Internship

[Anonymous]

My DS is a rising Junior, he applied for many internships, but was not selected for any. His preference is Internship in Cybersecurity. Please guide us, TIA

[Anonymous]

Lots of kids aren’t getting internships this summer, OP. Plus, you are way late.
If this is a college junior then you are in the wrong forum.
If this is a high school junior, usually the kind of parents who push their kids into internships during high school are also savvy enough to know what that environment is like nowadays.
It’s nearly July. It’s going to be very hard of not impossible to find any sort of internship or paid work. Let your teen do something else meaningful this summer. They have their whole lives to sit behind a desk, what’s the rush?

[Anonymous]

It's the end of June. I don't know what you want us to do. It would have been smart to make an alternative plan several months ago.

[Anonymous]

Is your student in high school or college?

[Anonymous]

Regardless of HS or college, hunt should have started back in January. And if college, did your kid work with their career services office? Talk to classmates in their major for tips, etc?

[Anonymous]

If your student is in college, you need to be looking for a job for Summer 2026 in Fall 2025. I run our internship program and we do all of our hiring in September/October. If we don't have our roles filled by end of October, we are late and missing out on the best talent. I work for a consulting firm and I know we take a more competitive approach than most companies. Realistically, there are still good roles and good talent until about January, but everything after that is pretty late.

Students looking for a job right now for this summer will seem like they are leftovers who weren't strong enough to get a job during prime recruiting season.

If your student is in High School, most intern roles in this professional space (cybersecurity) will be taken by college students. If you have a connection to get your student a job (through what I call the "friends & family program") that's probably your best bet.

But know that this is *not necessary* in high school. When I look at college student resumes I don't think it makes a student more impressive to have had H.S. internships. I look at GPA, and what coursework/program they are in. Bonus points for learning any coding language on a self-taught basis (not in school, or any kind of academic program). That tells me you can learn on the job and be self-directed.

Tell your kid to spend the summer learning Python, R, C#, or any object oriented coding language (if you know one, you can quickly pick up others). This will be more impressive on a resume later, assuming he can answer interview questions to demonstrate capability.

Udemy, Coursera, Codeacademy, and YouTube are good places to start. Reddit has groups for this to get help from people who are also learning.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If your student is in college, you need to be looking for a job for Summer 2026 in Fall 2025. I run our internship program and we do all of our hiring in September/October. If we don't have our roles filled by end of October, we are late and missing out on the best talent. I work for a consulting firm and I know we take a more competitive approach than most companies. Realistically, there are still good roles and good talent until about January, but everything after that is pretty late.

Students looking for a job right now for this summer will seem like they are leftovers who weren't strong enough to get a job during prime recruiting season.

If your student is in High School, most intern roles in this professional space (cybersecurity) will be taken by college students. If you have a connection to get your student a job (through what I call the "friends & family program") that's probably your best bet.

But know that this is *not necessary* in high school. When I look at college student resumes I don't think it makes a student more impressive to have had H.S. internships. I look at GPA, and what coursework/program they are in. Bonus points for learning any coding language on a self-taught basis (not in school, or any kind of academic program). That tells me you can learn on the job and be self-directed.

Tell your kid to spend the summer learning Python, R, C#, or any object oriented coding language (if you know one, you can quickly pick up others). This will be more impressive on a resume later, assuming he can answer interview questions to demonstrate capability.

Udemy, Coursera, Codeacademy, and YouTube are good places to start. Reddit has groups for this to get help from people who are also learning.

Very good advice, OP.

-IT company owner

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's the end of June. I don't know what you want us to do. It would have been smart to make an alternative plan several months ago.

+1 Junior in college? Students apply for summer internships the year before. DC is a rising senior in college, at an internship now. They applied last fall, I believe. They have also started applying for next year summer for some positions. Most internships open in the fall.

Waaaaay too late. But, I think a lot of companies right now have limited internship spots, and they take rising seniors.

[Anonymous]

DC, a rising junior in International Affairs, started looking for internships in November '24 and didn't get anything. He's back at his summer job from last year, and happy to have something.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If your student is in college, you need to be looking for a job for Summer 2026 in Fall 2025. I run our internship program and we do all of our hiring in September/October. If we don't have our roles filled by end of October, we are late and missing out on the best talent. I work for a consulting firm and I know we take a more competitive approach than most companies. Realistically, there are still good roles and good talent until about January, but everything after that is pretty late.

Students looking for a job right now for this summer will seem like they are leftovers who weren't strong enough to get a job during prime recruiting season.

If your student is in High School, most intern roles in this professional space (cybersecurity) will be taken by college students. If you have a connection to get your student a job (through what I call the "friends & family program") that's probably your best bet.

But know that this is *not necessary* in high school. When I look at college student resumes I don't think it makes a student more impressive to have had H.S. internships. I look at GPA, and what coursework/program they are in. Bonus points for learning any coding language on a self-taught basis (not in school, or any kind of academic program). That tells me you can learn on the job and be self-directed.

Tell your kid to spend the summer learning Python, R, C#, or any object oriented coding language (if you know one, you can quickly pick up others). This will be more impressive on a resume later, assuming he can answer interview questions to demonstrate capability.

Udemy, Coursera, Codeacademy, and YouTube are good places to start. Reddit has groups for this to get help from people who are also learning.

Last year my rising junior kid did a coding program by a big company. It wasn't an internship, per se, but a leadership/coding program. Then, this year, they applied to an internship there.

Even so, it's too late to apply to these programs. As everyone has stated, you need to apply in the fall.

Your best bet is leetcode, and maybe take some AI, cybersecurity online programs.