Finding an internship as a high school student can be difficult. Many formal internship programs are designed for college students, and high schoolers often have limited work experience to put on a résumé.
In this guide, we’ll explain how high school students can find internships, where to find opportunities, and what kinds of experiences can strengthen a college application.
No. Colleges do not require internships as part of your high school extracurricular profile.
An internship is just one way to spend your time outside the classroom. A part-time job, research experience, community service, family responsibilities, an independent project, academic competitions, or a long-term hobby can be just as meaningful to admissions officers.
What matters more is how you spend your time, what responsibility you take on, and what you learn from the experience.
A high school internship is a short-term work or learning experience that lets you explore a professional field while building practical skills. Internships for high school students can be:
A high school internship doesn’t have to look like a traditional corporate internship. For example, a student interested in marketing might help a local restaurant build out a social media strategy. A CS student might build a website for a local nonprofit.
There’s no single “best” type of internship for college applications, and you absolutely don’t need to intern at a Fortune 500 company for the experience to matter.
The strongest internships for high school students let you explore an interest, take on real responsibilities, learn from professionals, and ideally walk away with tangible work you can point to. What matters more is what you actually did and what you learned from those experiences.
Below are the most common types of internships high school students can pursue.
For students interested in STEM, high school research internships and summer research programs can be valuable ways to explore an academic interest.
Typical research roles for high school students can involve:
Many competitive programs such as the Research Science Institute and Boston University RISE have deadlines between December and February, several months before the summer begins. October is a good time to identify programs, review eligibility requirements, prepare a résumé, and ask teachers for recommendations.
Local small businesses are one of the most overlooked sources of high school internship opportunities. Many small businesses do not advertise formal internship programs, but they may be open to motivated students who can help with a specific project.
For example, a student interested in business or marketing could help a local business organize events or even do basic competitor analysis. A student interested in communications can help a small business build out email marketing campaigns or run social media.
Don’t hesitate to walk into a shop in your town or send a short, polite email asking if they’d be open to bringing on a high school intern. Instead of simply asking, “Do you have internships?” introduce yourself, explain what interests you about the business, and describe how you could contribute.
Don’t dismiss a part-time job because it doesn’t have “internship” in the title. It can be the best internship opportunity for high school students with no professional experience. Working at a restaurant, library, retail store, summer camp, tutoring center, or local business – like a grocery store, hardware store or ice cream shop – can build the soft skills colleges care about – reliability, communication, teamwork, time management, and maturity.
Many internship opportunities for high school students are never posted on major job boards. Finding them often requires a mix of formal applications and direct outreach. Here are three different ways:
Talk to your school counselor and teachers about local partnerships, summer programs, research opportunities, alumni connections, or businesses that have previously worked with students.
Ask family members, family friends, teachers, coaches, neighbors, and other professionals whether they know someone working in a field that interests you.
Try cold outreach local organizations such as nonprofits, research labs, museums and community organizations.
Keep your message short and personalized. Explain who you are, why their work interests you, what experience or skills you already have, and how you might be able to contribute.
AcceptU offers structured remote internship opportunities for high school students in grades 10 through 12. Students are matched with host companies and industry mentors to work on real, focused projects with clear, tangible outcomes.
The program runs during the academic year, over winter break, and during summer term, so students can align their internship with their existing schedule and workload.
If you’d like to learn more about AcceptU’s remote high school internship program, book a consultation with our team.
Start with your school counselor, teachers, family network, local businesses, nonprofits, nearby universities, and formal internship programs. You can also create opportunities by reaching out directly to organizations and explaining how you’d be able to contribute.
Ben received a BA from Cornell University and has spent more than 15 years working within education and college preparation. Prior to joining AcceptU, Ben was a long-time teacher with Kaplan, and subsequently built and launched multiple tutoring and test prep programs through Varsity Tutors and Learner.com.
