My son is in high school and is looking for a job/internship this summer - something he can put on his College resume to display real-world experience and wow the Ivies. He's extremely fluent in Unity/C# (published several games on the iOS App Store), and is just starting to mess around with Machine Learning. Any recommendations on some companies/startups in the Bay Area (Palo Alto area) that would take in an intern, given the skills above? (If needed he could spend all his summer, "24/7" on the internship)
Step 1. Stop doing the work for him. He should be writing these posts.
You can reach out to startup recruiters on LinkedIn. They are always looking for interns.
Reach out to Coursera. They might have something for him. If he is willing to work pro bono, that might be best.
How about some research work, possibly on ML? Sometimes university faculties will accept promising high schoolers for summer research. Are you based in Bay Area ?
Do this!
You should ask ur friends at different companies if they are willing to hire your kid. i am guessing you live in palo alto so you are rich. Nepotism always works
Current Ivy brat here. "He's extremely fluent in Unity/C# (published several games on the iOS App Store), and is just starting to mess around with Machine Learning." And you think he needs more real-world experience? If your son can't get into ivies with that resume *as it is*, a summer internship isn't going to help. That's plenty of real world experience in his chosen field - he needs the extracurriculars, leadership experience, grades, and charisma to round out his application. My advice is to let him enjoy one of his few remaining summers without work. He'll probably have three summers in a row of internships during college - let him enjoy this one. Feel free to PM with questions
According to his councilors, job experience/internships bring a kid up to the next level - yes, apps on the App Store are real world, but a kid building interactions and proving his ability to work with a team in the Professional World. This also shows leadership (and grades shouldn't be a problem)
I promise I understand - I understand *exactly* what he is attempting to do, I did it. And his counselors (and you, it seems) are optimizing for maximum college admissions likelihood. But here's my case: does going from 99.9% to 99.99% merit a summer spent working a tech internship, as opposed to *anything he wants to do more*? Because there are tradeoffs here that merit consideration. Your kid is probably under 18yo - that's early to spend all your time working. And it sounds like he's already spent a ton of time on professional development. Is getting more when it's not necessary (and I'm certain it's not necessary) worth throwing away one of his last summers off?