Internship is a word that buzzes on all college campuses. That buzz, however, may be trickling down to a high school near you.

The “High School Careers," study, a recent survey of 4,769 students (172 high school students and 4,597 college students) and 326 employers from across the country by Internships.com and Millennial Branding, showed that high school internships give students an advantage in the college application process, and eventually in the increasingly competitive job market.

The Edge They Give When Applying for College

90 percent of companies surveyed in the study agreed that high school internship programs can help students get into more selective colleges.

The internship your child gets under her belt in high school can make her case as a strong applicant for college admissions committees by helping your teen stand out from the mass of other applicants. According to Robin Richards, CEO of Internships.com, admissions committees will be able to see that your child is motivated, inquisitive, and serious about success because she used her time in high school to gain professional experience.

The Advantage They Confer Choosing a Path

A high school internship could give your child the career direction she’s been searching for. It could help her validate or eliminate certain fields and majors. Currently, 50 to 70 percent of students change their majors at least once. Most students change their major at least three times before they graduate. An internship in high school can help save a lot of wasted time and effort because if students understand what they want and don’t want to do earlier, they will make the right career decision sooner.

The Continuing Return of Internships

The word on college internships is out. With more employers looking to offer internships, and also hire interns for full-time jobs, it’s only logical that more students will be looking to complete one.

Of the companies surveyed in the “High School Careers" study, 89 percent said that students who complete high school internships will have a competitive advantage when looking for a college internship, and 83 percent said that those internships will yield better paying jobs.

The Benefits of Overall Experience

Forget about the resume boost that a high school internship can offer your child. Think instead about how high school internship experience can help your teen define herself.

High school students who complete internships begin to know who they are, what their abilities are and, as a result, begin to believe in those abilities, said Developmental Psychologist Marilyn Price-Mitchell.

An early internship can help give your teen confidence and a better understanding of the professional world that she can then apply to both her academic and personal life.

“Students come back to school and they’re more focused, they’re more excited about what they're learning — suddenly the real world is real to them," said an internship coordinator at a high school in the Jacksonville area.

The Way Big Employers Are Catching On

Half of the employers who participated in the “High School Careers" study are currently accepting high school interns or planning on doing so next year.

Media giant Facebook, multinational corporation Microsoft, and organizations like the United Nations, the Museum of Modern Art, and the Smithsonian Museum are already offering high schoolers prestigious internships to give them a leg up on their peers. And as the “High School Careers" study suggests, it’s only a matter of time until this buzz catches and more and more employers begin to open their doors to high school students.

Sources:

Internships.com and Millennial Branding (2014). High School Careers. Retrieved from Millennial Branding. Retrieved from Millennial Branding

Salpeter, Miriam (2014). Why It's Important to Think About Your Career in High School. U.S. News. Retrieved from U.S. News

Smith-Barrow, Delece (2014). Land a Summer Internship as a High School Student. U.S. News. Retrieved from U.S. News

Spanos, Staci. High School Internships. News 4 Jax. Retrieved from News 4 Jax