Seemingly, some high schools have discovered a ploy to increase their yearly yield of Harvard acceptances.

But at Philips Academy in Andover, Mass., the college counselors do not suggest summer school as a means to get accepted by undergraduate programs.

"We do not encourage students to go to Harvard Summer School as a wedge to get admitted," Director of Public Information Tana G. Sherman says. "We tell them 'no' because that's the information that we get from Harvard admissions."

"We urge students to do anything that shows productive expenditure of time. There is a misconception that summer school will give you a leg up," Robert S. Koppert, college counselor at the Dalton School in New York City says.

"One student going to Harvard in the fall took an intensive ancient Greek class at Harvard Summer School," he continued. "It really helped give her a sense of Harvard and she is eager to get her feet wet."

However, according to Koppert, this particular student was more interested in the prevailing college experience than the Harvard ties summer school would indicate.

"Those students who are less immersed in the culture of college admissions and are more naive, might think that summer school will help them get in," Koppert says.

Though rumors of easier college admission practices after completion of the Secondary School Program continue to float through the summer school, not every summer school student leaves Cambridge with Crimson ambitions.