You can get into college without an internship or a summer program. Summer jobs are just as good on your transcript, and often better than a program you need to pay for yourself.  That said, spending the summer simply playing computer games does not look good.  Consider some of these options.

Exchange Programs (most of these are limited to US citizens)

• AFS Intercultural Programs - Opportunities to spend a year of high school studying abroad or a shorter time period or even virtually in a variety of countries.  Some offer need-based scholarships, others do not.

  • Scholarship to study in Japan

• Benjamin Franklin Summer Institutes - in the US (North Carolina recently) with students from other countries, ages 16-18

• Bureau of Exchange Programs - master list from the State Department, not limited to high school students

• National Security Language Initiative for Youth (NSLI-Y) - programs to learn languages (e.g. Korean, Russian, Hindi, Bahasa, Arabic, Chinese, Persian/Tajiki, etc.) in a variety of countries around the world for ages 15-18 - deadline usually in November

• Congress-Bundestag Youth Institute for High School Students - Spend a year at a German school, living with a host family - ages 15-18 (no German proficiency required)

• Kennedy-Lugar Youth Exchange & Study (YES) Abroad - spend an academic year attending high school in a Muslim country (only Morocco and Senegal have a French language requirement) deadline in early December

• Youth Ambassadors - 3-4 week exchange programs to Latin American and Caribbean countries

Read this first:  Views on Summer Programs?

Place to look for government jobs (better than flipping burgers on your resume):

• USA Jobs - have to create an account

Virtual Volunteer Activities (if you can't read cursive, maybe it is time)

• Library by the People - Working with the Library of Congress - transcribing from cursive in English and Spanish

• Smithsonian Digital Volunteers Transcription Center - women's history, science, African American History

• Zooinverse - bunch of opportunities - observing science and transcribing including weather in Australia

• Letters of Encouragement Campaign (MCPS .net emails needed)

• Old Weather

• Nest Watch

• Western Monarch Count

• eBird - discover a world of birding

• Science Starter - including one to look at the shapes of cyclones!

• iNaturalist - A community for naturalists

• Cyanobacteria Monitoring Collaborative

• mPing

• The Pieris Project

• Globe Observer Home

• Community Collaborative Rain, Hail, & Snow Network

• Smartfin

• RinkWatch

• Nature's Notebook

• Streamselfie

Internships - Lists of possible programs (including free ones and ones with stipends):

• STEM SUMMER PROGRAMS

  • NASA

  • NIH - biomedical

  • NEI - Eye institute

  • NSA and even work study

  • Smithsonian - internships and programs

  • Los Alamos National Laboratory

  • All National Labs

  • Whole bunch of Summer programs from around the US

  • Internships and Research Opportunities

  • Science Programs

• Minority

• Undocumented STEM Internships

• Courses - no need to take for credit, but if you can why not?  Those in MC2 know of those options, those that don't there are plenty.

  • UMD

  • Telluride - normally very affordable

  • Berkeley - cheaper than most Ivy type places

  • Mathcamp

• Others

  • List of Summer Programs from Fastweb

  • College Greenlight's List of Summer Programs with Generous Financial Aid

  • College Transition's List of Summer Programs

  • 80 Free Summer Programs (some have state residency or other requirements)