14 Online Summer Courses for Middle School Students
- Stephen Turban
- Sep 17
- 8 min read
Updated: Oct 13
If you are a middle schooler, summer is the perfect time to go beyond classroom learning and dive into subjects that spark your curiosity. Enrolling in an online course is a great way to do just that! As a middle schooler, an online summer course can help you explore a field of interest, like science, coding, medicine, business, or the arts, from the comfort of home. These courses not only make advanced topics more accessible but also let you learn at your own pace while still engaging in interactive lessons, projects, and discussions.
What makes these programs valuable is the mix of hands-on activities, exposure to real-world applications, and opportunities to network they offer. You can build new skills, discover academic interests, and prepare for the challenges of high school, all without having to travel anywhere.
In this blog, we have highlighted 14 online summer courses for middle school students.
Location: Online
Cost: Free
Application deadline: March 20
Dates: Summer: July 7 – 25 + weekly sessions during the fall
Eligibility: Students in grades 6 and 7 attending school in the U.S.
The Stanford Middle School Scholars Program (SMSSP) is a no-cost academic initiative created for low-income middle schoolers. The program begins with a three-week virtual summer course and continues into the fall with weekly online sessions. Here, you will strengthen skills in writing, mathematics, and critical thinking, while also preparing for future academics. Classes are led by Stanford instructors—many of whom hold doctoral degrees—and focus on interactive learning and active engagement. Alongside structured coursework, you will connect with a motivated peer community and receive individualized guidance from experienced educators, gaining both academic knowledge and confidence to navigate the transition toward high school.
Location: Online via edX
Cost: Free
Application deadline: Open enrollment
Program dates: Eight weeks; self-paced
Eligibility: Open to all
This course introduces you to the principles and practice of rhetoric as well as persuasive writing and speaking. You will examine speeches delivered by influential figures like Martin Luther King Jr., John F. Kennedy, and Ronald Reagan to understand different rhetorical techniques and structures. The course, based on Harvard Professor James Engell’s “Elements of Rhetoric,” covers the ways to create clear arguments, the identification of persuasive strategies, and how to use them in your own writing and speech. The experience can help you engage in civil discourse and communicate clear ideas.
Location: Online
Cost: Varies by year; financial aid available
Application deadline: Varies
Program dates: Various sessions throughout the year, including summer; commitment of 2.5–3.5 hours/week for six weeks
Eligibility: Students in grades 7–11
This live online course focuses on the impact of major economic events on businesses and individuals. You will explore issues like increasing the minimum wage and monetary supply, and learn about investment strategies used to minimize tax liability. You will also gain insights into the savings and investment mechanisms that can help you diversify your finances and minimize personal risk. The course is led by Johns Hopkins instructors who provide structured lessons, interactive discussions, and feedback to help you refine your work. You will gain hands-on experience through projects and investigations, collaborate with instructors and peers on complex ideas, and have opportunities to present your findings.
Location: Virtual via Coursera
Cost: $49/month
Application deadline: No deadline
Dates: Self-paced program
Eligibility: Open to all
The Machine Learning Specialization is a combination of three online, self-paced courses designed for learners who want to explore artificial intelligence and machine learning. You will engage in coding exercises and explore foundational topics like supervised and unsupervised learning, neural networks, and decision trees during the course. You will gain practical experience building models using Python and tools like TensorFlow and scikit-learn. In the process, you will develop skills to build AI applications. A computer with a basic setup is all that you need to get started!
Location: Virtual via edX
Cost: Free with an optional upgrade available
Application deadline: Rolling applications
Dates: Self-paced with varying start dates
Eligibility: Anyone with some experience in Python
This online course offers middle school students an introduction to the principles and algorithms used to work with modern artificial intelligence. The course covers the technologies powering innovations like game-playing engines, handwriting recognition, and machine translation. Through projects, you will explore AI topics like graph search algorithms, adversarial search, machine learning, reinforcement learning, neural networks, and natural language processing. You will also gain experience in Python programming and popular AI libraries to design your own intelligent systems. Taught by Harvard University experts David J. Malan and Brian Yu, the course is an opportunity to learn from leading educators in the field.
Location: Virtual
Cost: Free
Application deadline: Open enrollment
Program dates: Self-paced; typical commitment of 15 weeks
Eligibility: Open to all
Offered by MIT’s Comparative Media Studies/Writing department, the Writing and Rhetoric course can help you explore how rhetoric shapes meaning and influences understanding, motivation, and change. During the course, you will learn to analyze how rhetorical strategies affect readers. Throughout the course, you will evaluate public arguments and come up with persuasive claims. Although self-paced, the course comes with assignments and oral presentation exercises to help you gain experience in writing and analysis.
Location: Virtual via Coursera
Cost: Free to audit; $79 for a certificate
Application deadline: Open enrollment
Program dates: Rolling
Eligibility: Open to all
Stanford Online’s Writing in the Sciences is an eight-week online course designed to help you build scientific and technical writing skills. During the first four weeks, you will focus on general writing skills. You will learn how to write with clarity, structure your ideas, and improve sentence and paragraph structure. The second half of the course focuses on scientific writing, covering topics like peer review, manuscript formatting, and research communication. The course offers video lectures, short writing assignments, quizzes, and peer editing exercises.
Location: Virtual
Cost: None
Application deadline: April 9
Program dates: April 21 – early June (about six weeks)
Eligibility: Open to all
Stanford University offers free virtual access to content from its flagship CS106A course, which introduces students to programming using Python. In the online course, you will explore concepts like control flow, loops, and conditionals as well as console programs with variables, graphics, lists, and dictionaries through sessions led by programmers, teachers, university students, or other instructors. Additionally, you will work on projects, building games by utilizing concepts you learn during the course. Once a week, you will attend a session with 10 other students to get a more personalized learning experience.
Location: Online via Coursera
Cost: No cost
Application deadline: Open enrollment
Program dates: Self-paced; about two months with a 10-hour/week commitment
Eligibility: Open to all
The Academic Writing Specialization from UC Irvine is a five-course series designed to help learners develop skills in academic writing and research. The program begins by covering the fundamentals of grammar and punctuation and moves on to essay writing and advanced writing techniques. You will learn how to find and assess sources as well as draft a research-based essay. Each course focuses on an aspect of academic writing, like punctuation and grammar, essay writing, advanced writing, and research. The specialization ends with a project, for which you will write a research paper on a topic of your choice, using what you have learned throughout the series.
Location: Virtual
Cost: Free to enroll; $249 to earn a certificate
Application deadline: Rolling
Program dates: Self-paced; about four to six hours/week for six weeks
Eligibility: Open to all
Stanford’s Computer Science 101 is an online self-paced introductory course that covers topics like digital images, coding, loops and logic, computer security, and computer hardware. Here, you will explore computer jargon, the basics of the internet, and parts of a computer while gaining basic coding exposure. By the end of the online course, you will have a clearer understanding of the patterns through which a computer operates.
Location: Virtual
Cost: $175
Application deadline: Not specified
Dates: July 14 – 18
Eligibility: Middle school students
This online summer course introduces middle school learners to the principles of urban planning and sustainability. Here, you will explore why some cities thrive while others decline by analyzing ancient and modern examples through virtual tools like Google Earth and digital maps. The course also offers opportunities to build skills in research, critical thinking, and spatial analysis while you study urban design, population dynamics, transportation systems, and resource management. Hands-on experiences include sketching and designing your own city while applying concepts of architecture, healthy neighborhoods, energy, water, and waste systems, and using free software. Collaboration with instructors and exposure to real-world case studies will allow you to critique existing city models and present your own ideas for sustainable futures.
Location: Online
Cost: $1,795 for enrichment course | $3,995 for college credit course; need-based scholarships available
Application deadline: Typically one week before the session start date
Program dates: Courses of varying lengths throughout the year, including summer
Eligibility: Students 13 or older
Georgetown University’s Cybersecurity course explores cyberthreats and the impact of tech, economics, and society on cyberspace. You can choose from two formats—the Enrichment Course, which involves 20 to 30 hours of instruction, and the College Credit Course, which offers 128 hours of instruction. Through a combination of practical exercises and lecture-based sessions, you will learn about cyberattack tactics, the impact of artificial intelligence on cybersecurity, and the ethics of AI-enhanced cybersecurity. You will work on a final capstone project, in which you will investigate a mock school ransomware attack and deliver a video presentation to discuss the right response.
Location: Virtual
Cost: $1,895
Application deadline: Varies by cohort
Program dates: Courses of varying lengths throughout the year, including summer
Eligibility: Students ages 13 and up
This online summer program offered by Georgetown University provides an introduction to how medical discoveries move from research to treatments. Throughout the course, you will study the structure and purpose of clinical trials, explore online research databases, and frame research questions using the PICO method. You will examine ethical and unethical practices through case studies, build foundational skills in biostatistics and epidemiology, and analyze how evidence-based medicine informs diagnoses and patient care. Hands-on work includes engaging with medical journal articles and developing your own research question. The program culminates in a capstone project where you will create and present a video on clinical trial design, supported by feedback from mentors.
Location: Online
Cost: $3,080 plus other course-specific costs; financial aid available
Program dates: June 16 – 27 (Session I) | July 7 – 18 (Session II)
Application deadline: March 20
Eligibility: Students in grades 8–11 who have completed an algebra course
Stanford University offers various summer courses for middle and high schoolers. Its introductory course on C++ covers concepts like data types, basic syntax, control statements, recursion, functions, and the interaction between hardware and compiler. Here, you will learn how to construct an algorithm and compute the solutions to real programming challenges. During the two-week course, you will engage in live video tutorials from Monday to Friday and spend three hours after class on homework, assignments, and projects.
One more option—The Lumiere Junior Explorer Program
The Lumiere Junior Explorer Program is a program for middle school students to work one-on-one with a mentor to explore their academic interests and build a project they are passionate about. Our mentors are scholars from top research universities such as Harvard, MIT, Stanford, Yale, Duke, and LSE.
The program was founded by a Harvard & Oxford PhD who met as undergraduates at Harvard. The program is rigorous and fully virtual. We offer need-based financial aid for students who qualify. You can find the application in the brochure! To learn more, you can reach out to our Director, Dhruva, at dhruva.bhat@lumiere.education, or go to our website.
Multiple rolling deadlines for JEP cohorts across the year, you can apply using this application link! If you'd like to take a look at the upcoming cohorts + deadlines, you can refer to this page!
Stephen is one of the founders of Lumiere and a Harvard College graduate. He founded Lumiere as a Ph.D. student at Harvard Business School. Lumiere is a selective research program in which students work one-on-one with a mentor to develop an independent research paper.
Image Source - Stanford University logo