Jason Koski/University Photography

Chinese high school students attending the China Cornell College Preparatory Program this summer stroll on Cornell's North Campus.

For Chinese high school students interested in attending college in the United States, the China Cornell College Preparatory Program (CCCPP) offers a preview of higher education at a cutting-edge Ivy League university.

This summer, 87 Chinese students from 38 high schools, including some international schools, attended the CCCPP, which is part of Cornell University’s Summer College Program that hosted some 900 high school students from 40 countries and as many U.S. states.

The CCCPP students attended classes for college credit with undergraduates, studied with Cornell faculty members and participated in trips to Niagara Falls, Buttermilk Falls, the Ithaca Mall, cultural nights, a talent show, intramural sports and more. This year students attended a college fair on campus, with representatives from more than 60 institutions, and staff from Cornell’s admissions office conducted a workshop on the application process.

“[CCCPP] bolsters their confidence for attending college, refines their skills and exposes them to the American system,” said Jim Schechter, director of the Cornell University Summer College. CCCPP is “part of the wider mission of internationalizing Cornell as part of the global community,” and represents a large, growing market in education, said Schechter.

To make the program more appealing to Chinese families and reassure parents about sending their children across the world, graduate and undergraduate program assistants are assigned to groups of 10 students to answer questions, help set up cell phones and chaperone them to restaurants, the Farmer’s Market, the mall, movies or Wegmans, for example.

“I was very surprised by how well these students adjusted when they came, as some are as young as 14,” said Eugene Choi, a graduate student in the field of chemical engineering who has been a program assistant the last two summers. “They were all fluent in English, and even being in a different country, they weren’t shy, they didn’t need much help,” she added. The students had many questions about the college application process and majors, Choi said.

As part of the summer program application, CCCPP students must take the TOEFL, a standardized English language test. Students who score below 100 are required to take an academic writing class as part of their coursework.

Popular classes for Chinese students have included “Freedom and Justice in the Western Tradition” taught by Isaac Kramnick, the Richard J. Schwartz Professor of Government. “Chinese students want to grapple with these ideologies that they’ve read about and thought about,” but that may contrast with the politics of their homeland, said Schechter.

The summer program was divided into two sessions, with the first from June 22 to July 13 and the second from July 14 to Aug. 3. Students could apply to attend one or both sessions.