Tufts University Pre-College Programs Engineering with Artificial Intelligence

Classes run Monday to Friday from 9am to 5pm and mix lectures and hands-on challenges with time working on your own or in small groups, and a guest speaker visits every day. Residents check in on the Sunday and orientation starts Monday morning. The final Friday ends at 2pm, after the project showcase.

• Week 1

  Daily lectures, activities and hands-on challenges cover the history of AI and its good and bad effects on society, along with a tour of its subfields, from machine learning algorithms to the large platforms already used on real problems. On the coding side, you move from writing your own Python to using packages, APIs and off-the-shelf AI tools.

• Week 2

  The first week's topics continue, but the focus shifts to your group's final project. You pick a real-world problem, research its criteria and constraints, then design, prototype and test a solution, which you present as a video at the closing showcase.

Outside class, residential staff plan activities such as ice cream socials, midnight pancakes and visits to Davis Square. Past weekend trips have included Six Flags New England, Crane Beach and downtown Boston. The trips change from year to year, and their cost is included in the program fee, apart from souvenirs and extras.

Tufts names Gregory Marton, a visiting professor at its Center for Engineering Education and Outreach, as the program's instructor. He spent more than two decades working on human language and AI at MIT, Google and startups. He began teaching at Tufts in 2023 with a course on how language-model assistants like ChatGPT connect to linguistics, cognitive science, education and engineering design, and he teaches versions of it to high schoolers as well as undergraduates.

Teaching assistants work with you during the daily challenges and project time and hold dedicated office hours. Guest speakers cover careers, research and the real problems they face in machine learning. Tufts describes its engineering classes as small but doesn't publish a class size or teacher ratio for this program.

You can apply if you're entering grades 10 to 12 or graduating from high school in 2027, and you must already be able to program. Classes use Python, but Tufts accepts experience in any language as long as you understand program flow, variables, loops, conditionals, functions, and arrays or other data structures. To live on campus you must be at least 15 when the program starts and no older than 19 before it ends.

Tufts reviews each application as a whole and on a rolling basis. Review only starts once your transcript, recommendation and parent form have arrived, and a decision usually follows within 10 business days. Tufts doesn't publish an acceptance rate and doesn't give feedback if you're turned down. Homeschooled students can apply, and non-native English speakers need proof of English, such as a TOEFL iBT score of 100 or an IELTS score of 6.5.

• Online application

  Your personal and parent details, your recommender's contact information and optional test scores.

• Transcript

  A school official uploads it after Tufts emails them.

• Recommendation

  One letter from a teacher, counselor or mentor, whom Tufts contacts for you.

• Parent permission form

  Sent automatically to the parent you name.

• Statement of interest

  Tufts lists one for this program but doesn't give a prompt or length, so check the application when it opens.

You leave with a group engineering project: a working AI prototype, its code, and a video presenting the problem and your solution, shown at a closing showcase that friends and family can attend. That video and the documentation you produce along the way become a personal digital portfolio.

The program isn't for credit, so it won't appear on a college transcript, and Tufts doesn't list a certificate. Tufts also states that taking part doesn't lead to or guarantee admission to a Tufts degree program, and conduct reports from the summer are visible to Tufts admissions offices and may be considered in later applications.

Living on campus costs $5,950 for the two weeks and commuting costs $4,425. The residential fee covers your dorm room, three meals a day (brunch and dinner on Sundays), lab materials, bedding and towels, 24-hour residential care, program activities and weekend excursions, and a staff-accompanied airport transfer during set arrival windows. The commuter fee covers the program, its activities and a weekday lunch, but not breakfast, dinner or weekend meals.

With either option, you also pay for travel to and from Boston, spending money and any medical bills, and residents pay for laundry ($1.50 a cycle). Tufts charges $55.16 for a health insurance plan if you can't show valid U.S.-based insurance for the whole program, and $55.00 for vaccinations if you can't document the required ones. Tufts' tuition payment plan isn't available for summer programs.

Once admitted, you have 10 days, weekends included, to pay a $550 deposit, which counts toward the fee but is never refunded. The balance is due by 15 May 2027, and tuition can be refunded until 11:59pm ET that day and not after. If you apply after 15 May, you pay in full on admission to hold your place.

Need-based aid is limited, and Tufts says its scholarships typically cover 75% to 100% of the program fee. Decisions go out twice a month from February, and international students aren't eligible. Tufts suggests waiting for your aid decision before paying the deposit, although the program may fill while you wait.

Residential students are supervised by a director, senior staff and one resident advisor for every ten students, and they check in with a counselor several times a day. Curfew is 11pm in your room from Sunday to Thursday and midnight on Friday and Saturday, and breaking it can get you sent home without a refund. You use a buddy system during free time, and you can't leave campus or go into a lab without a staff member unless your parents have given permission through Tufts' official process.

You need a Tufts ID card to enter the residence halls, rooms are locked, and Tufts has its own police department on duty around the clock. Tufts says it makes reasonable efforts to background-check staff and give them Title IX training. On arrival day, staff meet students at Boston Logan Airport, North Station and South Station. Tufts tries to help students who need to arrive early or leave late but can't guarantee the same services outside the set windows.

Medical care is the gap to know about. Tufts Health Services offers urgent care for a fee, hospital and transport bills go to the student, and routine counseling isn't provided. A student who needs ongoing mental health support will need an off-campus arrangement. Commuters aren't supervised outside program hours. The full rules are on Tufts' policies page.