Summer Activities for High School Students: Start Planning Now (Before February Deadlines!)

ByAimee Heller
A photo which spotlights International College Counselors offers expert advice and suggestions on the best summer activities for high school students.

It may only be January, but now is the time to start planning summer activities for high school students. While deadlines can scatter across the year, many summer programs for high school students close their admissions in February, and these opportunities can play a meaningful role in shaping a student’s college story. While admissions officers carefully review the extracurricular activities students pursue during the school year, they also look closely at how students use their summers.

Summer is a unique opportunity for students to deepen existing interests, explore new ones, and demonstrate intellectual and personal growth outside the classroom. Whether your student is pursuing academic enrichment, leadership development, or hands-on experience, purposeful summer activities for high school students can significantly strengthen a college application by showcasing qualities colleges value most—curiosity, initiative, motivation, and follow-through.

Why Should I Plan Ahead?

Many summer opportunities—including internships, volunteer placements, research programs, and college-sponsored programs—have limited availability and early application deadlines.

Whether a student hopes to try something entirely new or expand on an existing passion, the range of possibilities is vast. International College Counselors (ICC) helps students navigate more than 500 curated summer ideas from our proprietary database, ensuring their summer experiences align with their academic interests, personal goals, and long-term college admissions strategy. Summer is not about filling time, but about planning for the future and building a cohesive student narrative.

Types of Summer Activities Colleges Look for

For students eager to use their summer break to grow, learn, and strengthen their college profile, here are seven high-impact options to consider:

1. Volunteering & Community Service

Meaningful service goes beyond logging hours. A student might volunteer weekly at a food pantry and eventually help organize donation drives, manage volunteers, or improve outreach. Another student could tutor younger children in reading or math, or assist at a senior center, learning patience and communication across generations. Colleges value service that shows long-term commitment and a genuine connection to community needs, especially when students take on leadership or create lasting impact.

2. Academic Camps and College Programs

Many schools, colleges, and universities offer summer residential programs for high school students, lasting anywhere from one to seven weeks. Students live on campus, attend classes, and engage with peers from around the world.

These programs:

  • Demonstrate academic interest and motivation
  • Allow students to explore favorite subjects or new areas of study
  • Provide a realistic preview of college life. Students live in dorms, eat in dining halls, and navigate campus independence

Specialty summer camps offer immersive experiences across a wide range of interests:

  • Leadership camps build teamwork, communication, and decision-making skills
  • Coding and STEM camps provide hands-on technical experience
  • Art, theater, and creative writing camps encourage artistic expression and help build a portfolio
  • Athletic camps help students refine skills and learn advanced strategies

While college programs rarely have a direct tie to college admissions, these experiences combine learning, personal development, and community building.

3. Online Courses & Workshops

In addition to a more reasonable price tag, online learning allows students to go beyond their high school curriculum and demonstrate intellectual curiosity and academic initiative. Programs such as Coursera, Khan Academy, Udemy, or edX offer expert-led courses in subjects ranging from computer science and advanced math to psychology, economics, writing, and foreign languages.

When chosen thoughtfully, online courses:

  • Deepen subject mastery
  • Help students explore new academic interests
  • Strengthen a student’s academic narrative

Courses are especially meaningful when students can apply what they’ve learned to other projects, research, or future coursework.

4. Research Projects

Research experiences are especially valuable for students considering STEM, social science, or academic careers. A student might assist a professor with data collection, literature reviews, or lab experiments. Others may conduct independent research under mentorship—such as studying environmental issues in their community or analyzing public health data—and present findings through a paper, poster, or competition.

Colleges appreciate students who engage deeply with questions, methods, and problem-solving. Many ICC students have gone on to win science fair competitions and co-author or publish academic papers, which is a powerful differentiator in competitive college admissions. Even without awards or publication, research demonstrates intellectual rigor and persistence.

5. Independent Projects

Independent projects often become the most compelling parts of a student’s application. Examples include starting a tutoring initiative, launching a small business, creating an educational website, developing an app, producing a podcast, or organizing a community fundraiser. What matters most is initiative, significance, and ownership: students identifying a problem or interest, taking action, and following through. These projects can show leadership, ownership, and vision, qualities colleges value deeply.

Independent endeavors are often easier to start and sustain during the summer when students can dedicate focused time to development.

6. Internships

Internships offer students the chance to gain hands-on, real-world experience while developing essential professional and life skills such as problem-solving abilities, critical thinking skills, and effective communication, qualities that translate directly to college success.

Internships also allow students to explore potential career paths before committing to a major or future profession. Early exposure can help students refine their interests and avoid investing time and resources in fields that may not be the right fit.

Students should seek internships aligned with their interests:

  • STEM-oriented students may find opportunities at research labs, engineering firms, tech startups, or healthcare organizations.
  • Arts-focused students might intern at museums, theaters, media companies, or graphic design studios.
  • Aspiring journalists can work with newspapers, digital media outlets, or broadcasting stations.
  • Business-minded students often pursue internships with marketing agencies, finance firms, nonprofits, or startups.

Even unpaid or part-time internships demonstrate initiative, responsibility, and maturity, especially when students can reflect on what they learned and how the experience shaped their goals.

Beyond skills and experience, internships help students build professional networks and mentorship connections, which can lead to future opportunities and strong letters of recommendation. On a college application, internships signal initiative, maturity, and a willingness to learn.

7. Work Experience

A summer job, whether at a retail store, restaurant, or local business, teaches valuable life skills. Students learn how to manage time, communicate with supervisors and customers, handle responsibility, and work as part of a team. Colleges respect work experience, especially when students balance employment with other commitments or advance to positions of trust, such as shift leader or trainer.

Many employers are also willing to provide letters of recommendation, offering colleges a valuable external perspective on a student’s work ethic and character.

How International College Counselors Can Help with Summer Activities for High school Students

At International College Counselors, we know how strategic summer planning fits into a student’s broader college journey. Choosing the “right” summer activity isn’t about doing the most. It’s about doing what fits. We work with families to:

  • Identify summer programs, opportunities, and activities for high school students that match your student’s interests and goals using ICC’s proprietary database.
  • Track deadlines so nothing gets missed
  • Strengthen applications, essays, and preparation for competitive programs
  • Ensure summer choices contribute to a cohesive admissions story

Whether your student is just beginning to explore interests or is ready to build on existing passions, ICC can help plan a summer experience that is intentional, impactful, and personally meaningful. With expert guidance and personalized planning, students can turn their summer into a meaningful extension of who they are—and who they hope to become.

Aimee Heller serves as the Director of Communications for International College Counselors and the Chief Operating Officer of Edit the Work. She is an award-winning advertising copywriter who knows how to best showcase a student’s unique achievements, personality and passion in 650 words or less (or more if the essay requirements specify). For 25 years, she worked in New York on a number of accounts including Coca-Cola, IKEA, The History Channel and Moët & Chandon. She also wrote for major news outlets including CBS and The Miami Herald. Aimee graduated cum laude from Boston University with a Bachelors of Arts degree in communications and has a Master’s degree in education from City College of New York. She has worked with students in high schools and boarding schools throughout the United States, helping them attain stellar results with colleges, graduate schools, summer programs and scholarships.