DD has one friend who is doing an "internship"- basically doing admin work for her father's bank but this kid has such an inflated ego she is calling it her "financial" summer.

Our high school helps to facilitate summer internships by soliciting parent support. It was a great experience for my kid but they also other things that summer. They did something related to their intended major and also started on applications. Senior fall is a busy time, so I suggest getting started over the summer of possible. Common app topics usually the same and school specific Supplemental essay topics are usually released by early August. If shooting for highly selective schools, there are a lot of essays to complete.

In the same vein as paying a professor, would donating to a house of reps member’s campaign fund work?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:to be fair, nobody is pushing paper in internships anymore.

my kids are not the kids who had internships at Blackstone during HS bcs of their parents, but those kids made a ton of connections and had interesting projects. often for like 6 weeks and then went to Montauk for the rest of the summer. nice work if you can get it.

Please do tell…what substantive work are high schoolers doing at their non-STEM, six week internships?

My kid did economics research at a reputable institution with a large cohort of other interns, and presented a paper at the end. They continued their research this year and they meet with their mentor/supervisor each week for feedback and more assignments. They are hoping to do similar work somewhere else this summer AND take on a more regular PT job. They also applied to an internship that is more accounting oriented at a museum, which would be cool.

They know tons of HS kids with summer internships. Some are competitive and substantive, some are paid, some unpaid, some in name only through connections, some almost entirely fabricated. One kid has parents who pay a professor to "do research." They really vary, which makes sense in an area as large as as DC.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:top college coaches say retail/fast food will get you better results then pay to play

This is just so not true.
They say if you made it to management positions at retail/fast food as a high schools, you may get good results.
It almost certainly requires some parental connection to make management positions at retail/fast food at the age of 16, as it requires years of devotion to the job. As far as I know, no retail/fast food is taking 12 years old kid.

Summer between junior and senior year is 12 year old summer.

Consultants seem to agree on two things that shocked me.

The value of becoming an eagle scout.
The value of a retail customer facing job.

Apparently, the 4 or 5 years it takes to become an eagle scout is more impressive than the 6 or 7 years it takes to become a BJJ brown belt or the 8 or 9 years it takes to be a competitive (but not recruitable) club baseball player.
By a LOT!!! Who even does boy scouts anymore?

Apparently, a minimum wage retail job is usually more impressive than most internships, especially if it is also during the school year.

Honestly, I was shocked too.

My rising HS Sr will be working, doing his summer sport, and working on his application/essays.

Don’t need internships. Show dedication and time well spent. One of mine is a swimmer and also coaches every season and lifeguards and give private swim lessons. He managed to also volunteer at a local hospital junior program for several weeks each summer. He also found other short gigs that aligned with his major. Nothing time consuming or difficult to get but showed some initiative for career exploration and major interest. The other was a kids camp counselor and food server/ helper. But volunteered at a historic site museum, shadowed some folks in the field he’s interested in. Nothing intensive but showed his interests and added up to a meaningful “career-oriented” common app listing.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It was the only way kid could get exposure to business - a high area of interest for him. No classes offered in his school.

Not snarking but what did he learn about?

I don't have time to describe this for you.
Look into the programs yourself and see what they offer.

Sounds like a Karoline Leavitt response.

If an internship in his area of interest for college is "useless" and "boring", maybe kid should consider a different major they have more interest in. Many internships give kid some insight into that field and help them figure out what they may like to do. My kid did unpaid research at a university that summer, not connected via parents, but via cold emails on kid's part, on their own. Kid loved it and actually did the hands on research in the lab and often was the only person working on it, running the experiments and collecting data. Kid also has a regular paid job through the school year teaching kids. Kid had plenty of time to chill with friends evenings and weekends. In daytime, all the friends were also doing some research/internships too.

Anonymous wrote:I thought this was going to be a college junior. Geez OP.

HS is in the thread title.

I mean, OP is bonkers, but I’m not sure why you were confused.

Have him work on his college applications. That's life-changing for sure!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It was the only way kid could get exposure to business - a high area of interest for him. No classes offered in his school.

Not snarking but what did he learn about?

I don't have time to describe this for you.
Look into the programs yourself and see what they offer.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Years of real summer jobs helped my son get a real internship in college. The recruiter said that they rarely consider students who have zero work history.

+1 my kids worked "regular" jobs during HS summers and first college summer. Did well with college internships.

Also, as someone who hires interns, I only really consider someone who had some experience like retail/camp counselor/food service. If you've only done "internships" since HS, I'm going to assume most of those weren't real jobs and that you just have well connected parents.

Agree with this. We are wealthy/well connected and my kids both did internships (like on Capitol Hill) in high school, but they also worked retail and as camp counselors to make money during college, before junior year paid internships. They learned good practical people skills in retail. For at least one kid, the retail job was a hook for getting his first post college job.

I didn’t realize Capitol Hill had high school internships. I thought it was only college and normally through your state’s house of reps member. How did you find out info about these?

There’s the Page program which is super fancy and prestigious, but it also seems like there’re less formal internships that some senators offer https://unanimousconsent.discourse.group/t/senate-job-hunt-mega-thread/215/83

Summer jobs are great and our DC worked the summers after freshman and sophomore years at the pool. But it’s incorrect to assume that internships are only secured through parents, and amount to nothing more than making copies. Our DC had an incredible paid internship last summer that was both competitive and life-changing. And I believe it helped her gain admission to a T10.

I thought this was going to be a college junior. Geez OP.