Computer Science Programs & Competitions for High School Students

Computer science extracurriculars run from USACO and hackathons to AI research programs and industry-backed summer academies like Google CSSI.

The strongest CS applicants pair a competition result or research project with a self-directed build — use these programs for the structured half of that story.

65 verified programs match this page; 19 of the featured listings are completely free; 12 can be done online.

Featured programs

Browse 30+ curated programs for high school students:

• Stanford AI4ALL — Stanford University: Discover a free summer program empowering high school juniors with hands-on AI experience, skill-building for college applications, and diversity-focu
• Women's Technology Program at MIT — MIT: Empower your STEM journey with a free four-week summer program for high school women at MIT. Gain hands-on engineering skills and boost your college a
• Microsoft Discovery Program (High School Internship) — Microsoft: Paid summer internship offering hands-on computer science experience for high school juniors and seniors. Boost college applications while developing
• Meta Hacker Cup — Meta: Global programming competition for high school students to master algorithms and coding. Build problem-solving skills and boost college applications.
• Summit STEM Fellowship (SSF) — Summit Education: The Summit STEM Fellowship (SSF) is a virtual summer program for top STEM students around the world. Students learn from mentors at Harvard, Stanford,
• American Computer Science League (ACSL) All-Star Contest — ACSL: Top scorers from ACSL compete at All-Stars. Programming and CS theory.
• Stanford Compression Forum Summer Internship — Stanford University: Data compression research internship at Stanford. Work with researchers on multimedia compression.
• Carnegie Mellon Informatics & Mathematics Competition (CMIMC) — Carnegie Mellon University: Challenging hybrid contest spanning math and computer science.
• Amazon Women in Innovation Scholarship — Amazon: $10,000 scholarship for women pursuing computer science.
• Georgia Educational Technology Fair — Georgia Educational Technology Fair, Inc.: Statewide technology competition where Georgia students showcase digital projects and skills across multiple tech categories.
• CodeCombat Championship — CodeCombat: Compete in a free online coding competition for grades 6-12. Build game AI, enhance programming skills, and boost your college applications with hands
• IEEE Presidents' Scholarship — Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers: Earn the IEEE Presidents' Scholarship for high school seniors excelling in STEM. Perfect for college applications and advancing skills in computer and
• MIT Battlecode — MIT: Develop coding, AI, and problem-solving skills in this free hybrid competition for high school students. Boost college applications with hands-on prog
• Congressional App Challenge — U.S. House of Representatives: Join a nationwide competition to design innovative apps, showcase your coding skills to Congress, and boost your college applications. Open to grades
• AEOP GEMS (Gains in the Education of Mathematics and Science) — U.S. Army Educational Outreach Program: Explore hands-on STEM modules at Army research labs nationwide in this free high school summer program. Gain real-world skills and boost your college
• Engineering Summer Academy at Penn (ESAP) — University of Pennsylvania School of Engineering and Applied Science: Explore cutting-edge STEM fields in this in-person summer program for high schoolers. Gain hands-on engineering experience, boost college applications
• Stanford SHTEM Internship — Stanford Compression Forum: Remote high school research internship blending STEM and humanities. Gain hands-on experience in NLP and computer science to enhance college applicati
• MITES Saturdays — MIT Office of Engineering Outreach Programs: Explore free in-person STEM courses for 9th-10th graders at MIT. Build advanced math, science, and engineering skills to strengthen college applicatio
• MIT Blueprint — HackMIT: Join a free high school hackathon at MIT to build apps, learn coding, and gain hands-on experience. Boost your college applications with mentorship an
• NYU Tandon CS4CS — NYU Tandon School of Engineering: Explore computer science and cybersecurity in this free, hands-on summer program for high school students. Build skills, boost college applications, a
• AIMI Summer Research Internship — Stanford Center for Artificial Intelligence in Medicine & Imaging: Two-week fully virtual Stanford AIMI internship where high schoolers do mentored, small-team AI-in-healthcare research with lectures from Stanford exp
• AIMI Summer Health AI Bootcamp — Stanford Center for Artificial Intelligence in Medicine and Imaging (AIMI): Two-week fully virtual bootcamp from Stanford's AIMI center introducing US high schoolers to machine learning in healthcare, with live lectures, codin
• WPI Summer Programs — Worcester Polytech Institute: STEM summer programs at Worcester Polytechnic Institute for rising 10th through 12th graders.
• USA Computing Olympiad (USACO) — USACO: Compete in free online programming contests for grades 7-12 to master coding, algorithms, and problem-solving. Build STEM skills and boost your colleg
• Wolfram Middle School Summer Camp — Wolfram Research: One-week, fully online summer camp from Wolfram Research that teaches girls ages 11-14 programming and computational thinking in Wolfram Language. Tui
• Changemakers in Computing — University of Washington Allen School: Free four-week summer program at UW Seattle's Allen School for rising juniors and seniors at Washington state high schools, exploring computing, socie
• UT Dallas Research Program for High School Students — University of Texas at Dallas CS K-12 Outreach: Eight-week summer research labs and CS/AI workshops run by UT Dallas computer science faculty (June 8-July 31, 2026) with a virtual attendance mode; v
• UT Computer Science Summer Academies — UT Austin Department of Computer Science: One-week residential summer academies at UT Austin for students entering grades 10-12, with tracks in game development, iOS apps, machine learning, ro
• Saturday Data Science Academy — UNC Charlotte Center for STEM Education: Semester-long academy at UNC Charlotte where 25 high school students spend six Saturdays (plus two virtual evenings) on data analysis, visualization,
• CompSciConnect — University of Maryland Computing Catalyst: Three-year summer academy at the University of Maryland where rising 6th-8th graders progress from Scratch to web development to 3D game design, with

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