Summer camps are embracing the AI trend

This summer vacation, Sichuan-based parent Beibei (pseudonym) did not sign her child up for a traditional summer camp as she had done in previous years.

After her child graduated from primary school, she wanted to find a summer program that was "not too far from home and different from previous experiences." While browsing Xiaohongshu, she noticed an AI summer camp. Compared with the AI, robotics, and project practice highlighted in the program promotion, what truly appealed to her was that the camp leveraged Harrow's educational resources, resulting in more standardized venues, management, and teaching staff.

In the end, she spent over 10,000 Hong Kong dollars to enroll her child in this six-day small-group AI summer camp.

Unlike many promotions that emphasize "AI changes the future" or "master artificial intelligence in a few days," she did not have high technical expectations for this summer camp. "The main goal is to help my child build an interest in AI, broaden their technological horizons, and develop courage and confidence through group collaboration and result presentations."

As the 2026 summer vacation began, AI has almost become one of the hottest keywords in the summer camp market. From tech companies partnering with educational institutions to launch featured courses, to training organizations intensively rolling out AI-themed products—covering AI agents, robots, smart glasses, to product development and entrepreneurship practice—AI summer camps have rapidly evolved from a niche offering to a new hotspot in the summer education consumption market in just a few months.

Beneath the buzz, the market has also become increasingly complex. Course prices range from several thousand yuan to tens of thousands of yuan. Some focus on real project practice, others emphasize visits to enterprises to experience cutting-edge technology, and many institutions promote concepts like "cultivating future AI talents," "building AI products," and "AI entrepreneurship."

As more and more families start paying for AI summer camps, a new question arises: What exactly are parents paying for? Are AI summer camps selling AI capabilities or educational anxiety? Are they genuine educational innovation or just another round of conceptual competition in the summer market?

Why Are AI Summer Camps So Popular?

The rising popularity of AI summer camps reflects simultaneous changes on both the supply and demand sides.

In the view of Wang Jiangyou, founder of CodeKing, on one hand, a large number of institutions are accelerating into this track; on the other hand, AI is no longer an unfamiliar concept, and more and more parents are recognizing that artificial intelligence will become a new essential skill for the next generation.

"The client side has matured, and parents generally recognize that AI is the future development trend; on the supply side, many institutions have quickly entered the market after seeing its popularity," Wang Jiangyou told Jiemian News.

This change is also evident among parents.

This summer vacation, Henan-based parent Ayuan (pseudonym) signed his 10-year-old child up for an AI summer camp for the first time. Having long worked in the internet software industry, he previously paid more attention to his child's underlying qualities such as character and stress resistance. Now, he has begun to rethink what children truly need in the AI era.

In his view, AI has transformed the job market and is also reshaping education.

"Many college graduates find that their skills can no longer meet the new demands of enterprises after entering society. I increasingly feel that the core competitiveness of children in the future will no longer be the accumulation of knowledge, but innovation capabilities, as well as the ability to collaborate with AI and use AI to solve problems."

This is not an isolated case.

Beijing-based parent Zhixia (pseudonym) told Jiemian News that her child had been learning Python before, and this summer, they focused for the first time on AI project practice. In her opinion, compared to visiting enterprises and checking in at laboratories, it is more important for children to actually complete a product development project and go through the entire process from identifying problems, designing solutions to final presentations.

More and more parents are beginning to realize that they are not just buying a summer course, but seeking a new way to cultivate capabilities.

That is precisely why the competition for AI summer camps this year is no longer limited to educational institutions—more and more tech companies are also entering this market. This summer vacation, Alibaba, Rokid, robotics companies and others have partnered with educational institutions to launch AI camp products, with resources from major tech firms becoming a new selling point.

"For tech companies, education is an excellent scenario for technology implementation. Many robots and AI hardware do not yet have many large-scale application scenarios, while study tours allow more children to actually engage with these products and help companies expand awareness of their AI ecosystems," Wang Jiangyou said.

In his view, major tech firms have the most advanced technology, but they may not understand education. "What truly determines the quality of the course is not who provides the product, but who can break down technology into learning content suitable for teenagers."

In fact, this is also the biggest change in AI summer camps this year.

In the past few years, many AI courses remained at the level of knowledge explanation and tool experience, but this year, more and more products are emphasizing concepts like "real industry scenarios," "project-based practice," and "product development," hoping to get children out of the classroom and learn AI in real-world contexts.

However, seemingly similar products can deliver vastly different actual experiences.

Wang Jiangyou told Jiemian News that one of the biggest misconceptions in the industry right now is that parents tend to mistake "looking the same" for "learning the same things."

For example, two robotics courses may appear identical, but one may only involve controlling devices to perform pre-set actions, while the other requires students to program independently and complete underlying development; two AI product development courses may seem similar, but one may only follow the teacher to complete established procedures, while the other requires students to focus on real problems and independently complete demand analysis, solution design, and product iteration.

"In the end, it looks like the children have all finished a work, but the capabilities cultivated by the two learning methods are completely different."

In his view, what truly matters in AI education is not letting children learn a certain technology in a few days, but developing project thinking, inquiry ability, and the awareness of working collaboratively with AI in the process of continuously solving problems.

However, the rapid rise of the market also means that more institutions are entering the field.

Wang Jiangyou has observed that in the past year, many institutions that originally engaged in traditional study tours, overseas study programs, and even cultural tourism businesses have also begun to launch AI summer camp products. Some courses have highly similar names and promotion methods, and there have even been cases of simply copying popular products and packaging AI concepts to attract enrollments.

For most families who are new to AI education, this means a new dilemma of choice is emerging.

When more and more courses are labeled with AI, robotics, big tech company partnerships, and real projects, where does the true value of AI summer camps lie? How can parents determine whether a course is cultivating capabilities or merely creating an experience of "having learned AI"?

All Are AI Summer Camps—Where Do the Differences Lie?

Opening the promotion pages of various institutions, you can almost see similar keywords: robots, AI agents, big tech company partnerships, industry practice, project-based learning. In promotional videos, children are programming around robotic dogs, experiencing AI glasses, and completing roadshow presentations—all seemingly very similar.

The real differences are not easy to spot from promotional materials.

To sign up her child, Ayuan spent a lot of time doing research. He not only communicated repeatedly with the institution's person in charge, but also went to the site to sit in on courses for several consecutive days, hoping to figure out exactly what these courses teach.

In his view, many current AI courses easily fall into a misconception—packaging more complex technologies as more advanced selling points.

"Some courses immediately promote large model fine-tuning and complex algorithms, even letting primary school students engage with these contents. I think this has exceeded children's cognitive abilities," Ayuan told Jiemian News.

What truly won his approval is a different teaching logic.

On the first day of the course, the teacher did not rush to explain tools or start the project directly, but launched discussions around several questions: What exactly is AI? What is the relationship between AI and humans? What problems can AI help humans solve? Where are its capability boundaries?

It was not until the children formed their own understanding of these questions that the course moved to the practical session. Each child used AI to complete their first work based on their interests, and then after several days of group discussions, mutual reviews of roadshows, and repeated revisions, they gradually turned their initial ideas into complete products.

In the classroom, some children developed small games, some created legal science popularization websites, and some built sneaker museums. The works were not very complex, but they were all achievements completed independently by the children.

"What truly matters is not learning a few tools, but letting children develop a thinking habit," Ayuan said. "In the future, when encountering problems, they will proactively think about using AI to contemplate, verify, and find solutions."

Zhixia has a similar judgment.

Before signing up, she researched almost all the popular AI summer camps on the market, including some products launched by major internet companies.

"Many camps are more focused on visiting and experiencing—taking children to companies to look around and listen to sharing sessions. These can stimulate interest, but there is not much time left for children to work on projects."

She ultimately chose an institution that centers on project practice. Throughout the camp, children need to focus on real-life problems, form teams independently, and design solutions. They can develop AI agents, mini-programs, or even design an APP, and finally complete result presentations and roadshows.

"What I hope he learns is the complete process of solving problems, not just checking in at a company."

During the interview, Wang Jiangyou repeatedly mentioned a term—project-based learning. In his view, what truly widens the gap between different AI summer camps is not whether there are robots or which big tech company they partner with, but whether the course is developed around real problems.

In the past, many courses emphasized knowledge points and standard answers; in the AI era, what matters more is how to break down problems, find paths, and iterate continuously when facing open-ended questions. Technology is only a carrier. What truly needs to be cultivated is the mindset to solve complex problems and the ability to use AI to solve problems.

But these contents are also the most difficult part for parents to judge.

Ayuan admitted that everyone is promoting robots, AI, large models, and project-based learning—all seemingly very professional. But once you actually enter the classroom, you will find that some courses focus on experience, some on creation, some are closer to visits, and others require children to complete a project from scratch.

Especially in non-first-tier cities like Henan, many parents have realized that AI is the future trend, but do not know what courses are truly suitable for their children.

"The biggest difficulty is not not knowing that AI is important, but not knowing how to choose." In his view, many current institutions easily use parents' information gap to create anxiety.

For example, promotions like "develop an AI product in seven days" or "learn AI in a few days" make it difficult for ordinary parents to distinguish which are marketing tactics and which are course designs that truly conform to children's growth patterns.

AI summer camps are beginning to shift from competition over "whether AI is included" to competition over "who can truly teach AI well." Factors that truly determine quality, such as course design, teacher capabilities, and project depth, are precisely the parts that are hardest to show in promotional materials and hardest for parents to identify.

There Are No "Crash Courses" for AI Education

The popularity of AI summer camps also reflects a more noteworthy question: What kind of AI education is truly valuable?

Xiong Bingqi, dean of the 21st Century Education Research Institute, told Jiemian News that there is nothing wrong with AI courses themselves. The key is for parents to figure out what exactly their children need to learn.

"AI is not simply learning to use a certain tool, but a new way of learning."

He believes that the most important ability in the AI era is not letting children memorize more knowledge, but learning to raise questions, analyze problems, and use AI to solve problems. If a course can cultivate children's creativity, critical thinking, and practical abilities, it has positive significance; but if it only uses the AI concept to package courses and create anxiety, treating AI as a new shortcut to higher education, it deviates from the essence of education.

During the interviews, many parents mentioned the same feeling: what truly troubles them is not whether to let their children learn AI, but not knowing how to choose.

Ayuan admitted that many parents around him have realized that AI is the future trend, but do not understand the essence of AI or what children should learn, and ultimately can only follow the market's promotions.

"Many people see online cases of AI prodigies making AI products in a few days and start to get anxious, worrying that their children are already falling behind."

Xiong Bingqi believes that this anxiety largely comes from information asymmetry.

On one hand, AI is indeed profoundly transforming society and putting forward new requirements for the capabilities of future talents; on the other hand, the market can easily amplify this anxiety, packaging AI as a new educational "trend" and making parents mistakenly believe that enrolling in a course will give them a competitive edge.

"There are no shortcuts in education," he said. Any ability requires long-term accumulation, and it is impossible to achieve fundamental changes through a single summer camp.

Chu Chaohui, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Educational Sciences, also reminded that we should be alert to a new "exam-oriented" tendency emerging in AI education.

He believes that whether it is programming, AI, or robotics, they are essentially just tools. What truly matters is whether children have developed the abilities of independent exploration, problem-solving, and continuous learning in the learning process.

"If AI is only turned into new exams, new competitions, and new training programs, then it is just continuing the old educational path and not truly giving play to the value that education in the AI era should have."

In Chu Chaohui's view, the greatest significance of AI lies in helping children turn their interests into creativity.

In the past, many of children's imaginative ideas often stayed in the imagination stage; now, with the help of AI, they have the opportunity to quickly turn ideas into works, turn problems into projects, and complete their own expressions through continuous revision and iteration.

This creative process is more important than what the final work is.

Looking back, this year's AI boom during summer vacation not only reflects new changes in the education market, but also exposes new problems.

On one hand, more and more parents are beginning to realize that what the future society needs is not just knowledge, but the ability to collaborate with AI; on the other hand, under the rapid expansion of the market, course quality varies unevenly, and phenomena like conceptual packaging, exaggerated promotions, and anxiety creation have also begun to appear.

For ordinary families, what they truly need to distinguish may not be whether an institution partners with a certain big tech company or is equipped with robots, but whether the course truly centers on children: whether it encourages children to raise questions, explore actively, and complete projects collaboratively, and whether it helps children develop a future-oriented mindset, rather than just completing a tech experience.

This is perhaps what AI summer camps are truly worth paying for.

This article is from "Jiemian News", authors: Zha Qinjun, Wang Qiang, editor: Wen Shuqi, published with authorization from 36Kr.