedule discussion. Mentors are the one's who will guarantee the student's summer internship placement, work with the student on their research paper, and travel.
Starting immediately. Once the student is paired with their mentor, they undergo a period of intense learning, in which the mentor, be they a professor or industry professional, conducts regular classes with the student, teaching them the specific technical concepts needed for both the internship placement and academic research paper, specific to the student profile. The effort and abilityof the student to absorb later on sets the baseline for the level of the students internship placement and depth of the research paper. There are no limits, except for the students ability, and mentors are carefully chosen to have depth and breadth in their area of expertise such that they are able to dig deep with the student, whatever topic they choose.
Common App written essay sessions occur with Brightspark founders
Starting in grade 11, submission of finished research paper to academic journals for publication at end of year.
Students are paired with a mentor in their field of interest, and conduct academic research on a specific topic, with the goal of inclusion into their student profile portfolio, publication in a high school or undergraduate academic journal. This can be either a fully independent research paper with the student as the sole author, or taking an assistant authorship role as part of a larger study or existing professor/ professionals research. For science students, this usually takes the form of working in a lab under a professor as an assistant on an experiment. For tech and engineering students, the research takes the form of working either with a professor or industry professional, or in most cases, students choose to write there own paper with the paired mentor teaching the concepts, outlining the system design, debugging, and guiding the details. For athletes and musicians, students often have the chance to travel(in most cases to the U.S. or within Canada), compete/perform with their mentor at competitions, and receive elite personal coaching. For literature students, the research process takes the form of in-depth analysis and critique of literary works involving a particular question, genre, author, or literary movement, with the output of a paper. The topic is chosen by the student, and is very specific. Some example paths that our students have taken in the past:
Occurring in grade 10 or 11 summer, guaranteed placement into an elite internship in the U.S. or Canada. Most recently, we paired students to intern at a NYC blockchain hedge fund, on FalconX distributed systems team, and at Google's Computer Science Summer Institute.
Brightspark students travel abroad with their mentor to an industry specific event directly tying in with their conducted research. In some cases, students have the chance to present their research at such events.
Submission of early decision and regular decision applications. Students in 100% of times have developed a close personal relationship with their Spark mentor. Mentors help on waitlist letters, career guidance, interview preparation, post graduation job placement, and college schedule strategization.