15 Free Online AI Summer Programs for High School Students

Artificial intelligence is one of the fastest-moving fields today, and high school students no longer have to wait until college to explore it. A growing number of universities and nonprofits now run AI programs that introduce you to machine learning, data science, and AI ethics through hands-on projects, mentorship, and university-level coursework. These experiences range from free, self-paced online courses to selective, fully funded residential programs, so there is an entry point no matter your background.

Why should you attend an AI program?

AI programs give you structured exposure to a field that is reshaping medicine, finance, engineering, and the arts. Depending on the program, you might build machine learning models in Python, study neural networks and computer vision, or examine the ethics and social impact of AI, often while working alongside faculty, researchers, and peers who share your interests. Beyond the technical skills, these programs can help you decide whether AI is a field you want to pursue and give you concrete projects to reference in college applications and interviews.

Key Takeaways

• Several programs are completely free, including Carnegie Mellon AI Scholars (fully funded), Columbia AI4ALL, RAISE at MIT, Girls Who Code, Kode With Klossy, Technovation Girls, AI4ALL Open Learning, and Elements of AI, while the Stanford Pre-College Institutes, Stanford AI4ALL, and the AIMI programs charge tuition with need-based financial aid available.

• Most programs are fully online like Veritas AI. Still, formats vary: Carnegie Mellon AI Scholars is a residential program on campus, Stanford AI4ALL offers both online and residential options, and Kode With Klossy runs virtually as well as in person in select U.S. cities.

• Selectivity ranges widely. Carnegie Mellon AI Scholars and the Stanford AIMI Summer Research Internship are highly competitive, while open-enrollment options like Elements of AI, AI4ALL Open Learning, and RAISE at MIT require no application at all.

• Eligibility is not one-size-fits-all: Stanford AI4ALL targets current 9th graders, Carnegie Mellon AI Scholars is for rising seniors, Girls Who Code, Kode With Klossy, and Technovation Girls focus on girls and gender-expansive students, and Veritas AI is open to everyone.

• Deadlines cluster in winter and early spring, with Carnegie Mellon and the AIMI programs closing in February, MIT Beaver Works on March 30, and Kode With Klossy around the end of March, so plan to research programs in the fall and apply to February-deadline programs first. For flexible deadlines do check out Veritas AI.

To help you get started, we've compiled a list of 15 free AI summer programs for high school students below, spanning free and paid options, virtual and residential formats, and beginner through advanced levels. If you're looking for more selective, application-based AI research opportunities, check out our blog here.

1. Stanford AI4ALL

Location: Online, or residential on the Stanford University campus (Stanford, CA).

Fee: Need-based financial aid is available to both domestic and international participants.

Application Deadline: Early February. You can check for updates here.

Program Dates: Online: June 15 – June 26 | Residential: July 19 – July 31.
Eligibility: Students in grade 9 at the time of application, aged over 14 and under 16 during the program; open to international students.

Hosted by the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI and Stanford Pre-Collegiate Studies, Stanford AI4ALL immerses ninth-grade students in artificial intelligence through lectures, live demos with AI companies, small-group research projects, and mentoring. Guided by Stanford AI Lab researchers, graduate students, and postdocs, you explore areas such as computer vision, medical AI, natural language processing, and robotics while working through the full lifecycle of an AI project. What sets AI4ALL apart is its accessibility, it welcomes ninth graders from around the world regardless of prior experience, keeping the focus on how AI can address real social challenges.

2. Veritas AI

Location: Virtual.
Fee: Varies by program. Need-based financial aid is available.
Application Deadline: Rolling. Applications for the summer close in June. You can apply here.
Program Dates: Multiple weekday and weekend cohorts throughout the year.
Eligibility: High school students (grades 8–12). For the AI Scholars program, no prior experience is required. For the AI Fellowship, applicants should have prior Python experience or complete AI Scholars first.

Veritas AI, founded and run by Harvard graduate students, offers programs for high school students who are passionate about artificial intelligence. Students looking to get started with AI, ML, and data science would benefit from the AI Scholars program, a 10-session boot camp built around the fundamentals of AI and data science and real-world projects. More advanced students can take the AI Fellowship with Publication & Showcase, working 1:1 with a mentor from a top university on an individual project, with support from an in-house publication team to help secure a spot in a high school research journal. You can also explore some examples of past projects on the Veritas AI site.

3. Carnegie Mellon AI Scholars

Location: Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA (residential).
Fee: None, fully funded, covering tuition, housing, meals, and select program-related field trips.
Application Deadline: Early February.
Program Dates: Late June – mid-July (a four-week program).
Eligibility: Students in 11th grade at the time of application (rising seniors), at least 16 by the start date; U.S. citizens or permanent residents. No prior coding experience required.

AI Scholars at Carnegie Mellon University, one of the world's top universities for computer science and AI, is a four-week residential program that gives rising seniors a college-level introduction to artificial intelligence, taught by CMU faculty, staff, and researchers. Before arriving on campus you complete a virtual pre-program Python course, then move into coursework, faculty lectures, group research projects, and industry field trips, presenting your work at a closing symposium. This fully funded, merit-based program covers tuition, housing, and meals, and is designed to expand access to AI for students who face financial or other barriers to opportunity. Admission is highly competitive, making it one of the most selective options on this list.

4. MIT Beaver Works Summer Institute – Serious Games with Artificial Intelligence

Location: Virtual (online course).

Fee: Free for families with a household income under $200,000; $2,400 for families above that threshold. The online prerequisite course is free and open to all.

Application Deadline: March 30, after completing the required online prerequisite course.

Program Dates: July 6 – August 2.

Eligibility: U.S.-based high school students (typically rising juniors and seniors) who complete the required online prerequisite course; prior Python experience recommended.

Serious Games with Artificial Intelligence, part of the MIT Beaver Works Summer Institute (BWSI), is an online course in which you learn applied AI by building a simulation-based "serious game" in Python. You model real-world scenarios such as disease spread and public-health decision-making, coding intelligent agents and analyzing how AI-driven choices compare with human ones, all while following basic Agile software-development practices. The program begins with a free online prerequisite course open to all interested students, and a selected group continues into the intensive four-week summer program.

5. Stanford AIMI Summer Research Internship

Location: Virtual.

Fee: A program fee is due upon acceptance; need-based financial aid, including full aid, is available.

Application Deadline: February 20 (financial aid deadline: February 13).

Program Dates: Session A: June 15 – June 26 | Session B: July 6 – July 17.

Eligibility: U.S. high school students entering grades 9–12 in the fall, at least 14 by the start and based in the U.S. Best suited to students with some background in statistics, math, or programming.

The Stanford AIMI Summer Research Internship is a two-week virtual program for students interested in the intersection of AI and medicine. Through technical lectures, hands-on projects, and mentorship from Stanford students and researchers, you explore how AI is developed, evaluated, and applied to healthcare problems such as medical imaging and diagnosis. Because it is project-based and research-focused, the internship is best suited to students who already have some background in statistics, math, or programming, and participants who complete it earn a Certificate of Completion from Stanford AIMI.

6. Stanford Pre-College Summer Institute – Artificial Intelligence

Location: Virtual.

Fee: $3,050 tuition. Need-based financial aid and fee waivers are available.
Application Deadline: March 13.

Program Dates: Session 1: June 15 – June 26 | Session 2: July 6 – July 17.

Eligibility: Students in grades 10–11 with beginning proficiency in Python.

The Stanford Pre-College online AI course introduces you to the foundations of artificial intelligence and machine learning over an intensive summer session. You study supervised, unsupervised, and reinforcement learning, analyze the strengths and weaknesses of algorithms, and examine how bias can enter data and AI systems. Live online sessions run Monday through Friday, and you should expect to put in time outside class on readings, group work, and pre-recorded lectures.

7. Stanford Pre-College Summer Institute – Introduction to Machine Learning

Location: Virtual.

Fee: $3,050 tuition. Need-based financial aid and fee waivers are available.

Application Deadline: March 13.

Program Dates: Session 1: June 15 – June 26 | Session 2: July 6 – July 17.

Eligibility: Students in grades 10–11 with exposure to a programming language and working knowledge of statistics.

In Stanford's Introduction to Machine Learning online course, you explore how real-world AI models are built, trained, and optimized. Using Python, you preprocess and visualize structured data, train and test machine learning models, and fine-tune algorithms to improve performance on real datasets. By the end of the course you will have a solid foundation in machine learning principles and AI-driven decision-making, making it a natural companion to Stanford's introductory AI course.

8. AIMI Summer Health AI Bootcamp

Location: Virtual.

Fee: A program fee is due upon acceptance; need-based financial aid is available.

Application Deadline: February 20 (financial aid deadline: February 13).

Program Dates: Two two-week virtual sessions in June and July.

Eligibility: Students entering grades 9–12 at a U.S. high school in the fall, at least 14 by the start and based in the U.S. No coding experience required.

The AIMI Summer Health AI Bootcamp is a two-week virtual program that introduces you to how machine learning is applied in healthcare. Through online modules, group discussions, and guided activities, you explore AI's role in diagnosing disease, evaluating treatments, and improving patient care, alongside the ethical challenges these applications raise. Unlike the research internship, the bootcamp is designed for learners of all technical levels, so no coding experience is required — just an interest in AI, math, computing, or healthcare.

9.  Columbia AI4ALL

Location: Virtual (New York-based program).

Fee: Free (need-based; AI4ALL summer programs are free or offer extensive tuition assistance).

Application Deadline: Typically early spring — confirm this year's cycle on the official site.

Program Dates: Three weeks in the summer (a recent cycle ran late June to mid-July).

Eligibility: Rising 10th–12th graders from backgrounds underrepresented in AI; preference for New York metropolitan-area students.

Columbia AI4ALL is a three-week virtual summer program that introduces you to artificial intelligence through both technical instruction and social context. You study core ideas such as classification, clustering, data bias, and model evaluation in faculty-led sessions and guided group projects, then bring them together in a final project. As part of the national AI4ALL network, the program keeps a consistent focus on how AI systems affect people and works to open access to AI for students from communities historically underrepresented in the field.

10. RAISE at MIT

Location: Virtual.

Fee: None.

Application Deadline: No application required — the tutorials and tools are open-access.

Program Dates: Self-paced and available year-round.

Eligibility: Open to high school students; several resources also suit middle school students.

MIT RAISE (Responsible AI for Social Empowerment and Education) offers free, self-paced AI tutorials and tools you can work through from anywhere. Featured resources include DoodleBot, which introduces robotics and machine learning through a creative AI platform, and the Personal Image Classifier (PICaboo), which walks you through building your own AI image-classification model. Because the materials are open-access and self-paced, RAISE is a low-pressure way to build AI literacy and hands-on skills during the school year rather than only over the summer.

11. Girls Who Code Summer Programs

Location: Virtual.

Fee: Free.

Application Deadline: Rolling deadlines.

Program Dates: Self-paced Pathways Program (about six weeks) and two-week Summer Immersion Program sessions across the summer.

Eligibility: High school girls and/or non-binary students.

Girls Who Code offers free, online summer programs for high school students interested in AI and computer science. The two-week Summer Immersion Program covers game design, UX, and core coding concepts with live instruction, while the self-paced, six-week Pathways Program explores topics like AI and cybersecurity alongside Python, HTML, and JavaScript. Both include hands-on projects, mentorship from tech professionals, and access to an alumni network that supports your growth in the field.

12. Kode With Klossy Summer Camps

Location: Virtual.

Fee: Free.

Application Deadline: March 31.

Program Dates: Two-week sessions across June, July, and August.

Eligibility: High school girls and gender-expansive students aged 13–18.

Kode With Klossy runs free, online two-week summer camps for high school students from underrepresented genders in STEM. You choose a track — including AI, machine learning, web development, mobile app development, or data science — and gain hands-on experience with languages such as Python, JavaScript, and Swift. The program emphasizes project-based learning, so you finish with a portfolio and practical experience building real applications and data-driven solutions.

13. Technovation Girls

Location: Virtual (global program; participate online individually or through a local Chapter or Club).

Fee: Free.

Application Deadline: No application — register and submit your project by the season deadline (submissions are due around April 20).

Program Dates: The season runs roughly August through May; teams spend about 12 weeks building their project.

Eligibility: Girls, as well as nonbinary, gender-fluid, and transgender students who want a female-identified environment, ages 8–18.

Technovation Girls is a free, global program in which you team up (1–5 students) to identify a problem in your community and build a mobile app or AI-powered tool to solve it. Guided by a free online curriculum and volunteer mentors, you learn coding, artificial intelligence, and entrepreneurship, with recent curriculum updates placing more emphasis on training and integrating AI. At the end of the season you submit a pitch video, a demo, and a business plan to a global competition, with finalists invited to pitch at the Technovation World Summit for educational scholarships.

14. AI4ALL Open Learning

Location: Virtual.

Fee: Free.

Application Deadline: No deadline.

Program Dates: Self-paced; each course runs about one to four hours.

Eligibility: High school students; designed with underrepresented communities in mind.

AI4ALL Open Learning is a free, online curriculum from the nonprofit AI4ALL that introduces high school students to artificial intelligence through short, approachable courses. You explore AI's impact across fields — from art and facial recognition to deep fakes — while building critical-thinking skills and considering the ethical implications of the technology. Designed with students from underrepresented communities in mind, the self-paced courses run about one to four hours each, so you can build AI literacy on your own schedule.

15. Elements of AI

Location: Virtual (self-paced).

Fee: Free.

Application Deadline: None — open enrollment, start anytime.

Program Dates: Self-paced; about 30 hours of work total.

Eligibility: Open to anyone, including high school students; no programming or advanced math required.

Elements of AI is a free, self-paced online course created by the University of Helsinki and MinnaLearn that has introduced more than a million learners across 170+ countries to the basics of artificial intelligence. Across six interactive modules you explore what AI is, how machine learning and neural networks work, and the real-world and ethical implications of AI — with no coding or advanced math required. Because it is entirely open-access and self-paced, it is an easy, zero-cost way to build a solid AI foundation before tackling more technical programs.

Frequently Asked Questions

What are the best free AI programs for high school students?

Several strong options cost nothing. Carnegie Mellon AI Scholars is fully funded, covering tuition, housing, and meals for rising seniors, while Columbia AI4ALL, RAISE at MIT, Girls Who Code, Kode With Klossy, Technovation Girls, AI4ALL Open Learning, and Elements of AI are all free as well. The best fit depends on whether you want a structured cohort program, a research experience, or a self-paced course. If you are new to AI, you can explore the AI Scholars program by Veritas AI.

Do I need coding experience to join an AI program?

Not always. Carnegie Mellon AI Scholars includes a pre-program Python course and requires no prior coding, and Elements of AI, AI4ALL Open Learning, and the AIMI Health AI Bootcamp are all built for beginners. More technical programs like the MIT Beaver Works Serious Games course and the Stanford AIMI Summer Research Internship recommend or expect some Python or statistics background.

Which AI programs are fully online?

Most on this list are virtual, including Veritas AI, the Stanford Pre-College courses, both AIMI programs, the MIT Beaver Works online course, Columbia AI4ALL, RAISE at MIT, Technovation Girls, AI4ALL Open Learning, and Elements of AI. Carnegie Mellon AI Scholars is residential, and Stanford AI4ALL offers both online and residential options.

Which AI programs are best for students interested in AI and medicine?

The Stanford AIMI Summer Research Internship and the AIMI Summer Health AI Bootcamp both focus on artificial intelligence in healthcare, from medical imaging and diagnosis to the ethics of health AI. The internship is more research-intensive and suits students with a technical background, while the bootcamp is designed for learners of all levels.

Are there AI programs open to international students?

Yes. Stanford AI4ALL, Technovation Girls, Elements of AI, and AI4ALL Open Learning are all open to students outside the U.S. Some funded programs are restricted to U.S. citizens or residents, including Carnegie Mellon AI Scholars, the AIMI programs, and the MIT Beaver Works summer course, so check each program's eligibility before applying.

When should I apply to AI programs for high school students?

Deadlines cluster in winter and early spring. Carnegie Mellon AI Scholars and the AIMI programs close in early-to-mid February, MIT Beaver Works closes March 30, Stanford Pre-College closes in mid-March, and Kode With Klossy closes around the end of March. Open-enrollment options such as Veritas AI, RAISE at MIT, AI4ALL Open Learning, and Elements of AI have no deadline, so you can start them anytime.