What are kids doing post-HS graduation and prior to college orientation?
Jobs?
Summer programs?
Internships?
Travel?
I would love to hear any ideas to help keep this summer productive.
My kids…
Kid one worked most of the summer but did attend a four week summer music festival as a player.
Kid two worked full time.
They both works so that the would have discretionary spending money…and for books. Since we were paying for the rest, we didn’t think that was too much to ask.
Plus…having some job experience was a good resume start.
Internships.
Between Freshman and Sophomore years of college they both did summer programs abroad because they were partially or fully funded by college.
Mine is getting his EMT certification. He did the first step - EMR - last summer.
I think that the summer between high school and university can be depressing. What the student has been doing for most of their life had ended. What they are about to be doing hasn’t started, and may be a bit far away and scary.
My youngest is at a university which had an orientation for next year’s incoming students scheduled right around the time that the students were graduating high school. I thought that this was a very good idea. The orientation was very welcoming and encouraging, and allowed students to enter the summer having a better idea and an encouraging idea of where they would be four months later. At one point in the orientation the students broke into groups, and each group got to see the actual dorm where they would be living next year (and as such also meet other students who were going to be in the same dorm).
In between, summer jobs was what my kids mostly did. I was surprised how easily my kids found summer jobs for the time between high school and university.
One parent who I barely know had their daughter take a 6 week intensive language program (a French immersion program in Canada). They liked it a lot. We have priced it out and it is quite reasonable. Of course this only filled 6 weeks and they still had to figure out what to do for the rest of the summer.
I worked as a soccer referee, relaxed, did yardwork for my family, and went on a two week backpacking trip that I got a scholarship for! I was the first of my family to go away for college and live on campus, so I did a lot of research on what i would need to pack.
I worked part-time and packed for college. I also spent a lot of time with high school friends and went camping. It was a nice break from the stress of senior year.
And as a suggestion…for both of our kids…we actually had graduation picnic celebrations the first week of August. It was sort of a last get together before everyone started leaving for college. And it also didn’t conflict with all of the celebrations that were happening right around graduation day.
Mine is hopefully going to travel with us and the relax the way he sees fit. I don’t care if he spends the whole summer playing computer games. He’s earned this already several times over.
It can be difficult to find jobs for that particular summer, especially for students whose colleges start their academic year in August. This may be the shortest summer the kids ever have, which makes them undesirable to employers. Some kids may also have to take time off in the middle of the summer for college orientation, which doesn’t make them popular with employers.
One of my kids continued to work at a part-time job he had held for more than a year but was unable to get the increased hours he would have preferred. The other found a job in a store that was desperate for help and didn’t care that she would vanish in 10 weeks, but it was only part-time. Under the circumstances, I think they were lucky to find jobs at all.
Kid 1, audited a class at the university where my spouse teaches, and otherwise relaxed and hung out with friends.
Kid 2 worked day camps, same as he had other summers, and trained for his pre-season and hung out with friends.
Summer after first year, kid 1 worked and took a class to knock off a gen ed. Kid 2 worked more camps and trained for preseason.
Mine will be working full time for the company I work for. I showed him the “Books & Supplies, Transportation, Personal” portion of the COA and explained that those were his costs. He should take home more than enough this summer.
My dd didn’t graduate until the third week in June and was moved in to school the first week of August. After graduation she spent a week with her HS friends at the shore for senior week, then it was July. At that point she had 4 1/2 weeks. She volunteered with her favorite local charity, worked/volunteered as a counselor for a summer program that she had attended in years past, did some travel visiting elderly relatives - spent a week with her grandparents then on to visit a great aunt and some other older relatives who she doesn’t see much. We spent time together on a mini vacation as a family, and she spent time with her HS friends. In the middle we traveled to her school for an orientation.
It went very very fast and I am thankful for the time we had.
Mine worked at their regular HS jobs that summer, restaurant work mainly.
Internships have been a college summers thing, and summer programs were a HS summers thing.
But that one summer between the two was kind of nice…no pressure to get into college or to get an internship, just make money for fall and enjoy being a kid one last time 
They have their lives ahead of them to be “productive”. If it’s not a financial burden, perhaps this would be a good time to pull back from scheduling their summers and see what happens when you just let them be. Leave it up to them to figure it out.
S travelled for a few weeks after high school graduation. Once he got home he spent his time hanging out with friends, getting ready for college, and doing some plain old vegging. He has been working steadily since his first year of college. I’m glad I was able to give him a final summer of summer.
My D worked part time and traveled with her aunt and visited relatives for two weeks. She enjoyed spending time with her high school friends and boyfriend.
My S will probably participate in the community theater musical, work part time and spend time with his buddies and girlfriend.
Beach week, hopefully a job, maybe a family vacation and then off to school…
My D was awarded an internship with a local non-profit working to reduce the incidence of HIV/AIDS and implementing a children’s safe water initiative in rural Kenya. She’ll remain stateside working with the other interns who are college seniors or grad students. She is interviewing next month for a internship with one of our Senators at his local office. Most of the interviewees want to work in his DC office rather than here at the home office, so I’m hoping she’ll get accepted. Otherwise she’ll work part-time and possibly take an summer class online to get a jump-start on her pre-reqs.
My kid went on vacation for a couple weeks and had a short internship at Google in Seattle which she enjoyed
We traveled with our son a fair bit. Last chance really, since he plans to do research or internships every summer of college.
We also scheduled various doctor, dentist, eye appointments. Getting wisdom teeth out the summer before college is pretty common.