You’re a high school senior, and you haven’t done an internship yet. Yikes! Now, if you are reading this, we really hope that it is early fall on senior year, or even the summer before, or possibly you’re a junior trying to play for next year. If it is already past the college application deadlines, it is certainly still worth getting an internship to deepen into your interests before college — it just won’t help you get into college. The guidance we give in this post can still help you, though, so don’t stop reading.
If you are in advance of submitting your college applications, though, time is of the essence. Having an internship on your college application can be a game changer when you submit, but only if you play it right by getting a strong internship for you.
What makes a strong internship?
Well, a strong internship is connected to the other interests that you’ll be emphasizing. Or, in other words, it is relevant. It’s also extended. We aren’t fans of calling a two-day shadowing opportunity where you follow an employee or entrepreneur around an internship, because it isn’t. Strong internships should be at least a few weeks long. Strong internships won’t necessarily pay you — in fact, it will probably be unpaid — but you shouldn’t be paying for an internship.
Again, you should not pay to do an internship. Companies selling internship-style opportunities to teenagers is more of a trend outside of the United States than it is within the US, but we don’t like these programs regardless of your location if you want to emphasize an internship on your application. Programs you pay for can certainly be fun, but that doesn’t mean they’ll become a cornerstone of a supplemental essay.
Which brings us to why to do this for your college applications at all. Like, what’s the point?
Well, beyond the personal development opportunities they provide, internships can look really good to colleges. We say “can” because it’s all about how you frame it. An internship can be mentioned in your activities list and nowhere else, but that does very little for the strength of your application. We encourage students to make their internships truly useful on their applications by not just including them in their activities list, but also working them into supplements, including an internship on your resume for colleges that allow you to submit it, and incorporating it into conversations like an alumni interview.
All of this is well and good, of course, if you can get an internship. And that’s the point of this post. Read on to learn how to secure a productive and useful internship as a high school senior.
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If you want to secure an internship as a high school senior, especially if you’ve never had an internship before, there are four steps you need to take. Below, we break down each step so that you are empowered to make moves immediately. For even more impactful assistance, send us an email.
Step 1: Decide What You Like
The title of this step is a tad flippant, but it really is that simple. You need to determine where your interests and your talents intersect, and start there. Then, zoom in. This is a similar process to picking a college major, which makes sense given that any internship you pursue as a senior should be related to what you’ll be emphasizing in your college applications as a potential area of focus.
Decide on three interests, and then be happy down the line if you find something that addresses two of them. These need to be realistic, too. If you want to be a doctor, don’t expect to be assisting surgery or even getting within five yards of a patient. Instead, maybe your big long-term interest is medicine, but a focused interest is helping people, and another is dynamic work environments that require thinking on your toes, and a third could be technology that helps people. So, you could have an internship with a tech start-up related to medicine, a nonprofit that assists with access to medical services, or an organization that runs mobile clinics. In none of these would you be close to patients, but in all of them you’d develop your interests under the umbrella of the medical field.
This same logic can be applied to any passion, helping you focus in on a trio of specific interests that will guide your internship search.
Step 2: Brush Up Your Resume
Next, use your interests and the field you’re drawn most to when crafting a resume that is tuned towards your ideal path. Don’t try to put everything on your resume, either. This resume must be only one page, and so filtering previous experiences to focus in on what is most relevant is important.
What you should include is previous work experience, even if it’s not relevant if it reflects your skills, and long-term or on-going community engagement experiences. Don’t include that you know how to use Microsoft Word. Everyone does. It’s not impressive. However, you do need to prove that you know how to use Microsoft Word, or another word processor, by formatting your resume well. There are so many template options that are slick and clean, so pick one and keep it simple.
Once you have your resume, you need to write a cover letter. Each cover letter introduction should be customized to the company or nonprofit you are reaching out to, but the rest can be mostly copy-and-paste. What goes in it, though? Basically, the cover letter is one page or less introducing yourself, stating what you are seeking in an internship opportunity, and summarizing 2 or 3 top hits on your resume that are most relevant. Remember, also, to thank them for their time and consideration.
Step 3: Look Around You
Once you know what you want and have a resume that shows what you can offer, you need to figure out where to send it! You may already have some places in mind. If that’s the case, great! But you don’t want to put all your eggs in one internship basket.
So, look around you. What businesses or industries are in your area? Where do your family friends work or the parents of your friends, or even your teachers? The best way to get an in for an internship is having a personal connection, so mining your network isn’t cheating — it’s playing the game while also being completely ethical. We’re underlining this because we often hear from students that they don’t want to ask their parents or family for help finding an internship or summer job because it might be unfair. However, your network is also part of the hand of cards you have to work with. So, use it, respectfully and with an awareness that the most important cards you hold are your skills.
Step 4: Aim for a Recommendation
After you’ve secured an internship, you need to execute on the opportunity. If you’re a younger student, an internship is a building block. You want to do well so that it can build to something bigger. As a senior, the stakes are a bit different. It is unlikely that you will have time to do another internship before you have to submit your applications, so this opportunity isn’t a building block as much as it is the end goal. Accordingly, the goal is different: a recommendation.
Many colleges allow you to submit a supplemental recommendation from a supervisor, boss, or coach. An internship is a perfect route to a strong supplemental application if you do exceptional work. So, do exceptional work.
If you are a senior who hasn’t had an internship yet, you need to move quickly. The clock is ticking down, and in order for an internship to be impactful for your application you need to line one up as soon as possible. Of course, your applications aren’t the only reason to do an internship, but it should be a motivating factor!
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