Summer Residential Governor’s Schools provide gifted high school juniors and seniors with intensive educational experiences in visual and performing arts; humanities; mathematics, science, and technology; or through mentorships in marine science, medicine and health sciences, or engineering.

Each Summer Residential Governor’s School focuses on one special area of interest. Students live on a college or university campus for up to four weeks each summer. During this time, students are involved in classroom and laboratory work, field studies, research, individual and group projects and performances, and seminars with noted scholars, visiting artists, and other professionals. In the three mentorships, students are selected to work side-by-side with research scientists, physicians, and a variety of other professionals. A director and a student-life staff provide supervision of students 24 hours a day, throughout the program.

A school or division selection committee chooses the nominees from each school or division and forwards the nominees to a state committee. Consideration is given to students’ academic records, test scores, extra-curricular activities, honors, and awards, creativity, original essays, and teacher recommendations. Students applying for the Visual and Performing Arts Summer Residential Governor’s School participate in a statewide adjudication where they audition or present portfolios for review before a pair of professionals in the specific arts field. Because of the limited number of residential placements available, not all students who are nominated by their schools can be accepted for participation.

Since 1987, VDOE has sponsored Governor's World Language Academies, summer residential programs for Virginia's most motivated and talented world language students. As of 2020, more than 9,600 students have completed one of the programs. The 2022 Governor's Summer Residential World Language Academies will include full-immersion academies in French, German and Spanish; a partial-immersion Japanese Academy; and a Latin Academy.