Parents feel pressure to encourage their teens to pack their summers with impressive, resume-stacking activities, as if admissions officers at selective colleges are keeping a precise score on how each applicant spent their summer. In reality, colleges are more interested in authentic exploration than manufactured perfection.
Summer is one of the best times for students to give their budding interests a litmus test. Teens need time to discover what energizes them most, and just as importantly, what undercuts their focus. Summer provides a chance to do just this in a relatively low-stakes way.
Why “Cultivation” Matters More Than Busy Schedules
Selective colleges are looking for future students who show curiosity, follow-through, and a sense of direction instead of those who have simply collected a long list of activities. A thoughtful summer experience can demonstrate that a student knows how to commit, reflect, and grow.
Depth does not mean prestige or number of hours; it means:
- Staying with an activity long enough to learn something real about yourself.
- Taking initiative, even on a small scale.
- Being able to explain why you chose a particular experience.
- Considering what you took away from it.
Summer as a Low-Stakes “Test Drive”
Summer experiences are powerful, because they are flexible and low-risk. You can treat June, July, and August as a series of test drives. That is, they can be brief, intentional experiments in different directions. And good planning and flexibility can add to the value of these experiences.
For instance, your teen’s summer could include:
- A short job shadow.
- A two-week workshop in an academic subject of interest.
- Volunteering at a camp, museum, hospital, or animal shelter.
- Helping a local business.
None of these require 50-hour work weeks; none needs to feel like perfect fits right away. The goal is to step into real-world contexts and ask:
- Do I like how this feels?
- Do I want to do more of this at the end of the day?
- Do I like the kinds of problems and people here?
Then, as interests evolve, parents should help their teens pull on threads of interest and pivot away from what they dislike. Flexibility here is key.
Why Learning What You Don’t Like Is So Valuable
Parents often fixate on helping students “find their passion,” but in practice, narrowing the field by ruling things out is just as important. A student who discovers that they don’t enjoy lab research or can’t stand the pace or veneer of a sales environment, is not failing. Instead, they’re gaining crucial data.
(By the way, I’d say the same thing about visiting a college campus the student doesn’t like.)
Designing a Summer Around Authentic Exploration
You don’t need a huge budget or the world’s biggest Rolodex of connections to build a meaningful summer. Instead, your teen needs intentional planning and honest reflection.
Here’s a rough framework to help you envision that:
1. Brainstorm a Few Interest Areas
Have your teen list 3–5 things they’re curious about: subjects (e.g., biology, history, computer science), settings (hospitals, schools, startups), or roles (helping people, designing things, analyzing, building).
2. Find Small, Concrete Ways to “Try On” Interests
For each interest, brainstorm one or two realistic summer experiments:
- Job shadowing or informational interviews.
- Short online or local courses.
- Volunteering with a relevant organization.
- Part-time work in a related environment.
3. Build in Reflection
The value of a summer experience multiplies when students reflect on it. Help your teen regularly ask:
- What did I like and dislike about this experience?
- What kind of tasks made time go quickly? Which ones drained me?
- What surprised me about the work or environment?
- Can I imagine doing something like this more often? What about as an adult?
4. Adjust as You Learn
If your student quickly realizes they dislike something, it’s okay to pivot. The point is not to “stick it out” for the sake of a line on their resume, but to honor what they’re learning about themselves and redirect toward something they would like more. Be nimble.
Balancing Rest, Work, and Exploration
A healthy summer doesn’t need to be wall-to-wall programming. In fact, overscheduling can backfire, leaving students burned out and resentful as their junior or senior years get started. Admissions officers understand that teens are human. A summer that blends responsibility, curiosity, and some good R&R is more compelling than a joyless parade of resume padding.
How This Helps the College Search
By the end of a couple summers, a student ideally has:
- A better sense of the environments they enjoy (large vs. small, fast-paced vs. reflective, independent vs. collaborative).
- A clearer understanding of the kinds of problems and people that energize them.
- A short list of “no, thank you” fields or settings.
- A handful of experiences they can describe in applications with genuine insight.
When it’s time to build a college list and write essays, these experiences and self-awareness become rich material. Instead of vague statements like “I’ve always liked helping people,” a student can say, “After volunteering at X and shadowing Y, I learned that I’m most engaged when I’m doing Z.” That specificity is what makes an application feel authentic.
Fitz has dedicated the entirety of his 28 year career to encouraging higher education opportunities. He worked in the Vanderbilt, Duke Law and St. Lawrence admissions offices prior to serving as an enrollment management consultant for 200+ selective colleges around the country. He created Find The Right College to make trustworthy college counseling more accessible. Fitz is also the father of two teens so he also understands first-hand the challenges associated with a college search.
