Inquiring on behalf of two college freshmen. I know this question is kind of abstract but is there an ideal summer for a college freshman? How significant is the summer after freshman year at college as far as future opportunities? Do most children try to take classes toward their major, get what used to be traditional summer jobs like camp counseling etc or should they have tried to get substantive internships and the like (which I know is probably too late now to get one of those)? One student is in engineering one wants to be a clinical psychologist. Thanks.
My kids just get regular full time jobs. Summer classes can be expensive, many graduate in 4 years without having to take any.
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My son was a musician who played in summer music festivals every summer. But he also had a very understanding and accommodating employer at a local restaurant who always had some job waiting for DS when he was here.
DD worked. After freshman year, she worked full time as a lifeguard. After soph and junior years, she stayed at her college (they had a 12 month lease on a house anyway…starting July 1 after her sophomore year). She worked full time in the college undergrad admissions office, and one summer she did take a class (she advises NOT to do that because summer classes are crammed a year into 10 or so weeks…she did not like that truncated course one bit).
Getting a job is a great summer activity after freshman year of college. It gives your student some work experience to put on their resume.
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Yes, it’s probably too late to get internships. One opportunity depending on where they are in school, is to see if any faculty are staying on campus and if there’s an opportunity to do research with them. That could pay off ultimately, especially if they continue to work with that faculty member, as they pursue graduate school in clinical psychology. Grad school, back in the day when dinosaurs roamed the Earth and I applied, I was able to go directly from undergrad to grad school, but I had also done a senior research project and was TA in undergrad. These days, most schools, especially the APA approved programs, are likely wanting to see a few few years of experience before applying. However, multiple years of working in research and hopefully getting their name on a publication could help defray that.
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One of my kids worked a summer job at home. The other one stayed at school - she continued her research position from May through the end of July and took a class. She did come home for about a week in August and worked before/after care as well as a “sub” at camp.
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There is something to be said for just getting a regular job and working over that first summer. Socking away money makes the rest of the year less stressful. D22 is an education major who worked at the same job she’s had since she’s been 16. She made great money, lived at home and socked everything away.
S23 is a wildlife bio major and got a job in his major, but that is very unlikely and it only happened because he came in with lots of experience and knew the right people. That job ended up costing us a fortune in getting him out there and getting him equipped with a suitable vehicle. They provided the housing which was a tent with no electricity or hot water and he made $12/hr (which is actually above minimum wage in MT). While he walked away with something to put on his resume, it was a net loss financially.
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Yes, but it depends upon the individual. Internships, working, and attending classes are all great options for the right person as is testing one’s tolerance for UV rays and relaxation.
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Getting a job related to major or career goal is ideal from a career-preparation standpoint, but much less likely after frosh year than after later years of college.
Otherwise, getting any job is a common summer activity. If taking college courses, be aware that since a summer session is shorter than a regular semester, courses go much faster.
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I would say no, because what makes sense for a given kid depends on their personal educational and (possibly) career goals, personal circumstances, preferences, and so on. So there is no one-size-fits-all formula for this summer.
So as to be a little more helpful, by this point I would encourage college students to have started using both the academic and career advising services at their college. It can also be very useful to talk to older students (this is one of the reasons why student activities can be good, you can meet older students to chat with). All that can help you start to map out different multi-summer possibilities.
But I also agree in many cases, that first summer many kids won’t be doing anything particularly major- or career-related. Normal paying jobs, possibly adult club sports, travel with family, and so on, all that can be fine, and in fact part of a sustainable four-year plan.
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What does the student want to do?
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Mine went abroad for their “Maymester” and took two classes in Italy. She came back and worked on campus for the engineering department in what I call the summer of “soft skills”.
I don’t think there is a wrong answer here unless it’s doing nothing 
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Thank you for asking this question. This is my third student to be in this position and while the answers are coming as I expected it is important to acknowledge the current state of jobs, internships, the country etc. We are in unprecedented times and college kids are well aware of the noise of AI taking jobs etc. My advice is to encourage them to get jobs but don’t stress them out about a perfect internship/job. Internships are very clear they don’t want freshman. Yes you will have some saying mine got one, but generally they don’t. Any job will give them skills that will help them moving forward.
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My personal thought is that the first summer is for them to reflect and plan. If the kid is determined to go in a certain field, he can use this time to research the potential employers, their internship positions and requirements, make connections to current (or last year) interns (reddit has a lot of information but may or may not be trustworthy), ask about their application process, what they think helped them standing out, what’s their actual internship experiences like, plan what he needs to learn and/or polish, course sequence for the next two years, MOOC and online forums/groups that can be helpful, etc. If he still has time, maybe start some small scale projects and make a digital portfolio for himself. These add up to a lot of work for one summer break.
I would also encourage the college freshmen to visit their high school to talk to current students there - share experiences (good and bad). College summer break usually starts before high school ends, and ends after the high school year starts. I’m a high school teacher and I invite my former students to my classes. My own kids visit their high school too.
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My first sought an internship in the car industry and failed. So he got a job detailing cars. It was during Covid.
My second did her May free trip and then had a job. Additionally, in her first two summers (the 2nd one she also interned), she took a geology class - the first at a JC abd the second at UTK - both on line and approved by her school. That’s how she knocked out her science gen ed requirement.
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I note by my standards, the fact very careful use of the summer after sophomore year seems to have become so important in certain competitve employment tracks is dismaying enough. It would be even sadder to me if that moved forward to the summer after their first year, but so far I agree that does not really seem to have happened (certainly not in any broad sense).
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Mine had a normal summer job the semester after freshman year – she was a counselor at a nature camp (which was actually in the general area of her career goals – which pertain to conservation and wildlife – because it involved nature education). The next summer, she had an internship in wildlife and habitat management, and she’ll do something similar this year, the advantage being that she can continue a research project from last year’s internship that will be the foundation for her senior thesis.
I think that the internship market is so competitive that there really shouldn’t be much pressure to find something professionally relevant during that first summer. If they find something, great. If not, they’ll have sophomore year to figure out how to make the best of their campus career resources and use those resources to find something.
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My oldest (graduating college senior this year) stayed in her college town the summer after her freshman year and had a fairly normal summer job (tangentially related to her major, but not an internship) as well as participating in a summer program with her church. She was fortunate to have an opportunity to live with a family from her church over the summer so housing and food costs were very minimal. After her second year she did a temporary job at the beginning of the summer and then studied abroad for six weeks. She had an internship for her third summer.
My current college freshman will most likely be coming home for the summer and working a couple of part time jobs. He still has one more summer opportunity he applied for but hasn’t heard back on…my guess is that he has a very slim chance at hearing a positive response there if he hasn’t heard back already. He applied for quite a few summer research programs, but competition was intense and as a freshman I think he had very little chance of acceptance. He will also be an unpaid online “TA” or mentor for a research program he participated in as a high school student. I think that’s just a few hours per week but something for his resume, which is nice.
My older son was on his college rowing team and they had a national competition after the school year got out, then they had an invitational in London in June, so although he was done with school by May 7 or so, he had commitments until about June 30. Which meant he really only had six weeks at home before starting school again. He had a friend who was working on a research project that really intrigued him, so he got permission to help with research from afar - it was unpaid, but it was interesting and something he could put on his resume and talk about when he was applying for jobs the next year.
My second son has a job in his major. He’s a construction management major and they are eager for employees. He worked construction the summer between graduating and starting college (really, he was on an excavating team and he mostly was putting up soil barriers and fences around construction sites) so that experience may have helped get the more “management” and less labor focused job, but we’ll see what it turns out to be (he’s a freshman right now, so the job is lined up, but he hasn’t done it yet).
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Thank you so much for all of the feedback.
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Not helpful, but the Army told my kid what to do the summer after his freshman (Plebe) year and every summer thereafter. In fact, the Army is still telling my kid what to do. 
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