Students interested in attending ROAR Academy must submit an application and unofficial transcript. The application process is competitive and only 20 students will be selected for each session. 

• Session 1*: June 26 – 30, July 3 –  8
• Session 2: July 10 – 14, July 17 – 21
• Session 3: July 24- 28, July 31 – August 4

Applications are reviewed as they are received, so you are encouraged to submit your completed application as soon as possible. Admissions decisions are made on a rolling basis.

• Late January — ROAR Academy application opens
• March 24, 2023 — Early application deadline. 
• March 31, 2023—Early application and financial aid admissions
• Late Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis.
• May 1, 2023 — Tuition due.

Students can only participate in ROAR Academy once, so if the student has already participated they cannot participate again.

High school students who live in California and will be entering 10th, 11th, or 12th grade in the fall of the year and they would like to attend summer camp.

The academy is great for students who are considering a STEM career path and would like to apply to AI, Robotics, and Data Science as their college majors. The curriculum is also suitable for those who has interest in learning Python programming in general and more narrowly upcoming autonomous transportation revolution and the foundation of their supporting technologies. 

ROAR Academy costs $800 for a two week program that runs from 9AM to 3PM, generally from Monday through Friday.

The enrollment and fee are only for California residents. For prospective students from other regions, please contact us and we will offer available spaces after the admission of California residents.

A complete application consists of:
1. Application – If you would like to preview last year’s application, please click here.
2. Unofficial Transcript

• Families who demonstrate financial need: FREE
• Families who do not demonstrate financial need: $800

ROAR Academy awards full and partial scholarships based on financial need. However, financial aid is awarded based on need and available funds. Financial need is demonstrated by qualifying for one of the following programs:

• Free or reduced price lunch at school
• CalFresh
• Medi-Cal

If your family demonstrates financial need, you do not need to submit an additional scholarship application. You only need to indicate your financial need when responding to the camp fee question in the application. However, ROAR Academy reserves the right to request financial need documentation during the application review process.

Requesting a fellowship review:  If your family cannot afford camp, but does not qualify for one of the programs listed above, you may e‑mail hc_kuan@berkeley.edu to request that we review your specific situation. You can contact us at any time—your child does not need to submit an application first. Do not submit financial statements (tax returns, etc.) unless requested to do so. Sensitive information should never be e-mailed to us, due to UC Berkeley’s data security policy.

Yes, there will be a $50 application fee. However, for families demonstrating financial need, fees are waived. 

Accepted participants are expected to bring an excitement to learn, an open mind, a great attitude.

If the student is admitted into a session that they can no longer attend, you can request that they be placed on the wait list for another session (or multiple other sessions). If a spot opens up in a session the student is wait listed for, we will e-mail you.

Access to a computer and a good internet connection are the only requirements to participate in the program. All the material will be hosted online and easily accessible from a web browser and any additional software tool will be made freely available to the students

In the curriculum of the Academy, we assume that this is NOT the student’s first computer class nor their computer programming class.

Students attending the Academy would have the best experience if they have good understanding about the following knowledge:

1. Fluently set up online user accounts at Kaggle.com and Github.com
2. Fluently manage a computer’s file system, preferably know about the Terminal environment
3. Have entry to intermediate computer programming experience, such as on BASIC, Scratch, C/C++, and Java
4. Familiar with the coding concepts of variables, loops, conditions, and functions