12 STEM Internships for High School Students in Canada

Participating in STEM internships for high school students can give you practical skills in experimental design, computational modeling, and technical protocols, preparing you for undergraduate academics. These programs expose you to STEM applications in fields like engineering, biology, and computer science while helping you network with researchers and industry experts. 

Top organizations across Canada, including universities and research institutes, offer such opportunities for high schoolers. For students interested in science, technology, engineering, and math, such experiences can clarify career paths and strengthen applications to competitive STEM undergraduate programs. We've selected 12 STEM internships for high school students in Canada, emphasizing summer programs and a mix of in-person and virtual options.

12 STEM Internships for High School Students in Canada

1. Alberta Innovates High School Youth Researcher Summer (HYRS) Program

Location: Various Alberta universities (e.g., University of Alberta, University of Calgary)
Cost & Stipend: Paid; Stipend provided (no less than minimum wage)
Acceptance Rate/Cohort Size: Competitive (~100 students province-wide)
Program Dates: 6 weeks between May 1 – August 31

Deadlines: Varies by institution (typically February)
Eligibility: Grade 11 high school students residing in Alberta; minimum of 85 per cent standing in each of Math 20-1 or 20-2, Biology 20, and one other Grade 11 science

This program allows you to engage in mentored laboratory investigations, applying techniques such as PCR amplification and gel electrophoresis to explore biomedical questions. Under faculty supervision, you design experiments to test hypotheses on topics like genetic mechanisms or cellular responses. Weekly seminars cover data visualization tools like R or Python, building your analytical proficiency. Collaboration occurs in multidisciplinary teams, where you contribute to ongoing projects involving model organisms or clinical datasets. Unique to this STEM internship for high school students in Canada is its integration with provincial research networks, offering insights into translational science applications. Mentorship from PhD-level researchers ensures rigorous feedback on your methodological approaches.

2. Ladder Internships

Location: Virtual
Cost & Stipend: Varies depending on program type; financial aid available
Acceptance Rate/Cohort Size: Selective
Program Dates: Multiple cohorts: Spring, Summer, Fall (starts September 15), and Winter
Deadlines: Vary by cohort: Spring (January), Summer (May), Fall (August 24), Winter (November)
Eligibility: High school students, undergraduates, and gap year students able to work 10-20 hours/week for 8-15 weeks 

Ladder Internships is a selective start-up internship program for ambitious high school students! In the program, you work with a high-growth start-up on an internship. Start-ups that offer internships range across a variety of industries, from tech/deep tech and AI/ML to health tech, marketing, journalism, consulting, and more. You can explore all the options here on their application form. Ladder’s start-ups are high-growth companies on average raising over a million dollars. In the program, interns work closely with their managers and a Ladder Coach on real-world projects and present their work to the company. Here is the application form. 

3. Shad Canada

Location: Various host universities across Canada (e.g., University of Toronto, UBC)
Cost & Stipend: $6,335 (Virtual); $8,900 (Live-in / A-Plus / Unplugged); full financial aid available
Acceptance Rate/Cohort Size: Highly competitive
Program Dates: June 29 – July 25 (Live-in / A-Plus / Unplugged); June 30 – July 25 (Virtual)
Deadlines: December 1
Eligibility: High School students completing Grade 10-11 (Secondaire IV-V in Quebec)

Shad Canada is an intensive, month-long program that brings together high school students from across the country at various university campuses. You will work in teams to tackle complex, interdisciplinary challenges, such as prototyping sustainable energy systems using CAD software or simulating quantum circuits with Qiskit. The program involves workshops, lectures, and hands-on projects that combine subjects like engineering, entrepreneurship, and computer science, and it culminates in a final showcase where you present your team's solution to a panel of experts. Distinctive in STEM internships for high school students in Canada, it blends theoretical physics lectures with practical robotics assembly. Mentorship from industry affiliates guides ethical innovation discussions.

4. WISEST Summer Research Program

Location: University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB
Cost & Stipend: Free; Paid (hourly wage)
Acceptance Rate/Cohort Size: Highly selective (~50 students)
Program Dates: July 3 – August 14
Deadlines: April 2
Eligibility: Grade 11 high school students identifying as women or gender-diverse; Indigenous and racialized students encouraged

The WISEST Summer Research Program at the University of Alberta offers a paid research opportunity for Grade 11 students who identify as women or gender-diverse. You conduct experiments in labs focusing on materials science, employing spectroscopy to characterize nanomaterials or finite element analysis for structural simulations. With a principal investigator, you formulate research questions on engineering applications, such as fluid dynamics in biomedical devices. Skills development includes MATLAB scripting for data processing and statistical validation of results. Team interactions feature journal clubs analyzing peer-reviewed papers on thermodynamics. Final outputs involve poster sessions detailing your contributions to hypothesis testing.

5. Student Advancement Research (StAR) Program at SickKids

Location: The Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, ON
Cost & Stipend: Free; Paid
Acceptance Rate/Cohort Size: Competitive (limited spots)
Program Dates: 6 weeks in summer (exact dates vary by lab)
Deadlines: Typically in March
Eligibility: Grade 11-12 students, aged 16+, identifying as Indigenous, Black, or Filipino; must have previously taken Grade 10 Science; must be Canadian citizens or permanent residents

This six-week summer program at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto provides an opportunity for high school students aged 16 and up to assist with pediatric research. You will be matched with a research lab where you might utilize flow cytometry to quantify immune cell populations or CRISPR for gene editing validations. The program specifically targets students who identify as Indigenous, Black, or Filipino, and it gives them practical experience in a clinical research setting, where they learn to use bioinformatics tools like BLAST and summarize their findings for a symposium.

6. Blueprint Engineering Outreach Program

Location: University of Toronto, Toronto, ON
Cost & Stipend: Free
Acceptance Rate/Cohort Size: Highly selective
Program Dates: July 7 – August 1
Deadlines: March 28
Eligibility: High school students in Grades 10-11 who self-identify as Black and are Canadian citizens or permanent residents

The Blueprint Engineering Outreach Program is a free, selective program for Black high school students in Grades 10 and 11 who are interested in engineering. You will work with mentors to construct prototypes with Arduino for sensor integration or simulate circuits in LTSpice, iterating on feedback from engineering faculty. Sessions build proficiency in 3D printing workflows and finite state machine programming. Collaborative labs involve dissecting control theory in robotics assemblies. This free STEM internship for high school students in Canada features site visits to industry partners for context on scalable engineering.

7. seed2STEM Program

Location: Various BC research institutes (e.g., UBC, BC Children's Hospital)
Cost & Stipend: Paid (minimum wage)
Acceptance Rate/Cohort Size: Competitive (~100 students)
Program Dates: July 7 – August 15
Deadlines: Typically in March

Eligibility: Grades 9-12 Indigenous high school students in British Columbia

The seed2STEM Program is a paid summer research opportunity for Indigenous high school students in British Columbia. Over six weeks, you will be paired with a supervisor at a research institute or university to work on a STEM project, such as performing histological staining on tissue samples or modeling ecological dynamics with differential equations. The program is committed to connecting Western science with Indigenous knowledge systems, with a curriculum that includes both land-based learning and lab-based research. End-of-program posters highlight your role in data interpretation phases.

8. Xavier Pelletier High School Internship Program

Location: BC Cancer Research Centre, Victoria, BC
Cost & Stipend: Free; $3,000 bursary
Acceptance Rate/Cohort Size: Highly selective
Program Dates: July 2 – August 26
Deadlines: March 3
Eligibility: Grade 11 high school students from Vancouver Island secondary schools, aged 16+

This highly selective program offers an opportunity for Grade 11 students from Vancouver Island to intern at the BC Cancer Research Centre in Victoria. Over two months in the summer, you will work alongside researchers on an oncology project, conducting Western blots to assess protein expression or qPCR for gene quantification in tumor models. In a lab setting, you troubleshoot assays with guidance, documenting variability in replicates. Seminars address immunotherapy mechanisms, including T-cell receptor sequencing. This specialized STEM internship for high school students in Canada provides access to advanced imaging facilities like confocal microscopy

9. ELITE Program for Black Youth

Location: Various sites across Canada (universities, labs, industry)
Cost & Stipend: Paid minimum wage (full-time or part-time)
Acceptance Rate/Cohort Size: Selective
Program Dates: 8 weeks (typically July – August)
Deadlines: Rolling
Eligibility: Black youth aged 15–22, high school or postsecondary students

The ELITE Program for Black Youth is an eight-week paid internship that provides Black high school and postsecondary students with hands-on experience in innovation and technology. Participants are paired with a host organization (university, lab, or industry partner) and a mentor to work on a project. Projects may involve tasks like developing automation scripts in ROS for robotics or analyzing sensor data using Kalman filters. The program emphasizes technical skill development, complemented by professional workshops on leadership and entrepreneurship.

10. RBC Summer Tech Labs

Location: Toronto, ON (hybrid options)
Cost & Stipend: Paid
Acceptance Rate/Cohort Size: Competitive
Program Dates: July 2 – August 20
Deadlines: Applications open in Spring
Eligibility: Grades 11-12 students in Ontario high schools, with working knowledge of one or more programming languages and applied experience with technology concepts or coding

Hosted by RBC in Toronto, the RBC Summer Tech Labs program is for high school students in Ontario with an interest in technology and coding. You build prototypes as innovation developers, coding front-ends in React or backend APIs with Node.js for fintech simulations. You'll work in "squads" to deploy models using Docker, receiving mentorship from RBC tech professionals, and you will present your final project to executives. Mentorship sessions dissect DevOps pipelines and cybersecurity protocols.

11. Nokia Future Tech Summer Internship

Location: Ottawa, ON
Cost & Stipend: Paid ($17/hr)
Acceptance Rate/Cohort Size: Highly selective
Program Dates: July 7 – August 22
Deadlines: February 18
Eligibility: Rising grade 12 high school students; minimum expected average of 75% (grade 11); must be registered in two grade 12 science courses; must be legally authorized to work in Canada

In this program, you will be placed on a team with professional engineers to contribute to telecom projects, such as configuring network simulators in NS-3 or optimizing signal processing with FFT algorithms. Teamed with engineers, you debug firmware for 5G prototypes, logging performance metrics. Training encompasses MATLAB for waveform analysis and agile tools such as Jira. You will acquire practical experience with industry-standard software and hardware, troubleshoot technical issues, and comprehend the real-world application of your STEM studies.

12. Saskatchewan Youth Apprenticeship (SYA) Program

Location: Participating high schools and worksites across Saskatchewan
Cost & Stipend: Free; trade credits upon completion
Acceptance Rate/Cohort Size: Open (school-dependent)
Program Dates: School-year based; summer extensions available
Deadlines: Rolling
Eligibility: High school students in Saskatchewan who are enrolled in participating schools

The Saskatchewan Youth Apprenticeship Program is a school-year-based program that provides high school students with an introduction to skilled trades. You will tackle challenges in trades such as welding automation or electrical circuit design, utilizing CAD for blueprint drafting. Under the guidance of a journeyperson mentor, you'll learn safety protocols and use professional tools. The program's unique feature is that the hours you spend in the program count towards an official apprenticeship, giving you a head start on a trades career.

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