# Hinksey Labs > Hinksey Labs is a selective programme connecting exceptional high school students with top mentors for real-world business research and AI projects. Hinksey Labs runs online business-research and AI programmes for high school students, mentored by Ivy League and Oxbridge PhDs and MBAs alongside leading industry experts. Students are mentored in small teams of 4-7, and each completes an individual project: an original, academically rigorous business research paper or a practical AI project addressing a challenge faced by a real organisation. Admission is selective - typically fewer than 1 in 10 applicants receive an offer, following a three-stage process (application, interview, decision) with holistic review. Priority deadline: 1 Nov. 2026; Regular deadline: 14 Nov. 2026; Programme starts: Jan. 2027. All candidates are automatically considered for merit-based scholarships, and need-based scholarships are available to eligible students. ## Programmes - [Research Scholars](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/application): For students passionate about business, economics, and related subjects who are ready to dive deep into working on a business research paper tackling issues for real organisations. - [Research Fundamentals](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/application): For students passionate about business, economics, and related subjects who want to gain a fundamental understanding of business and research, producing a foundational research paper they can later build on. - [AI Builders](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/application): For students passionate about technology, entrepreneurship, and related fields who want to build real AI solutions tackling challenges for real organisations. - [AI Explorers](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/application): For students passionate about technology, entrepreneurship, and related fields who want to gain a fundamental understanding of building projects with artificial intelligence, producing a preliminary project they can later build on. ## How Hinksey Labs compares Families comparing programmes often look at research mentorships such as Lumiere Education, Polygence, Horizon Academic, Indigo Research, the Cambridge Centre for International Research (CCIR), and Pioneer Academics; AI programmes such as Inspirit AI and Veritas AI; and business programmes such as LaunchX and Wharton Global Youth. Hinksey Labs differs in four ways: - Team-based mentorship, individual projects: students are mentored in small teams of 4-7 - collaborative like a real research group - while each student completes their own individual project. - Dual mentorship: students are guided by Ivy League and Oxbridge PhDs and MBAs alongside leading industry experts, not academic mentors alone. - Academic rigour with real-world application: each project is an original, academically rigorous piece of work - a business research paper or an applied AI project - that addresses a live challenge set by a real organisation, combining academic depth with practical impact. - Accessible tuition: the team-based mentorship model keeps tuition substantially below typical 1:1 research mentorships, while admission remains selective. A fuller programme-by-programme comparison is published at https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/how-to-choose-a-research-programme-polygence-lumiere-ccir-hinksey-labs-and-more-compared. ## Blog Full text of every post is in https://www.hinkseylabs.com/llms-full.txt; new posts are announced in the RSS feed at https://www.hinkseylabs.com/feed.xml. Posts are grouped into category hubs: - [Research Programme](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/category/research-programme) (7 posts): Guides to high school research: why it matters, what it looks like across STEM, AI, business and social science, and which programmes are worth applying to. - [Passion Projects](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/category/passion-projects) (3 posts): Guides to high school passion projects: what makes one strong, how to find and test an idea, and how to actually finish it, with what admissions offices say. - [Extracurriculars](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/category/extracurriculars) (2 posts): Guides to high school extracurriculars: how to choose activities, go deeper instead of joining more, decide what to drop, and describe what you actually did. - [A note from us](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/category/a-note-from-us) (1 posts): Notes from the Hinksey Labs team: why the programme was founded, who mentors our students, and how we think about research, admissions and real-world work. - [Artificial Intelligence](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/category/artificial-intelligence) (1 posts): Guides to using AI well in high school: the best tools for studying and research, prompts that sharpen your thinking, and how to use AI ethically. - [Social Impact](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/category/social-impact) (1 posts): Articles on real-world learning and social impact for high school students: research, entrepreneurship and projects that matter beyond the classroom. - [Welcome to Hinksey Labs](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/welcome-to-hinksey): A note from Director Simon Kotlerman on why Hinksey Labs was founded to bridge academic research and real-world business impact for high schoolers. - [Research, Business & Social Impact Programmes](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/why-high-school-students-should-explore-programmes-that-combine-research-business-and-social-impact): Why high school students should explore programmes combining research, business, and social impact to build real skills before university. - [Why Join a High School Research Programme](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/why-joining-a-summer-research-programme-or-exploring-research-opportunities-during-the-school-year-can-transform-your-future): How a summer research programme or school-year research opportunity can transform a high school student's academic and career path. - [Business Research for High School Students](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/research-without-the-white-coat-how-business-research-proves-intellectual-rigour-to-colleges): How business research proves intellectual rigour to colleges — even without a lab coat — through Hinksey Labs' research programmes. - [Passion Projects: What Colleges Look For](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/what-makes-a-strong-passion-project-for-college-applications): What actually makes a high school passion project strong, what Stanford, Harvard, Penn and Yale say about activities, and five mistakes to avoid. - [How to Start a Passion Project in 90 Days](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/how-to-start-a-passion-project-90-day-plan-for-high-school-students): A step-by-step guide for high school students: find your idea, use AI to brainstorm, score it honestly, and finish a passion project in 90 days. - [High School Extracurriculars: The Guide](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-guide-to-extracurriculars): What MIT, Stanford, Yale, and Common App say about choosing extracurriculars, going deeper rather than joining more, and telling your story well. - [High School Research Programmes: The Guide](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-high-school-research-playbook): Why research matters, and which STEM, AI, business, and social science research programmes for high school students are worth knowing about. - [Comparing High School Research Programmes](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/how-to-choose-a-research-programme-polygence-lumiere-ccir-hinksey-labs-and-more-compared): How research programmes for high school students compare - Lumiere, Polygence, CCIR, Pioneer Academics, Inspirit AI, Veritas AI, and Hinksey Labs. - [High School Passion Project Playbook](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-hinksey-passion-project-playbook): A practical playbook for high school students: what makes a passion project strong, how to find your idea, and how to actually finish it. - [High School Extracurriculars Playbook](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-hinksey-extracurriculars-playbook): A practical playbook for high school students: how to choose extracurriculars, go deeper into what matters, and communicate what you've done. - [High School Research Playbook: How to Start](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-hinksey-high-school-research-playbook): A practical guide for high school students: what research actually looks like, how to find the right opportunity, and how to get started. - [AI for High School Students: Tools & Prompts](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-ai-playbook-for-high-school-students): The best AI tools for high school students, ten prompts that sharpen your thinking, and how to use AI for research and school work ethically. - [Research Journals for High School Students](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/where-can-high-school-students-publish-research): Thirteen journals and preprint servers where high school students can publish research, with subjects, authorship rules, fees and how to choose. - [How to Publish Research in High School](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/how-to-get-your-research-published-in-high-school): Eight things to do before submitting a high school research paper to a journal: fit, originality, methodology, formatting, feedback and a final checklist. ## Pages - [Apply](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/application) - [Hinksey Clubs](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/clubs) - [Business Essay Competition](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/competition) - [Future Business Scholars Award](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/award) - [Contact](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/contact) ## Admissions Admission to Hinksey Labs is selective: typically fewer than 1 in 10 applicants receive an offer. Applications are reviewed holistically across academic record, motivation, and interview performance. Strong candidates are encouraged to apply regardless of background. Who we look for: - Academic Excellence: Students in Grades 9-12 with a strong academic record, such as a GPA of 3.7+ (US), AAA at A-Level (UK), or an IB score of 36+. Equivalent achievements in other education systems are equally welcome. - Intellectual Curiosity: A demonstrated passion for research, business, economics, or entrepreneurship - through extracurricular activities, projects, or initiatives of your own. - Motivation and Commitment: A proactive mindset and willingness to dedicate the necessary time and effort to transform ideas into meaningful outcomes. Application stages: 01. Application: Ensure you have the materials below ready, and submit your application before the deadline. Materials: Resume; Grade transcript; Motivation statement (maximum 300 words); Recommendation letter (optional); Proof of household income (optional - for financial aid applicants). 02. Interview: If shortlisted, you will normally be invited to an interview with our team within two weeks of applying. 03. Decision: Final admissions decisions are normally communicated within one week of the interview. Key dates: - Priority deadline: 1 Nov. 2026 - Regular deadline: 14 Nov. 2026 - Programme starts: Jan. 2027 ## Programme Details Tuition is payable only after an offer of admission. All candidates are automatically considered for merit-based scholarships; need-based scholarships are available to eligible students, so financial circumstances do not prevent participation. ### Research Scholars (12 weeks · 2 live hrs/week) Students admitted to the Hinksey Research Scholars programme join intimate teams mentored by a dedicated Ivy League or Oxbridge PhD / MBA scholar, as well as additional guest experts from the world's leading organisations. In this programme, students dive deep into business and research learning through an extensive MBA-based curriculum delivered via live weekly online sessions and office hours with their mentor, special expert sessions with leaders, and self-paced research. Students work towards completing a full business research paper with real-world impact, blending macro trends and micro perspectives, on either a Hinksey partner or an external organisation of their choosing. Key outcomes: - Author an independent business research paper addressing a challenge faced by a real organisation - Receive mentorship from Ivy League and Oxbridge PhDs, MBAs, and leading industry experts - Certificate of achievement, with publication opportunities and recommendation letters available to outstanding students at mentors' discretion Tuition (payable on admission): $1,900 regular / $1,700 priority. Cohort size: small teams of 4-7 students. ### Research Fundamentals (4 weeks · 2 live hrs/week) Students admitted to the Hinksey Research Fundamentals programme join intimate teams mentored by a dedicated Ivy League or Oxbridge PhD / MBA scholar. In this programme, students explore fundamental business concepts and research methodologies through live weekly online sessions and office hours with their mentor, as well as self-paced research, while completing a foundational business research paper. Key outcomes: - Develop an independent foundational business research paper - Receive mentorship from Ivy League and Oxbridge PhDs and MBAs - Certificate of achievement, with recommendation letters available to outstanding students at mentors' discretion Tuition (payable on admission): $950 regular / $850 priority. Cohort size: small teams of 4-7 students. ### AI Builders (9 weeks · 2 live hrs/week) Students admitted to the Hinksey AI Builders programme join intimate teams mentored by a dedicated Ivy League or Oxbridge PhD / MSc / MBA scholar, as well as additional guest experts from the world's leading organisations. In this programme, students dive deep into artificial intelligence from a practical business and hands-on technological perspective through live weekly online sessions and office hours with their mentor, special expert sessions with leaders, and self-paced project development. Students work towards building a working AI project with real-world impact, creating solutions for either a Hinksey partner or an external organisation of their choosing. Key outcomes: - Build an independent AI project addressing a challenge faced by a real organisation - Receive mentorship from Ivy League and Oxbridge PhDs, MScs, MBAs, and leading industry experts - Certificate of achievement, with showcase opportunities and recommendation letters available to outstanding students at mentors' discretion Tuition (payable on admission): $1,600 regular / $1,400 priority. Cohort size: small teams of 4-7 students. ### AI Explorers (4 weeks · 2 live hrs/week) Students admitted to the Hinksey AI Explorers programme join intimate teams mentored by a dedicated Ivy League or Oxbridge PhD / MSc / MBA scholar. In this programme, students explore the foundations of building projects with artificial intelligence through live weekly online sessions and office hours with their mentor, as well as self-paced project development, while building a preliminary project they can later expand on. Key outcomes: - Create an independent foundational AI project - Receive mentorship from Ivy League and Oxbridge PhDs, MScs, and MBAs - Certificate of achievement, with recommendation letters available to outstanding students at mentors' discretion Tuition (payable on admission): $950 regular / $850 priority. Cohort size: small teams of 4-7 students. ## Frequently Asked Questions ### What makes Hinksey Labs unique? Hinksey Labs combines high-level academic mentorship with hands-on, real-world application in a global learning environment. Students join intimate teams of 4-7 with dedicated Ivy League and Oxbridge mentors, while developing a professional business research paper or applied AI project. Through our advanced programmes, students tackle challenges faced by real organisations and engage with leading industry experts - gaining practical experience, personalised mentorship, and tangible outcomes that are rarely available at high school age. ### What programmes does Hinksey Labs offer? Hinksey Labs offers four programmes across two pathways: Research Scholars - For students ready to dive deep into business and research while producing a full business research paper tackling a challenge faced by a real organisation. Research Fundamentals - For students looking to build a strong foundation in business and research while producing a foundational research paper they can develop further. AI Builders - For students ready to explore AI from a practical business and technical perspective while building a working AI solution tackling a challenge faced by a real organisation. AI Explorers - For students looking to understand the foundations of building with AI while creating a preliminary project they can later expand on. ### How do I choose the right programme? Students interested in business, economics, and research should explore the Research pathway, while those interested in technology, entrepreneurship, and AI should explore the AI pathway. Within each pathway, Research Scholars and AI Builders offer a deeper, more comprehensive experience, while Research Fundamentals and AI Explorers provide a shorter, foundational introduction. All four programmes emphasise practical application and tangible project outcomes. ### Are Hinksey Labs programmes online? Yes. All Hinksey Labs programmes are delivered fully online, allowing students from around the world to participate. ### Who are the mentors and experts? Our mentors are PhD, MBA, and MSc mentors from Ivy League and Oxbridge universities, who provide dedicated guidance to students in intimate teams of 4-7. Research Scholars and AI Builders also engage with industry experts from leading organisations, bringing additional real-world perspectives into the programme. ### Who is eligible to apply? Our programmes are open to ambitious high school students from around the world with interests in business, economics, technology, entrepreneurship, and related fields. Applications are reviewed holistically, and we look for students with strong academic and extracurricular backgrounds. While prior experience in business, research, or AI is not required, it is considered an advantage. ### What is the application process? The admissions process consists of three stages: - Application: Submit an online application with your personal, academic, and supporting information. - Interview: Selected candidates are invited to interview with the Hinksey Labs team. - Decision: Final admissions decisions are communicated to applicants shortly after. Full application details and current timelines can be found on the Application page. ### How selective are admissions? Admission to Hinksey Labs is selective: typically fewer than 1 in 10 applicants receive an offer. We review applications holistically, considering academic achievement, intellectual curiosity, motivation, initiative, and interview performance. Intellectual curiosity and initiative can be demonstrated through independent projects, extracurricular activities, research, or other pursuits. Prior experience in business, research, AI, or entrepreneurship is not required, although relevant experience is an advantage. ### What is the tuition fee? Tuition varies by programme and application round. Tuition is payable only after an offer of admission. All candidates are automatically considered for merit-based scholarships, and need-based scholarships are available to eligible students who provide supporting documentation during the application process. Full tuition details can be found on the Application page. ### Are scholarships or financial aid available? Yes. All candidates are automatically considered for merit-based scholarships. Need-based scholarships are also available to eligible students who provide supporting documentation during the application process. While full scholarships are not available at this time, we work closely with admitted students to provide support where possible so that financial circumstances do not prevent participation. ### What if I decide the programme isn't for me? We understand that plans can change - and we've got you covered. We're confident in the high calibre of the programme we offer, which is why, if you decide to withdraw after attending the first session, you'll be eligible for a full refund of the tuition fee (excluding the enrolment fee). For full details, please refer to our Refund Policy, available at the bottom of our website. ### How are the programmes structured? Each programme combines live online learning, dedicated mentorship from Ivy League and Oxbridge academics, office hours, peer research time, and independent project development. Research Scholars: 12 weeks | 24 live hours | Full business research paper Research Fundamentals: 4 weeks | 8 live hours | Foundational business research paper AI Builders: 9 weeks | 18 live hours | Applied AI project AI Explorers: 4 weeks | 8 live hours | Foundational AI project Research Scholars and AI Builders also include special sessions with guest experts from leading organisations. ### What is the weekly time commitment? Students attend approximately two hours of live sessions each week, complemented by optional office hours, peer research time, and independent project development. The amount of independent work varies depending on the programme, project scope, and individual student. However, we generally recommend allocating at least three additional hours per week to make the most of the experience. ### What do students learn? Learning varies by pathway. Research students develop skills across business strategy, research methodologies, market and competitive analysis, and related tools while learning how to investigate real-world business questions. AI students explore artificial intelligence from practical, technological, and business perspectives, learning how to develop and apply AI solutions to real-world challenges. Across programmes, students strengthen critical thinking, problem solving, analytical, and communication skills. ### How much support do students receive? Students are placed in intimate teams of 4-7 with a dedicated mentor throughout the programme, benefiting not only from expert guidance but also from collaboration and peer learning. In addition to weekly live sessions, students have access to office hours, written communication with their mentor, and dedicated peer research time, ensuring they receive ongoing support as they develop their independent business research papers or AI projects. Students are also supported by a dedicated programme coordinator who can assist with any technical or administrative questions throughout their journey. ### Are sessions recorded? Yes. Students can access session materials and recordings through the Hinksey Labs learning platform, making it easy to review content or catch up on missed sessions. ### What do students gain from Hinksey Labs? Students leave Hinksey Labs with a combination of tangible work, practical skills, meaningful connections, real world experience, and achievements they can carry forward. - Tangible Output: Complete a professional business research paper or applied AI project that brings their ideas and learnings to life - High-Level Exposure: Gain insights and guidance from leading academics, researchers, and industry professionals - Real-World Impact: Apply their knowledge to meaningful challenges faced by real organisations - Skills That Compound: Strengthen practical skills across business, research, and AI, alongside critical thinking, analysis, and communication - Global Network: Build meaningful connections with an international community of ambitious, like-minded peers - Verified Achievements: Earn an official Hinksey Labs Certificate of Achievement, with opportunities for publication, project showcases, and recommendation letters available to outstanding students ### Can students receive a letter of recommendation? Outstanding students may receive a personalised letter of recommendation highlighting their achievements and contributions, at their mentor's discretion. ### Can students publish or showcase their work? Outstanding Research Scholars may have opportunities to publish their research, while outstanding AI Builders may have opportunities to showcase their projects. These opportunities are based on the quality of the student's work and are available at Hinksey Labs' discretion. ### What opportunities are available after the programme? Students can continue engaging with the wider Hinksey Labs community through additional opportunities, including: - Hinksey Clubs - Curated high school clubs empowering ambitious students to lead communities in business, AI, and entrepreneurship. - Essay Competition - An annual competition challenging students to explore transformative ideas and showcase their thinking. - Hinksey Review - A peer-reviewed journal featuring applied research by emerging scholars in business, economics, policy, technology, and society. Hinksey alumni may also have access to exclusive opportunities, from special expert sessions to new initiatives across the Hinksey Labs community. We're always open to ideas from our alumni and happy to support students who want to launch initiatives, continue developing their work, or find new ways to contribute to the community. ## Blog Posts (Full Text) ### How to Get Your Research Published in High School: 8 Tips Before You Submit Published 2026-10-05 by Hinksey Labs. Category: Research Programme. URL: https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/how-to-get-your-research-published-in-high-school You have spent weeks or months researching a question, analysing evidence and writing your paper. Now comes another challenge: how do you actually get your research published? Publishing research in high school is possible, but having a completed paper does not automatically mean it is ready for a journal. Academic publications have their own subject areas, standards, formatting requirements and review processes. A successful submission therefore starts long before you press "submit". ### What Should You Do Before Submitting a Research Paper? Here are eight things to do first. #### 1. Find the Right Publication Before You Rewrite Your Paper One of the biggest mistakes students make is sending the exact version of their research to every journal they find. Start by identifying publications that actually fit your work. Look at: - The subjects they publish - Whether they accept high school students - Whether they want original research or also accept reviews - Word limits - Formatting requirements - Submission deadlines - Fees - Whether co-authors are permitted Then read several papers that the publication has already accepted. You will quickly get a sense of the kinds of questions, methods and writing styles its editors value. For example, [The Hinksey Review](https://hinksey.review) focuses specifically on applied research in areas including business, economics, policy, technology, marketing and human decision-making. It does not publish general literature reviews or summaries. Submissions are expected to make an original contribution and connect research to consequential real-world questions. That makes it potentially suitable for a student studying a question such as "How does a company's pricing strategy affect consumer behaviour?" It would be much less appropriate for a paper that simply summarises existing research about marketing. The closer your research fits the publication, the stronger your starting position. Not sure where to start looking? Our guide compares thirteen journals and preprint servers that publish high school research, with subjects, authorship rules and fees: [Read Where Can High School Students Publish Research?](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/where-can-high-school-students-publish-research) #### 2. Make Sure Your Paper Actually Adds Something Originality does not necessarily mean discovering something nobody in human history has ever considered. For a student researcher, an original contribution could be: - Collecting your own data - Analysing an existing dataset in a different way - Testing an established theory in a new context - Comparing businesses, markets or populations that have not previously been compared - Applying an existing framework to a new problem - Developing a new argument based on existing evidence Ask yourself: if someone already knew everything contained in my sources, what would they learn from my paper? Your answer should be clear. The Hinksey Review, for example, [explicitly looks for](https://hinksey.review/submit) a new argument, dataset, application or interpretation rather than a restatement of an established idea. #### 3. Strengthen Your Research Question A broad topic is not the same as a research question. - Too broad: social media and teenagers. - Better: how does TikTok influencer marketing affect purchase intention among Gen Z consumers? - Stronger still: how does perceived authenticity in TikTok micro-influencer content affect purchase intention among Gen Z consumers? A focused question makes it easier to: - Choose an appropriate methodology - Identify relevant sources - Analyse your evidence - Reach a meaningful conclusion If your paper feels unfocused, go back to the research question before editing individual sentences. #### 4. Make Your Methodology Easy to Understand A reader should be able to tell exactly how you reached your conclusions. Depending on your project, that could mean explaining: - How participants were selected - How survey questions were designed - Where your dataset came from - Why particular companies or case studies were chosen - Which variables were analysed - What analytical framework you used - What limitations your approach had Avoid simply writing that you "conducted research". Explain what you actually did. Rigorous publications expect claims to be supported by evidence and methods to be clearly stated and defensible. The Hinksey Review, for instance, evaluates submissions partly on research rigour and analytical consistency. #### 5. Don't Hide the Limitations Students sometimes worry that discussing limitations will make their research look weaker. Usually, the opposite is true. All research has limitations. Maybe your sample was relatively small. Perhaps your survey participants came from one geographic area. Maybe you were only able to analyse three companies rather than an entire industry. Acknowledging this shows that you understand what your evidence can and cannot prove. Instead of trying to make your conclusion sound bigger, make it accurate. That is much more persuasive. #### 6. Follow the Submission Guidelines Exactly Excellent research can still create a poor first impression when basic instructions are ignored. Before submission, check: - Word count - Citation style - Font and spacing - Abstract requirements - Keywords - File format - Table and figure formatting - Whether identifying information must be removed - Author and co-author rules For example, The Hinksey Review's [submission guidelines](https://hinksey.review/submit) currently ask for research papers of 4,000-6,000 words, APA formatting, a 150-300 word abstract, 5-7 keywords and an anonymised PDF for the initial review process. Those details matter. Do not wait until five minutes before the deadline to format your manuscript. #### 7. Treat Feedback as Part of Publishing Submitting a paper does not necessarily end with an immediate yes or no. You may receive feedback and be asked to revise. That is normal. A reviewer might question your methodology, ask you to clarify an argument, request stronger evidence or point out something confusing in your analysis. Read each comment carefully. Instead of thinking "they didn't understand what I meant", ask "why wasn't what I meant clear enough on the page?" Good research often becomes significantly better during the revision process. The Hinksey Review, for example, uses a multi-stage process involving initial screening, double-blind peer review, editorial review and potentially revisions before a final publication decision. #### 8. Give Yourself More Time Than You Think You Need If you want your paper published before a particular university application, competition or academic deadline, work backwards. Your timeline might include: 1. Research completed 2. First draft 3. Mentor feedback 4. Major revisions 5. Journal formatting 6. Submission 7. Peer review 8. Revisions 9. Editorial decision 10. Publication That process can take months. So don't finish a research paper two weeks before an application deadline and assume it will be published in time. Start researching possible publications while you are still developing the project. ### What If Your Paper Is Rejected? Rejection does not automatically mean the research was bad. Your paper may: - Not fit the publication - Require stronger evidence - Need a clearer methodology - Need another round of editing - Be competing against a particularly strong group of submissions Use whatever feedback you receive, improve the paper and consider another appropriate publication. But do not submit the same manuscript to multiple academic journals simultaneously unless their policies explicitly allow it. Academic publishing generally requires you to wait for a decision or formally withdraw your manuscript before submitting it somewhere else. ### Before You Submit: A Final Checklist Ask yourself: - Is my research question specific? - Does the paper contribute something beyond summarising existing work? - Can a reader understand exactly how I conducted the research? - Does my evidence actually support my conclusion? - Have I acknowledged important limitations? - Is every source properly cited? - Does my research fit this particular journal? - Have I followed every submission requirement? - Has someone else carefully reviewed the final draft? If you can answer yes to all of those, you are much closer to being publication-ready. ### Where Can High School Students Publish Research? A Guide to Student Research Journals Published 2026-10-01, updated 2026-10-08 by Hinksey Labs. Category: Research Programme. URL: https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/where-can-high-school-students-publish-research Completing a research paper in high school is already a significant achievement. But for students who want to take their work one step further, publication offers the opportunity to share that research with a wider audience. ### Can High School Students Publish Research? Yes. There are academic journals, student publications and research platforms specifically designed to showcase work by secondary school students. The challenge is finding the right publication for your subject, type of research and goals. This guide covers eleven journals and two preprint servers. Requirements, deadlines and fees change, so treat each entry as a starting point and check the journal's own submission page before you send anything. ### Which Journals Publish High School Research? #### 1. The Hinksey Review [The Hinksey Review](https://hinksey.review) publishes applied research in business, economics, policy, technology and society. It focuses on original research with real-world relevance rather than literature reviews or general summaries. - Who can submit: upper secondary school students, undergraduates, and independent researchers under 25. - Length: research articles of 4,000-6,000 words. - Review: an initial integrity screening, double-blind peer review, an editorial review, then a final decision. - Fees: free - there is no submission fee and no publication fee. - Timing: submissions for the next issue close on 14 November 2026, with publication in March 2027 - see the [submission guidelines](https://hinksey.review/submit). It can be a strong fit for students researching areas such as business strategy, economics, marketing, AI, public policy or consumer behaviour. #### 2. International Journal of Students' Research in Technology & Management The [International Journal of Students' Research in Technology & Management](https://mgesjournals.com/ijsrtm/) (IJSRTM) is an open-access, double-blind peer-reviewed journal for early researchers in technology and management, including business-focused topics. It was set up with university-level student researchers in mind, so confirm with the editors that your paper is eligible. - Authors: co-authors are allowed, making it suitable for collaborative projects. - Fees: submission is free, with a publication charge if the paper is accepted. - Best for: management, entrepreneurship, technology or business-related questions. #### 3. Humanities & Social Sciences Reviews [Humanities & Social Sciences Reviews](https://mgesjournals.com/hssr/) publishes research across a broad range of humanities and social science subjects, from the same publisher as IJSRTM. - Authors: co-authored submissions are allowed. - Fees: no submission fee, although there is a publication charge if a paper is accepted. - Best for: economics, sociology, public policy, culture or other social science disciplines. #### 4. The Journal of Research High School The [Journal of Research High School](https://www.journalresearchhs.org/) (JRHS) is an open-access, peer-reviewed journal built exclusively around high school researchers. - Subjects: engineering, humanities, natural science, mathematics and social science. - Article types: original research and literature reviews. - Authors: co-authored papers are allowed, with no limit on the number of authors. - Fees: there is a submission fee, so factor cost into your decision before applying. #### 5. International Journal of Management, Innovation & Entrepreneurial Research The [International Journal of Management, Innovation & Entrepreneurial Research](https://mgesjournals.com/ijmier/) (IJMIER) is an open-access, double-blind peer-reviewed journal covering management, entrepreneurship and innovation. - Authors: co-authors are allowed, which suits students who completed research as part of a team. - Fees: free to submit, with a publication charge on acceptance. - Best for: startups, business strategy, innovation, leadership or entrepreneurship. #### 6. Princetonian Journal of Sciences The [Princetonian Journal of Sciences](https://princetonian.org/journal-info) publishes original research by middle school, high school and college students across all fields of science, using double-blind review. - Authors: submissions must be written by a sole author. - Length: papers of up to 20 pages. - Deadlines: submissions are accepted on a rolling basis. - Fees: a publication fee applies only if the paper is accepted. - Best for: students who have completed an independent science research project. #### 7. The Young Researcher [The Young Researcher](http://www.theyoungresearcher.com/) is a peer-reviewed, open-access journal of original research by secondary school students across the sciences, humanities and social sciences. At the time of writing the journal is on hiatus and is not reading new submissions, so check its site for updates before planning around it. - Length: papers of no more than 5,000 words, excluding references and appendices. - Review: blind peer review, edited by secondary school students working with university scholars. - Best for: students who want a publication focused specifically on high school research, once submissions reopen. #### 8. Journal of Student Research The [Journal of Student Research](https://www.jsr.org/hs/index.php/path) (JSR) publishes student work across a wide range of academic subjects, with a dedicated high school edition alongside its university-level journal. - Authors: co-authors are allowed, and high school submissions need a school affiliation and a teacher or advisor. - Fees: there is a fee at submission and a further charge if the paper is accepted. - Before submitting: review the current requirements carefully, particularly around article type and formatting. #### 9. The Concord Review [The Concord Review](https://www.tcr.org/) specialises in history research papers by secondary school students and is one of the more selective publications open to them. - Authors: papers must be written by a sole author. - Length: generally between 5,000 and 10,000 words. - Deadlines: four a year, on 1 August, 1 November, 1 February and 1 May - see the [submission page](https://www.tcr.org/submit). - Fees: there is a submission fee, and a publication fee if the paper is accepted. - Best for: students who have completed a substantial long-form history research paper. #### 10. The Schola [The Schola](https://www.theschola.org/) publishes essays by high school students in the humanities and social sciences, including philosophy, history, art history, English, economics, public policy and sociology. - Authors: essays must be solely the author's own work. - Length: a main body of roughly 5,500-6,500 words - see [before you submit](https://theschola.org/pages/before-submission). - Deadlines: submissions are accepted on a rolling basis. - Fees: there is a non-refundable submission fee. - Best for: interdisciplinary work combining subjects such as economics, history and public policy. #### 11. Curieux Academic Journal [Curieux Academic Journal](https://www.curieuxacademicjournal.com/) is a youth-led nonprofit publication, founded in 2017, that publishes research by middle and high school students in any academic subject. Submissions are now handled through its sister site, The Curieux Review. - Subjects: the sciences, social sciences, humanities and the arts. - Deadlines and fees: check the current submission schedule, and any publication fee on acceptance, on its [submissions page](https://www.curieuxacademicjournal.com/submissions). - Best for: students looking for a journal created specifically around student academic work. ### Where Can You Share Research Without Peer Review? Preprint servers make a paper publicly available without the peer review a journal provides. They are useful, but a paper posted on one should always be described as a preprint, not as a peer-reviewed publication. #### 12. Research Archive of Rising Scholars The [Research Archive of Rising Scholars](https://research-archive.org/) (RARS) is an open-access preprint archive for young scholars, created by Polygence. The archive states that the work it hosts is not peer-reviewed, and positions itself as a home for articles while their authors prepare them for peer-reviewed publication elsewhere. - Subjects: STEM and the humanities. - Deadlines: submissions are accepted on a rolling basis. - Fees: free to submit. - Best for: students who want to make their work publicly available. #### 13. arXiv [arXiv](https://arxiv.org/) is a widely used online preprint archive where researchers share academic papers publicly, often before formal journal publication. It is not a peer-reviewed journal, although its papers are openly accessible and widely read within academic research communities. - Authors: co-authors are allowed. - Fees: free to submit, with no publication fee. - Eligibility: first-time submitters usually need an [endorsement](https://info.arxiv.org/help/endorsement.html) from an established arXiv author in the relevant field, which is the main practical hurdle for a high school student. - Best for: certain advanced research projects, typically completed with a mentor who is already active in the field. ### How Do You Choose the Right Publication? Finding a journal is not just about choosing the one that sounds most impressive. Before submitting, ask: - Does my research fit the journal's subject area? - Does it accept high school students? - Does it accept my type of research? - Are co-authors allowed? - Is there a word or page limit? - Are there submission or publication fees? - Is there a fixed deadline or a rolling submission period? - Is the publication peer-reviewed? The best journal is usually the one that most closely matches your research. ### Publication Starts With Good Research Getting published can be exciting, but publication should never be the only goal of a research project. The strongest student research starts with a meaningful question, a clear approach and evidence that supports a genuine conclusion. If you're still figuring out what student research can look like or how to get started, [The Hinksey High School Research Playbook](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-hinksey-high-school-research-playbook) walks through the process, from choosing an area of interest to developing a research question and finding the right research pathway. For students interested specifically in business, economics or entrepreneurship, [Research Without the White Coat](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/research-without-the-white-coat-how-business-research-proves-intellectual-rigour-to-colleges) explores what rigorous business research can look like, from market intelligence and customer discovery to using data to answer real-world questions. From there, publication becomes a way to share that work with a wider audience and take your research beyond the classroom. Have a paper in business, economics, policy or technology? See what The Hinksey Review looks for and how to submit: [Read The Hinksey Review Submission Guidelines](https://www.hinkseylabs.comhttps://hinksey.review/submit) ### The AI Playbook for High School Students Published 2026-09-24 by Hinksey Labs. Category: Artificial Intelligence. URL: https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-ai-playbook-for-high-school-students AI can help you study, research, brainstorm, write, and build projects, but using it well involves more than asking ChatGPT for an answer. The best AI tools can help you ask better questions, understand difficult ideas, challenge your thinking, and turn ideas into something real. The key is knowing what to use AI for and what thinking you should still do yourself. This guide covers useful AI tools, prompts, and strategies for school, research, and projects. At Hinksey Labs, we see AI as a tool to support better thinking and research, not replace it. ### How Can High School Students Use AI? AI is most useful when you treat it as a tool for thinking, rather than something that completes your work for you. - Learning: ask AI to explain difficult concepts in different ways, give examples, or test whether you actually understand something. - Research: explore topics, develop research questions, identify keywords, compare perspectives, and find gaps in your reasoning. These are some of the ways students at Hinksey Labs can use AI to support the research process without outsourcing the thinking. - Writing: get feedback on an argument, improve clarity, brainstorm ideas, or identify areas that need stronger evidence. - Studying: create practice questions, flashcards, quizzes, or study plans based on what you need to learn. - Building: use AI to help code a website, analyse data, design a presentation, prototype an idea, or develop a passion project. The question doesn't always have to be "What can AI do for me?" A better question might be: "What can AI help me do better?" Interested in using AI for deeper research? Our research playbook explores how to turn an interest into a question you can actually investigate: [Read The Hinksey High School Research Playbook](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-hinksey-high-school-research-playbook) ### What Are the Best AI Tools for High School Students? You probably already know [ChatGPT](https://chatgpt.com/), [Claude](https://claude.ai/), and [Gemini](https://gemini.google.com/). They're great all-purpose AI tools for brainstorming, explanations, feedback, and working through ideas. But you don't have to use the same chatbot for everything. Some AI tools are built specifically for studying, research, coding, or turning ideas into real projects. #### AI Tools for Studying - [NotebookLM](https://notebooklm.google/): upload your own notes, readings, PDFs, and sources, then ask questions based on that material. It can also turn sources into study guides, quizzes, and audio overviews. Best for: understanding readings, reviewing notes, comparing sources, and exam prep. - [Knowt](https://knowt.com/): turns notes, PDFs, and other study materials into flashcards, quizzes, podcasts, and practice tests. Best for: memorisation, active recall, and studying for tests. - [Quizlet](https://quizlet.com/): you probably already know Quizlet for flashcards, but its AI features can also help create study materials and provide AI-powered tutoring. Best for: vocabulary, flashcards, practice questions, and quick review. - [Khanmigo](https://www.khanmigo.ai/): an AI tutor designed to help you work through problems instead of immediately handing you the answer. Best for: maths, science, and concepts you need help understanding step by step. #### AI Tools for Research - [Perplexity](https://www.perplexity.ai/): an AI-powered search tool that answers questions while linking to the sources behind its response. Best for: exploring unfamiliar topics, finding starting sources, and getting an overview of different perspectives. - [Consensus](https://consensus.app/): searches academic research to help you see what peer-reviewed studies say about a question. Best for: finding evidence and seeing what existing research says about a topic. Remember: AI can help you find and understand research, but it shouldn't become your source. This is especially important in Hinksey Labs research projects, where your analysis and conclusions should come from the evidence you evaluate yourself. Want to take your research further? Our programme guide covers different ways to get research experience across AI, business, STEM, and social science: [Read The High School Research Programme Guide](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-high-school-research-playbook) #### AI Tools for Building & Coding - [Base44](https://base44.com/): turns a written idea into a functional app, handling much of the setup and technical work behind the scenes. Best for: students who want to quickly build and test an app idea without needing to code it from scratch. - [Claude Code](https://www.claude.com/product/claude-code): works alongside you while coding to write code, fix problems, explain what's happening, and help build projects. Best for: students with some coding experience who want AI help building, debugging, and improving real projects. #### AI Tools for Brainstorming & Visualising - [Canva AI](https://www.canva.com/): helps generate visuals, explore layouts, edit content, and turn ideas into presentations or graphics. Best for: presentations, visualising research, posters, and project materials. - [Gamma](https://gamma.app/): can turn an idea, outline, or set of notes into a structured presentation or visual document, giving you a starting point to develop further. Best for: organising ideas, brainstorming presentation structure, and turning research or projects into visual stories. - [MindMap AI](https://mindmapai.app/): turns ideas, notes, documents, or prompts into visual mind maps. Best for: brainstorming, connecting ideas, planning essays, and breaking down complicated topics. ### How Do You Write a Good AI Prompt? The tools matter less than the prompt. Compare these two: 1. "Give me a research topic about social media." 2. "I'm a high school student interested in marketing and psychology. Help me brainstorm research questions about how social media influences consumer behaviour. Keep them narrow enough for a student research project. Don't choose one for me. Ask me three questions afterwards to help me narrow my interests." The second prompt gives AI much more to work with. A simple formula can help: Context → Task → Constraints → Challenge. - Context: what does AI need to know about you or the situation? - Task: what exactly do you want it to do? - Constraints: what should or shouldn't it do? - Challenge: how can it push your thinking further? For example: "I'm developing an argument about social media use among teenagers. Identify three weaknesses in my current argument. Don't rewrite it for me. Instead, ask questions that force me to defend my reasoning." Sometimes the best AI prompt isn't one that produces a better answer. It's one that makes you think harder about your own. ### 10 AI Prompts for High School Students #### 1. Find a Topic You Actually Care About "Ask me 10 questions to help me identify a topic I would genuinely enjoy exploring. Don't suggest topics until I've answered them." #### 2. Turn an Interest Into a Research Question "Act as a research mentor. Ask me questions that will help me narrow [TOPIC] into a specific, researchable question. Don't create the final question for me." This is a useful starting point for Hinksey students narrowing a broad business interest into an independent research question. #### 3. Understand Something Difficult "Explain [CONCEPT] at three levels: beginner, high school, and university. Give me an example at each level." #### 4. Challenge Your Argument "Challenge my argument below. Identify my three weakest assumptions and ask me questions that would force me to defend them." #### 5. Improve Your Writing Without Rewriting It "Read this paragraph as an editor. Don't rewrite it. Tell me where the reasoning, evidence, or clarity could be stronger." #### 6. Study for a Test "Quiz me on [TOPIC] one question at a time. Don't show me the answer until I respond. Make the questions harder when I answer correctly." #### 7. Look at the Other Side "Here's my current conclusion: [CONCLUSION]. Give me the strongest reasonable argument against it and three questions I should investigate before deciding whether my conclusion still holds." #### 8. Turn an Idea Into a Project "Help me turn [IDEA] into a project I could realistically complete in 30 days. Break it into weekly milestones, but give me options instead of making important decisions for me." #### 9. Find Gaps in Your Research "I'm researching [TOPIC]. What assumptions might I be making, and what evidence would I need before reaching a conclusion?" #### 10. Go Beyond Obvious Ideas "Give me five approaches to [PROBLEM]. Then identify which are the most conventional and suggest three directions people might overlook." ### How Should You Use AI for Research? AI can make the early stages of research faster. It can help you explore an unfamiliar topic, develop questions, understand terminology, identify different perspectives, and challenge your assumptions. But it shouldn't do the research for you. For example, instead of: "Write a research paper about how TikTok affects consumer behaviour." Try: "I'm interested in how TikTok affects consumer behaviour among Gen Z. Ask me five questions that will help me narrow this into a specific research question. Don't create the final question for me." The second approach keeps you in control of the research. This is also how we approach AI at Hinksey Labs: it can support parts of the research process, but students still need to develop their ideas, evaluate evidence, and reach conclusions they can defend. ### How Can You Check if AI Is Actually Right? AI can sound confident and still be wrong. It can give you an incorrect statistic, misrepresent a study, use outdated information, or even produce a citation that doesn't exist. Before using AI-generated information in school or research, ask: - Does the source actually exist? - Does the original source support this claim? - Is the information current? - Can I verify the important claims somewhere else? - Am I citing the original source rather than AI? - Do I actually understand what I'm using? AI can help you navigate information. It shouldn't replace evaluating that information yourself. ### How Do You Use AI Ethically in School? There isn't one universal rule for acceptable AI use. Different schools, teachers, universities, and competitions have different policies, so always check the rules first. Then ask yourself: "Would I be comfortable explaining exactly how I used AI?" Using AI to explain a difficult concept, quiz you, or critique an argument is very different from asking it to complete an assignment and submitting that work as your own. A useful distinction is: - AI supports your work: brainstorming, learning, questioning, organising, practising, and getting feedback. - AI replaces your work: writing your final submission, producing your analysis, inventing citations, or reaching conclusions for you. If an assignment is supposed to demonstrate your thinking, the thinking should still be yours. ### From Using AI to Building With AI Most students are already learning how to use AI. A more interesting challenge is figuring out what you can create with it. You could use AI to analyse a public dataset, prototype an app, build a simple website, investigate a problem in an industry you care about, automate something repetitive, or develop a research or passion project. For example, you could ask AI to explain sustainability. Or you could investigate how businesses are reducing waste, compare different strategies, identify a problem that hasn't been solved well, and prototype your own approach. Hinksey Labs students can take a similar approach, using AI to build on their research and explore possible solutions to the real-world business problems they investigate. In both cases you're using AI. But in the second, you're using it to create something of your own. Have an idea you want to turn into something real? Our playbook covers how to find an idea, shape it into a project, and actually finish it: [Read The Hinksey Passion Project Playbook](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-hinksey-passion-project-playbook) ### The Skill That Matters Most Today's AI tools won't necessarily be the tools you use five years from now. The more valuable skills are learning how to ask good questions, evaluate evidence, challenge assumptions, solve problems, and develop your own conclusions. Those are also the skills behind strong independent research and the ones we focus on developing at Hinksey Labs. AI can help you move faster. But knowing what to ask, what to trust, and what to do with the answer is what makes it useful. Keep exploring: find more Hinksey Labs guides on research, passion projects, extracurriculars, and more. [Browse the Hinksey Labs Blog](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog) ### The Hinksey High School Research Playbook Published 2026-08-28, updated 2026-09-08 by Hinksey Labs. Category: Research Programme. URL: https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-hinksey-high-school-research-playbook ### Research Is Bigger Than You Think Say "research" and most people picture a lab. That's one version. Strip it back and research is a process - ask a meaningful question, find and weigh evidence, analyse what you find, reach a conclusion - and that process works in almost any field. A business-minded student might investigate why consumers pick one brand over another. Someone into AI might test where a model fails, or how generative AI is reshaping an industry. A biology student tests a hypothesis; a psychology student studies how social media shapes behaviour. The subject changes. The process doesn't. ### Why Do Research in High School? Research gives you what a classroom rarely does: a question nobody has already answered for you. Along the way you learn to ask sharper questions, tell strong evidence from weak claims, draw conclusions from data, work on problems with no answer key, and explain what you found, why it matters and where its limits are. It's also a low-risk way to test an academic interest, learn from a mentor, and end up with tangible work that shows initiative rather than just describing it. Want the deeper dive? Our guide explores the benefits of hands-on research, mentorship, portfolio-building, exploring future interests and developing skills beyond the classroom: [Read Why High School Research Programmes Can Transform Your Future](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/why-joining-a-summer-research-programme-or-exploring-research-opportunities-during-the-school-year-can-transform-your-future) ### What Can High School Research Actually Look Like? There is no single version of a research project. #### STEM You might conduct experiments, work with scientific datasets, explore an engineering problem, or use computational methods to test an idea. Example: how does temperature affect the efficiency of a particular material? #### AI AI research goes beyond simply learning how to use ChatGPT or another AI tool. You might investigate model accuracy, bias, responsible AI, human responses to AI, or how emerging technologies are changing a particular industry. Example: how accurately do different AI models identify misinformation? #### Business & Economics Business research is often about reducing uncertainty to help make better decisions. It can involve consumer behaviour, competitors, markets, pricing, strategy, or emerging technologies. Example: what factors make Gen Z consumers choose one clothing brand over another? #### Social Sciences You might investigate psychology, education, social media, culture, inequality, behavioural economics, or decision-making. Example: how does social media use affect students' study habits? You don't need a white coat to be a researcher. If you're interested in business, economics or entrepreneurship, read our closer look at market intelligence, customer discovery and strategic analysis as forms of rigorous research: [Read Research Without the White Coat](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/research-without-the-white-coat-how-business-research-proves-intellectual-rigour-to-colleges) ### How Do You Actually Get Research Experience? This is where many students get stuck. You know you want to try research - but where do you actually start? There isn't one route. The right path depends on how much experience you already have and how much support you need. #### Path 1: Research Preparation Best if you're interested in research but aren't ready to lead a project yet. These opportunities help you explore a subject, build foundational knowledge, and learn the skills you'll need before taking on more independent research. #### Path 2: Structured Mentored Research Best if you want to conduct research but need guidance through the process. A mentor can help you narrow your interests into a research question, evaluate evidence, work through challenges, and communicate your findings. #### Path 3: University Research Best if you're ready for a more intensive academic experience. These programmes may place students in university research environments, laboratories, or research teams working alongside academics, graduate students, or other researchers. #### Path 4: Independent or Self-Proposed Research Best if you already have an idea you want to investigate. You might develop your own research question and look for a mentor, programme, resources, or funding that can help you pursue it. There isn't one "best" route into research. A beginner who needs structure and a student who already has a sophisticated research question shouldn't necessarily be applying to the same opportunities. ### Finding Research Programmes There are research opportunities for high school students across STEM, AI, business, economics, social science, and interdisciplinary subjects. But don't only search for programmes with the word "research" in their name. Depending on your interests, useful opportunities could include: - Mentored research programmes - University research academies - Data and analytics programmes - Academic enrichment programmes - Research internships - Independent project programmes - Research competitions For example, a student interested in business and data might find relevant research experience through an analytics programme, while a student with an existing STEM idea might benefit more from a programme that supports self-proposed projects. Looking for actual programmes? We've already done the research for you - our directory breaks down programmes across business, economics, STEM, AI and machine learning, including who they're best for, what type of experience they offer, and current application information: [Browse High School Research Programmes](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-high-school-research-playbook) ### Which Type of Programme Is Right for You? Instead of asking "what's the best research programme?", ask "what's the best programme for where I am right now?" That usually means one of five situations: completely new to research; wanting to complete a first project with support; already holding an idea and needing mentorship, resources or funding for it; ready for an intensive university environment; or interested in business or data, where the best options don't always have "research" in the name. Each maps onto one of the four paths above - and the programme guide names specific programmes for each situation. See which programmes fit each of those situations, with deadlines: [Match a programme to where you are](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-high-school-research-playbook) ### How to Tell if a Research Programme Is Actually Worth It A recognisable university name doesn't automatically mean you'll get a great research experience. Before applying, look past the branding and ask: #### 1. Who Will Actually Mentor Me? Who are the mentors? What is their experience? Most importantly, how much access will you actually have to them? #### 2. Will I Actually Do Research? Will you develop questions, evaluate evidence, analyse findings, and draw conclusions? Or will you mostly attend lectures about research? #### 3. How Much Ownership Will I Have? Will you make meaningful decisions about your project, or simply complete a project someone else has already designed? #### 4. What Will I Leave With? Will you finish with something meaningful, such as a paper, presentation, analysis, or completed project? #### 5. Is the Programme Transparent? Can you clearly find information about mentors, costs, time commitment, expectations, and what students actually do? #### 6. Does It Actually Fit Me? Are you interested in the subject and experience? Or are you mainly interested in the name attached to it? Remember: publication doesn't equal better research. A strong research experience should teach you how to ask questions, investigate, analyse, and communicate your findings. A publication or impressive programme name cannot replace the experience itself. ### Ready to Start? Use This Checklist You don't need to have your entire research journey planned. Start here: 1. Choose an area you're genuinely curious about - business? AI? Biology? Psychology? Economics? Something completely different? 2. Narrow your interest - "I'm interested in AI" is a starting point, not a research question. 3. Start asking questions - what don't you know yet? What would be interesting to investigate? 4. Decide how much support you need - do you need to learn the basics, work with a mentor, or find support for an idea you already have? 5. Find the right pathway - research preparation? Mentored research? University research? Independent research? 6. Evaluate the opportunity - look at mentorship, real research, ownership, outcomes, transparency and fit. 7. Start - you don't need to know what your conclusion will be. That's the point. ### The Big Takeaway Research isn't about collecting credentials, or forcing yourself into a lab because that's what "real research" is supposed to look like. It's learning to ask a meaningful question, investigate it with evidence, and communicate what you find. One student thrives in a university lab; another investigates consumer behaviour; another researches how AI is changing an industry. Judge a programme by the experience it will actually give you, not by the name on it. ### Keep Exploring Want to understand where research fits into your extracurricular story? We've written a companion guide on choosing activities, going deeper into your interests, and communicating what you've actually contributed: [Read The Guide to Extracurriculars](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-guide-to-extracurriculars) Interested in business research or AI? If you want to take an interest further through structured, in-depth work, Hinksey Labs offers small-team programmes where students are mentored by Ivy League and Oxbridge academics while developing independent work connected to real-world challenges: [Explore Hinksey Labs Programmes](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/#programmes) This guide draws on research and guidance from the [National Academies' Undergraduate Research Experiences for STEM Students](https://www.nationalacademies.org/publications/24622) and [AACSB's 2025 State of Business Education Report](https://www.aacsb.edu/insights/reports/2025/2025-state-of-business-education-report), alongside information published by the universities and research programmes featured throughout. For detailed programme descriptions, deadlines and guidance on finding the right research experience, read [The High School Research Programme Guide](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-high-school-research-playbook). ### The Hinksey Extracurriculars Playbook Published 2026-08-25, updated 2026-09-08 by Hinksey Labs. Category: Extracurriculars. URL: https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-hinksey-extracurriculars-playbook This is the condensed version of our extracurriculars guide: how to choose activities, when to go deeper instead of adding more, how to decide what to drop, and how to describe what you did so it actually lands. Each section links to the full guide where the admissions-office detail lives. The principle underneath all of it: the goal isn't the longest list. It's spending limited time on things that are meaningful to you, and doing them with intention. ### More Isn't Better The biggest extracurricular myth is that more activities make a stronger application. The admissions offices say otherwise. [MIT](https://mitadmissions.org/apply/prepare/activities/) tells applicants to pick activities that "delight, intrigue, and challenge" them rather than ones that look impressive, and [Stanford](https://admission.stanford.edu/apply/overview/index.html) says exceptional depth in one or two activities may show more than minimal participation in five or six. Three activities you can talk about in depth say more about you than ten you barely attended - so the question isn't "how many?" but "which ones do I actually care about, and what have I learned, built or contributed there?" Want the deeper admissions perspective? For a closer look at what MIT, Stanford, Yale and Common App say about choosing activities, going deeper and communicating what you've done: [Read The Guide to Extracurriculars](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-guide-to-extracurriculars) ### What Actually Counts as an Extracurricular? Your extracurricular life is bigger than the club list. Research, a part-time job or internship, volunteering, an independent project, creative work, a small business, family or household responsibilities, and a hobby you've pursued seriously all count - [Common App's Activities section](https://www.commonapp.org/apply/first-year-students) explicitly makes room for them, and applications are read in the context of the opportunities you actually had. An extracurricular doesn't need a membership card or an official title. What matters is how you spend your time and what you do with the options available to you. ### How to Choose an Extracurricular Don't start with "what will look impressive?" Start with "what am I actually curious about?" - then run the candidate through [the guide's four-part filter](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-guide-to-extracurriculars). Interest: would I enjoy learning more about this now, regardless of whether I'll still love it in four years? Opportunity: will I actually get to do something - contribute, build, compete, research - rather than just attend? Commitment: can I give it consistent time without being stretched too thin? Growth: is there somewhere to go with it, a skill to develop or more responsibility to take on? The aim isn't the most impressive activity; it's one worth your time and energy. ### You Might Not Need Another Activity Sometimes the best next step isn't a new activity but going deeper into one you already have. [The guide's level-up test](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-guide-to-extracurriculars) - learn, contribute, lead, create - asks four things of a current activity: am I developing a real skill or understanding? Am I doing something useful for the team or community? Could I take responsibility for improving something (leadership doesn't need a title - identifying a problem and taking ownership counts)? Is there something I could build, organise, research or launch? ### What Does "Going Deeper" Actually Look Like? Take a student interested in environmental science. The same interest, in the same club, can sit at four very different depths: 1. Join the school's environmental club. 2. Contribute by helping organise a sustainability initiative. 3. Investigate a specific environmental problem at the school - waste, energy, procurement - and collect real data on it. 4. Create: develop or propose a solution, and get someone to adopt it. The point isn't an impressive résumé. It's taking an interest far enough that you're doing something real with it. ### Should You Keep or Drop an Activity? Not everything you start has to follow you through all four years - interests change, and that's normal. If you're unsure whether something still deserves your time, [the guide's five-question check](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-guide-to-extracurriculars) comes down to this: do I still care, am I still learning, am I contributing something, would I do it if applications didn't exist, and is it crowding out something I care about more? Mostly no? Redirect the energy. Consistency shows commitment, but another year on the résumé for its own sake isn't the point. ### How to Talk About What You Did When application season arrives, don't describe what the organisation does. Show what you did within it. "Member of Robotics Club" tells an admissions officer nothing. "Rebuilt the drivetrain code between competitions, cut our run time by a third, and trained two younger members to maintain it" tells them who you are. The framework is action, contribution, result: what you actually did, what you personally brought, and what changed because you were there. Results don't need to be awards or big numbers - a process improved, a skill developed, a person helped all count. Specificity beats impressive-sounding adjectives, especially inside [Common App's 150-character limit](https://www.commonapp.org/apply/first-year-students) per activity. ### Build Your Extracurricular Roadmap Choose two or three activities that matter most or take the most time, and for each write down why you started, why you still care, what you've actually contributed and learned, one way you could go deeper, and whether you honestly want to continue (the full seven-question version is [in the guide](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-guide-to-extracurriculars)). Then look across your answers. Your next opportunity might not be another club - it might be going deeper into something you've already started. ### Your Next Move - "I don't have many activities yet." Explore - try something connected to an interest you genuinely want to understand better. - "I'm involved in too many things." Choose - identify the activities that actually matter to you and decide where your time is best spent. - "I like my activities, but I mostly just attend." Go deeper - find one way to learn, contribute, take responsibility or create. - "I've been doing something for a while." Reflect - what have you actually learned, changed, created or contributed? - "I'm preparing applications." Communicate - focus on your actions, contributions and results rather than listing titles and memberships. ### The Big Takeaway There's no perfect extracurricular list, and no admissions office is asking for one. The strong approach is a loop, not a list: explore something you're curious about, choose what's worth your time, go deeper, contribute, reflect on what changed, and then communicate what you actually did. That beats building the profile you think colleges want. ### Keep Exploring Thinking about starting a passion project? If you're weighing up how a passion project fits into your extracurricular story, we've written a companion playbook on what makes one strong, the mistakes to avoid, and how to turn an idea into something you can actually finish: [Read The Hinksey Passion Project Playbook](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-hinksey-passion-project-playbook) Want to take an interest further? If you're interested in business research or AI and want to develop an interest through structured, in-depth work, Hinksey Labs offers small-team programmes where students are mentored by Ivy League and Oxbridge academics while developing independent work connected to real-world challenges: [Explore Hinksey Labs Programmes](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/#programmes) This guide draws on published guidance from [MIT Admissions](https://mitadmissions.org/apply/prepare/activities/), [Stanford Undergraduate Admission](https://admission.stanford.edu/apply/overview/index.html), [Yale Undergraduate Admissions](https://admissions.yale.edu/what-yale-looks-for) and [Common App](https://www.commonapp.org/apply/first-year-students). For a deeper look at the admissions guidance behind these recommendations, read [The Guide to Extracurriculars](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-guide-to-extracurriculars). ### The Hinksey Passion Project Playbook Published 2026-08-21, updated 2026-09-08 by Hinksey Labs. Category: Passion Projects. URL: https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-hinksey-passion-project-playbook This is the short version of everything we've written about passion projects: what makes one worth doing, the traps that sink most of them, how to find and test an idea, and how to get it finished. Each section points to the fuller guide where the detail lives. One idea underpins all of it. A non-profit isn't automatically better than a research paper, an app isn't automatically better than a community workshop, and a project doesn't need thousands of users to be worthwhile. The question to start with isn't "what would look impressive?" - it's "what do I care enough about to explore deeply, and what can I actually do with that interest?" ### What Makes a Strong Passion Project? There isn't a magic formula. But strong projects tend to have five things in common. #### 1. Genuine Interest Would I still care about this if it weren't going on a college application? There should be a believable connection between you and the subject - start with something you're genuinely curious about, frustrated by, or motivated to understand. #### 2. A Specific Question or Problem Can I explain what I'm trying to investigate or change in one sentence? "I'm passionate about mental health" is an interest. "How does late-night social media use affect sleep habits among teenagers at my school?" is something you can actually investigate. Move from broad interest to specific question. #### 3. Initiative Am I actually making decisions? A passion project should give you room to choose the question, design the research, build something, contact people, organise participants, test ideas, or work out what to do when something doesn't go to plan. #### 4. Sustained Exploration Am I going deeper than an afternoon of Googling? That might mean reading research, interviewing experts, collecting data, learning a new skill, testing an idea, or revising your work based on what you discover. #### 5. An Outcome Where is this project going? Your outcome might be a research report, prototype, dataset, workshop, documentary, curriculum, website, experiment, event, or useful resource. It doesn't need to "change the world" - it needs to go somewhere. Want the deeper admissions perspective? For a closer look at what Stanford, Harvard, Penn and Yale say about activities, initiative, curiosity and impact: [Read What Makes a Strong Passion Project](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/what-makes-a-strong-passion-project-for-college-applications) ### Avoid the Passion Project Traps Before you start, watch out for a few common mistakes. #### 1. Starting With "What Will Look Good?" Building around an imagined admissions formula is a quick way to end up with a project you don't actually care about. Try instead: what topic, question or problem would I willingly spend the next three months learning about? #### 2. Starting an Organisation You Don't Need The classic version: a student who cares about financial literacy launches "The Youth Financial Literacy Initiative", opens an Instagram account, posts three times and stops. An organisation is useful when one is actually needed - but don't start with the title. Problem first, format second. #### 3. Going Too Broad "Reduce food waste" isn't a project yet. "Measure what my school canteen throws away in a week, then test whether a pre-order system cuts it" is one. If you can't explain your project in one sentence, it probably still needs narrowing. #### 4. Confusing Visibility With Impact Thirty students using something you built can matter more than thirty thousand views. Impact could mean meaningful interviews, an unexpected research finding, a workshop adopted by your school, a useful resource, or simply something that genuinely helped a small group of people. #### 5. Designing Something You'll Never Finish Your first version doesn't need a huge budget, an advanced coding team, twenty volunteers, and a major corporate partnership. Start with something you can actually complete: small, finished, tested, improved. ### Finding Your Idea "What's your passion?" is a hard question to answer head-on. Look instead for where four things overlap: curiosity (what you voluntarily read, watch or argue about), friction (what makes you ask "why does this work this way?"), community (problems the people around you actually have) and skills (what you're good at, or would love an excuse to get good at). Where two of those meet there is usually a question worth a few months of your time - football and statistics, AI and education, fashion and sustainability. You don't need the final idea yet, just a direction worth exploring. ### Three Project Shapes Worth Exploring No admissions office prefers one type of project over another, so think about what you actually want to do with your question. Most strong projects take one of three shapes: - The researcher investigates something: question, evidence, finding, communication - a survey, a dataset, an interview, a report. - The builder creates something: problem, user, prototype, test, improve - a tool, a resource, a curriculum, a physical prototype. - The community problem-solver makes something useful: need, learn, act, measure, improve - a workshop, an initiative, a service for a specific group. These don't have to stay separate. Research, build, test, share can be one project - and [the 90-Day Plan](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/how-to-start-a-passion-project-90-day-plan-for-high-school-students) works through a fully fleshed-out example of each shape. ### Use AI to Brainstorm, Not to Choose for You Asking an AI for "ten impressive passion project ideas for college" gets you the same generic list it gives everyone else. Used well, it's a good sparring partner instead - four kinds of prompt earn their keep: - An interview prompt that asks you one question at a time about what you read, notice, belong to and can do, and only then names the intersections. - A go-deeper prompt that turns one topic into fifteen specific, investigable questions a high school student could realistically tackle. - A pressure-test prompt that scores an idea on connection, specificity, feasibility and originality, and names the three reasons you might abandon it. - A make-it-smaller prompt that shrinks a goal into a thirty-day minimum viable version, with phase two and three sketched only if version one works. The four copy-and-paste prompts, word for word, are in the 90-Day Plan: [Get the AI brainstorming prompts](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/how-to-start-a-passion-project-90-day-plan-for-high-school-students) Remember: AI should help you ask better questions. It shouldn't manufacture your interests for you. ### Choose a Project You'll Actually Finish Have a few candidates? Don't pick the one that sounds most impressive. [The 90-Day Plan](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/how-to-start-a-passion-project-90-day-plan-for-high-school-students) has a seven-question scorecard - personal connection, a one-sentence question, resources you already have, a first version in eight to twelve weeks, real learning, a concrete output, and usefulness to someone other than you - each scored from one to five for a total out of thirty-five. Anything under twenty-one needs rescoping or a different direction. The goal isn't the idea with the highest "wow" factor; it's the one you're actually likely to start, learn from and finish. ### Your 90-Day Roadmap You have an idea. Now make it real, in five phases: 1. Weeks 1-2, explore: read credible sources, talk to people who live with the problem, and turn a broad interest into one specific question you can explain in a sentence. 2. Weeks 3-4, design: decide what version one is, what "finished" means, and which skills, people or resources you'll need. 3. Weeks 5-8, do the work: the interviews, the data, the experiment, the prototype, the draft - by the end, something exists that didn't before. 4. Weeks 9-10, test: show it to users, teachers, experts or participants and ask what worked, what didn't and what surprised them. 5. Weeks 11-12, improve and share: revise, then decide how it lives in the world - a report, a site, an event, a resource, a publication. Want the complete 90-day breakdown, with the goal for each phase and what to do when a phase slips? [Read How to Start a Passion Project](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/how-to-start-a-passion-project-90-day-plan-for-high-school-students) ### Is My Passion Project "Good Enough"? Forget follower counts. The test is whether you can give specific answers to five questions: why this, what you actually did (not what the organisation "does"), what happened, what you learned, and what you'd do next with another six months. If you can, you have something more valuable than an impressive title - a story about curiosity, action and growth. And that's the point. ### The Big Takeaway There is no perfect passion project. The strongest approach isn't: find something impressive, give it a title, make it look big. It's: explore, question, start small, do the work, test, improve, share. Start with something you genuinely care about. Narrow it into a question or problem you can act on. Choose a format that fits the problem, rather than the other way around. And most importantly: build something you'll actually finish. A small project that exists, teaches you something and evolves through real work is far more meaningful than an ambitious idea that never gets beyond the planning stage. ### Keep Exploring Want to see how passion projects fit into your wider extracurricular profile? Our extracurricular guide looks at choosing activities, going deeper, demonstrating contribution, and communicating what you've actually done: [Read The Guide to Extracurriculars](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-guide-to-extracurriculars) Interested in turning your curiosity into research? Our research playbook explores what high school research can look like across business, AI, STEM and social science, plus how to find the right research experience: [Read The Hinksey High School Research Playbook](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-hinksey-high-school-research-playbook) Want to take an interest further? If you're interested in business research or AI and want to develop an idea through structured, in-depth work, Hinksey Labs offers small-team programmes with academic mentorship from Ivy League and Oxbridge academics while you develop independent work connected to real-world challenges: [Explore Hinksey Labs Programmes](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/#programmes) This guide draws on published guidance from [Stanford Undergraduate Admission](https://admission.stanford.edu/apply/overview/index.html), [Harvard College](https://college.harvard.edu/guides/prospective-students/application-tips), [Penn Admissions](https://admissions.upenn.edu/how-to-apply/preparing-your-application/activities) and [Yale Undergraduate Admissions](https://admissions.yale.edu/what-yale-looks-for), alongside [PBLWorks' research on high-quality project-based learning](https://www.pblworks.org/what-is-pbl/gold-standard-project-design). For a deeper look at the guidance behind these recommendations, read [What Makes a Strong Passion Project](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/what-makes-a-strong-passion-project-for-college-applications) and [How to Start a Passion Project in 90 Days](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/how-to-start-a-passion-project-90-day-plan-for-high-school-students). ### How to Choose a Research Programme: Polygence, Lumiere, CCIR, Hinksey Labs, and More Compared Published 2026-08-14 by Hinksey Labs. Category: Research Programme. URL: https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/how-to-choose-a-research-programme-polygence-lumiere-ccir-hinksey-labs-and-more-compared Search for research opportunities as a high school student and you will find dozens of online programmes, each with its own model and promise. Comparing them is harder than it should be, because most descriptions use the same words: mentorship, rigour, publication, impact. This guide groups the programmes families most often compare by how they actually work, notes who each model suits, and ends with the questions that separate them quickly. ### One-to-One Research Mentorships Lumiere Education, Polygence, Horizon Academic, and Indigo Research all pair a student with an individual mentor - usually a PhD student, PhD holder, or professor - to produce an academic research paper over roughly ten to twelve weeks. The strengths of this model are individual attention and topic freedom. A student who already knows they want to study, say, behavioural economics can shape a paper around exactly that, at their own pace. Several of these programmes also support submission to high school research journals. This is generally a premium-priced model, with extended and publication-focused tracks at the top end. It suits independent students who want to go deep on their own question and are comfortable working largely alone. ### Cohort and Seminar Programmes Pioneer Academics and the Cambridge Centre for International Research (CCIR) take a different approach: students learn in structured small groups, closer to a university seminar. Pioneer runs an accredited research programme with guided readings and discussion; CCIR offers courses taught by academics who teach at universities such as Cambridge, Oxford, and MIT. The strengths here are structure and teaching quality. Students who want a course-like experience with clear milestones, rather than an open-ended project, tend to do well in this format. These programmes generally sit at the upper end of the price range for online research programmes. ### AI-Focused Programmes Inspirit AI and Veritas AI specialise in artificial intelligence. Both combine a taught curriculum - machine learning foundations, coding practice - with a mentored project, drawing mentors from universities such as Stanford and Harvard. Veritas leans towards research projects; Inspirit leans towards structured teaching. These suit students whose main interest is AI itself and who want a curriculum first and a project second. Tuition tends to sit at the very high end. ### Business and Entrepreneurship Programmes LaunchX and the Wharton Global Youth Program focus on business rather than research. LaunchX has students build and launch a real startup; Wharton's online courses teach entrepreneurship and leadership through case work and pitch competitions. The output is a venture or a course certificate rather than a research paper. These suit students who want to build something commercial, or to test whether business school appeals, more than they want to conduct research. ### Where Hinksey Labs Sits Hinksey Labs offers business research and applied AI programmes that combine academic rigour with real-world business experience. Students work in small teams of four to seven with Ivy League and Oxbridge PhD and MBA mentors alongside industry experts, applying their skills to challenges faced by real organisations. While mentorship is collaborative, each student produces independent, original work shaped by both their own interests and the organisation's real-world context. Students can choose between [Research Scholars](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/#programmes) and [Research Fundamentals](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/#programmes) for business research, or [AI Builders](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/#programmes) and [AI Explorers](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/#programmes) for applied AI. Each student completes an independent research paper or applied AI project and presents their work to a panel of experts at the end of the programme. Research papers are shared with partner organisations, while top papers may undergo additional peer review for potential publication in the [Hinksey Review](https://hinksey.review). Admission is selective, but the team-based mentorship model makes tuition more accessible than many comparable programmes, with merit and need-based scholarships available. This approach suits students who want their research grounded in real-world context. ### Questions to Ask Before You Choose Whichever direction you lean, the same few questions separate the programmes quickly: - Who actually does the mentoring and how much time do you get with them? - What is the output: a paper, a project, a certificate? And who is it for - a journal, a real organisation, or your own portfolio? - Do you work alone or with others? Both have real advantages; know which suits you. - What does the full cost include? Publication support, extended mentorship, and certificates are sometimes priced separately. Every programme here publishes details on its own site, and most admissions teams will answer direct questions about mentors, outputs, and costs. Ask them. A programme that answers plainly is usually one you can trust. ### The High School Research Programme Guide: STEM, AI, Business & Social Science Published 2026-07-21, updated 2026-09-08 by Hinksey Labs. Category: Research Programme. URL: https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-high-school-research-playbook When you hear the word research, you might picture a scientist working in a laboratory. That is research, but it's only one version of it. Research is ultimately about learning how to ask a meaningful question, find and evaluate evidence, analyse information, and use what you discover to reach a conclusion. Those skills matter in almost every field. - A student interested in business might analyse why consumers choose one brand over another, or how a company should respond to a changing market. - A student interested in AI might evaluate whether a model performs fairly across different populations. - A student interested in biology might test a scientific hypothesis. - A student interested in psychology might investigate how social media influences behaviour. Research gives you an opportunity to move beyond simply learning what other people already know, and begin investigating questions yourself. ### Why Research Matters Research teaches a combination of skills that are useful far beyond a lab. #### Asking Better Questions Instead of accepting information at face value, you learn to identify what you don't know and turn curiosity into something you can investigate. #### Evaluating Information You learn how to distinguish strong evidence from weak claims - an increasingly important skill in a world filled with AI-generated content and enormous amounts of online information. #### Analysing Data and Evidence Whether you're interpreting experimental results, consumer surveys, economic data, or model outputs, research teaches you to draw conclusions from evidence. #### Solving Open-Ended Problems Unlike many school assignments, research often doesn't have a predetermined correct answer. #### Communicating Ideas Research requires you to explain what you investigated, why it matters, what you found, and what the limitations are. That's why research skills appear across disciplines. In business education specifically, experiential and project-based learning can help students apply knowledge to real-world problems while developing skills such as critical thinking, problem solving, communication, and adaptability. ### STEM Research STEM research uses scientific and technical methods to investigate questions, test ideas, and understand how things work. STEM research might involve: - Experiments - Laboratory work - Engineering design - Environmental data - Computational modelling - Scientific datasets ### AI Research Learning to use AI tools and researching AI are not the same thing. AI research can ask questions like: - How accurate is this model? - Where does it fail? - Is it biased? - How could it be applied to healthcare or education? - How are humans responding to AI-generated information? - How is generative AI changing an industry? AI research can sit at the intersection of: - Computer science and medicine - AI and ethics - AI and education - AI and psychology - AI and business That makes it particularly exciting for students whose interests don't fit neatly into one traditional academic subject. ### Business and Economics Research Research is fundamental to how businesses understand consumers, markets, competitors, and emerging technologies, and make decisions when there isn't an obvious answer. Think about the questions businesses need to answer: - Why are customers choosing a competitor? - Would consumers pay more for this product? - How should a company enter a new market? - Does influencer marketing actually change purchase intent? - How is AI changing consumer behaviour? Those questions can be investigated using: - Consumer surveys - Interviews - Company reports - Financial data - Market data - Experiments - Case studies - Competitor analysis - Public datasets This kind of investigation builds skills that extend beyond a single research project. Critical thinking, communication, adaptability, and the ability to apply knowledge are increasingly important capabilities for future business graduates, particularly as technology and AI reshape the workplace. ### Social Science Research Social science researchers investigate people, societies, and behaviour. A high school student could explore questions involving: - Psychology - Education - Social media - Politics - Culture - Inequality - Behavioural economics - Decision-making Research methods might include surveys, interviews, experiments, content analysis, or existing datasets. So whether you're interested in science, AI, business, social sciences, or entrepreneurship, research is ultimately about the same skill: turning curiosity into a question you can investigate. ### High School Research Programmes You Should Know There isn't one "best" research programme. Some students need an introduction to a subject. Others already have a research question and need mentorship. Some want an intensive university experience. Here are several different pathways worth knowing about. Programme dates, costs, and eligibility can change each year - always verify current requirements directly with the programme before applying. ### Business, Economics, Entrepreneurial and Social Science Programmes There are fewer high school opportunities explicitly labelled "business research internships" than STEM research programmes. But that doesn't mean aspiring business students can't conduct serious research. Look for programmes involving data, economics, consumer behaviour, companies, strategy, statistics, and independent investigation. #### 1. Penn State BOSS: Business Opportunities Summer Session Best for: rising seniors who know they're interested in business but aren't sure which area they want to explore more deeply. Penn State Smeal's Business Opportunities Summer Session (BOSS) is a two-week residential programme for rising seniors from the US and Puerto Rico who are interested in studying business. Students participate in business fundamentals courses taught by Penn State faculty, company visits, group presentations, and hands-on learning experiences. Type: business academic exploration / research preparation Summer 2027 deadline: not yet announced as of August 2026. #### 2. Yale Young Global Scholars (YYGS) Best for: students interested in questions involving science, economics, politics, technology, and global issues. Yale Young Global Scholars is a two-week academic enrichment programme bringing together high school students from around the world. For Summer 2027, its academic tracks include: - Innovations in Science and Technology - Politics of Law and Economics - Solving Global Challenges YYGS is not a research internship, but it can provide strong preparation for students beginning to think more deeply about research questions. Type: interdisciplinary academic exploration / research preparation Summer 2027 deadlines: Early Action: October 15, 2026 Regular Decision: January 6, 2027 YYGS says qualifying applicants can receive need-based aid covering up to 100% of tuition. #### 3. Wharton Moneyball Academy Best for: students interested in business, data, and sport. Moneyball Academy shows what quantitative research can look like outside of traditional STEM. Students learn: - Statistics - Probability - Data visualisation - Regression - R programming and apply those skills to real questions involving sports analytics. Students ultimately work collaboratively on a capstone research project, giving them experience moving from data to analysis to findings. Type: analytics and capstone research Summer 2027 deadline: not yet published. #### 4. Wharton Data Science Academy Best for: students interested in analytics, economics, business, or machine learning. Data has become central to how businesses make decisions. Wharton's Data Science Academy introduces high school students to areas including: - Data science - Statistics - Machine learning - Programming - Analytics Students build technical skills that can be applied to research questions involving business, markets, economics, and consumer behaviour. Type: quantitative research preparation Summer 2027 deadline: not yet announced. #### 5. Hinksey Labs Business Research Programme Best for: students who want to explore business, entrepreneurship, strategy, and companies in a structured mentorship programme. Hinksey students can conduct mentored research around real companies, industries, and questions involving areas such as: - Marketing - Strategy - Entrepreneurship - Finance - Consumer behaviour - Economics - Emerging technologies Rather than simply learning about a company, students learn to identify a meaningful research question and investigate it using evidence and relevant business frameworks. This can give business-focused students a structured route into research when their interests don't fit naturally into a traditional university laboratory. Type: structured mentored research 2026-27 application deadlines: Priority: November 1, 2026 Regular: November 14, 2026 Cohort begins: January 2027 ### STEM Research Programmes #### 1. UCSB Summer Research Academies (SRA): STEM Tracks Best for: students who want to conduct research in a university setting across STEM, AI, humanities, or social sciences. UC Santa Barbara's Summer Research Academies is a four-week programme in which high school students choose an interdisciplinary research track and develop an original research project with guidance from researchers and instructors. For 2026, tracks included areas such as: - Robotics - Digital social movements - Bioethics - Molecular biology Students spend approximately 25-40 hours per week on research and finish by producing a technical research paper and presenting their findings at a capstone seminar. Type: directed university research Summer 2027 deadline: not yet announced. #### 2. MIT THINK Scholars Programme Best for: students who already have an idea they want to investigate. MIT THINK takes a different approach from many summer programmes. Instead of applying to work on someone else's predetermined project, students propose their own science, technology, or engineering project. Selected finalists receive mentorship and up to $1,000 in funding to help execute their proposal. That makes THINK especially interesting for students who have already reached the "I have an idea, but I don't know how to actually do it" stage. Type: mentored independent research / project development 2026-27 application deadline: not yet announced as of August 2026. #### 3. Boston University RISE Best for: rising seniors who want an intensive university research experience. BU's Research in Science & Engineering programme is a six-week experience for rising seniors. RISE offers two tracks: - Internship: students work approximately 40 hours per week on research projects under faculty, postdoctoral, or graduate-student mentorship. - Practicum: students collaborate on structured computational research projects in areas such as data science and computational neurobiology. Research areas can include: - Biology - Chemistry - Engineering - Computer science - Neuroscience - Psychology - Public health Students also learn about research ethics, reading scientific literature, and communicating findings before presenting their work at a poster symposium. Type: university research internship / structured research practicum Summer 2027 deadline: not yet announced. #### 4. Research Science Institute (RSI) Best for: students looking for an extremely selective, intensive STEM research experience. The Research Science Institute, run by the Center for Excellence in Education and hosted at MIT, brings together high school students for a six-week summer programme combining advanced STEM coursework with original research. Students work with mentors to develop and conduct research before presenting their findings. RSI is free of charge, making it an especially notable example of a highly selective research opportunity that does not require students to pay tuition. Type: intensive STEM research Summer 2027 deadline: not yet announced as of August 2026. ### AI and Machine Learning Programmes #### 1. Stanford AIMI Summer Research Internship Best for: students interested in AI and healthcare who want a genuine mentored research experience. Stanford's Center for Artificial Intelligence in Medicine & Imaging offers high school students a summer research internship focused on AI and healthcare. Students learn technical concepts while working in small teams on research involving real-world health data. The programme emphasises skills such as: - Framing research questions - Exploring data - Developing technical approaches - Evaluating results - Communicating findings Research can involve areas such as machine learning, medical imaging, clinical AI, model evaluation, and responsible AI. Stanford recommends stronger maths, coding, and/or healthcare experience for the internship, and points less experienced students toward its introductory bootcamp. Type: mentored AI research Summer 2027 application deadlines: Applications open: November 10, 2026 Deadline: February 1, 2027 #### 2. Carnegie Mellon AI Scholars Best for: students who want a fully funded introduction to AI and hands-on projects. CMU's AI Scholars programme combines college-level instruction with hands-on group research projects, faculty engagement, mentorship, and exposure to careers in artificial intelligence. Topics include areas such as: - Python - Algorithms - Data - Machine learning - AI evaluation Importantly, CMU says students do not need previous coding experience. Type: AI education and research projects Summer 2027 deadline: not yet announced. #### 3. MIT Jameel Clinic AI & Health Summer High School Bootcamp Best for: students who want to build their AI foundation first. MIT's Jameel Clinic introduces students in grades 10-12 to artificial intelligence and machine-learning methods used in healthcare. Students gain exposure to areas such as: - Machine learning - Clinical AI - AI-assisted drug discovery - Responsible AI - Healthcare applications The programme also includes collaborative project work. Type: AI research preparation Summer 2027 deadlines: Early Action: November 1, 2026 Regular: February 22, 2027 #### 4. UCSB Summer Research Academies (SRA): AI Tracks Best for: students who want to approach AI from a technical or interdisciplinary perspective. This programme is useful for students whose interest in AI isn't necessarily limited to coding. Recent tracks have explored areas such as: - Probabilistic computing and AI - The development and implications of machine learning - Psychology and computational methods Type: directed university research Summer 2027 deadline: not yet announced. #### 5. Hinksey Labs AI Research Programme Best for: students interested in AI who want to explore it through a structured, mentored research project. At Hinksey Labs, students can investigate questions involving AI and emerging technologies connected to real-world industries, organisations, and challenges. Rather than focusing only on building or coding AI systems, students can investigate how these technologies are being used, where they create value, and what challenges they introduce. Research topics might explore: - AI's impact on a particular industry or profession - How organisations are adopting emerging technologies - Consumer attitudes towards AI-powered products - The opportunities and risks created by generative AI - How AI could be applied to a real-world problem Students develop skills in research design, evidence analysis, and academic communication along the way. This makes the pathway accessible to students interested in understanding and researching AI, even without advanced programming experience. Type: structured mentored research 2026-27 application deadlines: Priority: November 1, 2026 Regular: November 14, 2026 Cohort begins: January 2027 ### Which Type of Programme Is Right for You? There isn't one "best" research programme. The right opportunity depends on where you are now, what you want to explore, and how much support you need. Before applying, think about what you actually want to get out of the experience. If you're new to research: look for introductory or research-preparation programmes that help you build foundational knowledge and skills. Examples: YYGS, Hinksey Labs, Penn State BOSS. If you want guided research experience: look for structured, mentored programmes where you'll learn the research process while completing a project. Examples: UCSB SRA, Hinksey Labs. If you already have a research idea: look for programmes that provide mentorship, resources, or funding to develop your own project. Examples: MIT THINK, Hinksey Labs. If you want intensive university research: look for programmes that place students in research-focused university environments. Examples: BU RISE, RSI, Stanford AIMI. If you're interested in business, data, or interdisciplinary research: don't only search for programmes with "research" in the title. Consider data programmes, competitions, and mentored research. Examples: Wharton programmes, YYGS, Hinksey Labs. ### How to Evaluate a Research Programme Before applying to anything on this list, look past the university name and ask six questions: who will actually mentor you and how much access you'll have to them; whether you'll do research or mostly attend lectures about it; how much ownership you'll have over the project; what you'll leave with; how transparent the programme is about mentors, costs and expectations; and whether you want the experience itself or mainly the name attached to it. And remember that publication isn't the same as better research. The full six-question test, with what a good answer to each looks like, is in our companion playbook: [Read The Hinksey High School Research Playbook](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-hinksey-high-school-research-playbook) ### Takeaway Whether you're interested in AI, business, economics, STEM, psychology, technology, or another field, research teaches you to ask better questions, evaluate evidence, analyse information, solve open-ended problems, and communicate what you discover. And there isn't one "best" way to get that experience. - One student might thrive in a university lab. - Another might need an introductory programme first. - Another might conduct mentored business research, investigate how AI is transforming an industry, or use data to understand consumer behaviour. The name of the programme matters less than the experience you're actually getting. If a mentored, structured research programme sounds like the right next step, explore how Hinksey Labs' Business Research and AI Research programmes work: [Explore our programmes](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/#programmes) For a closer look at how research mentorship models compare - one-to-one mentorships, cohort seminars, and where Hinksey Labs sits among them: [Compare research programmes](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/how-to-choose-a-research-programme-polygence-lumiere-ccir-hinksey-labs-and-more-compared) These ideas draw on published guidance from the [National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine](https://www.nationalacademies.org/publications/24622) and [AACSB International](https://www.aacsb.edu/insights/reports/2025/2025-state-of-business-education-report), alongside publicly available programme information as of August 2026. ### The Guide to Extracurriculars: How to Choose, Build, and Communicate Activities That Actually Matter Published 2026-06-15 by Hinksey Labs. Category: Extracurriculars. URL: https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/the-guide-to-extracurriculars Extracurriculars help colleges understand who you are beyond your grades. But building a strong extracurricular profile does not mean joining every club available, collecting leadership titles, or trying to predict what an admissions officer wants to see. [MIT](https://mitadmissions.org/apply/prepare/activities/), for example, explicitly encourages students to choose activities because they genuinely interest and challenge them, rather than because they seem impressive. [Stanford](https://admission.stanford.edu/apply/overview/index.html) similarly explains that significant depth in one or two activities can demonstrate more passion than minimal participation across many. The goal isn't to build the longest list. It's to spend your limited time doing things that are meaningful to you, and doing them with intention. ### Depth Over Quantity One of the biggest extracurricular myths is that more activities automatically make a stronger application. They don't. MIT says it doesn't expect applicants to "do a million things" and usually recommends quality over quantity. Stanford makes a similar point: exceptional depth in one or two activities may reveal more about your interests than surface-level involvement in five or six. Instead of asking "how many extracurriculars should I have?", ask: - Which activities do I genuinely care about? - Where am I investing meaningful time and effort? - How has my involvement developed? - What have I learned, created, improved, or contributed? Three activities you can speak meaningfully about may tell someone far more about you than ten clubs you barely participated in. ### What Actually Counts as an Extracurricular Your extracurricular life is bigger than your school's club list. Meaningful activities outside the classroom can include: - Clubs, sports, music, and student organisations - Research - Jobs or internships - Volunteering and community involvement - Independent or passion projects - Creative work - Entrepreneurship - Family or household responsibilities - Hobbies or personal interests you've pursued seriously This matters because not every student has access to the same opportunities. Applications are reviewed in context, and admissions officers recognise that students have very different extracurricular options, as well as different work and family commitments. [Common App's current Activities section](https://www.commonapp.org/apply/first-year-students) similarly gives students space to report experiences such as hobbies, work, volunteering, community engagement, and family responsibilities. ### How to Choose an Extracurricular You don't need to choose an activity because it sounds impressive. Start with something you're genuinely curious about, then look for an opportunity that gives you room to explore. Before committing to something new, use this four-part filter: Interest → Opportunity → Commitment → Growth #### Interest Would I genuinely enjoy learning more about this? #### Opportunity Will I get to do something - contribute, solve problems, create, compete, research, organise, or help others - rather than simply attend? #### Commitment Can I realistically give this consistent time without stretching myself too thin? #### Growth Is there room to develop skills, deepen my involvement, or take on greater responsibility over time? You don't need four years of commitment to everything you try. Interests change, and that's okay. The goal is to find activities worth investing your time and energy in now. ### The Extracurricular Level-Up Test You don't necessarily need another activity. Sometimes the better move is to go deeper into something you're already doing. Take one of your current activities and ask: Learn → Contribute → Lead → Create #### Learn Am I developing a real skill or deeper understanding? #### Contribute Am I doing something useful for the team, organisation, or community? #### Lead Can I take responsibility for improving something, even without an official leadership title? #### Create Is there something I could build, organise, research, launch, or improve? For example, a student interested in environmental science might: join an environmental club → help organise a sustainability initiative → investigate an environmental problem at their school → develop or propose a solution. The goal isn't to manufacture an impressive résumé. It's to follow an interest far enough that you begin doing something meaningful with it. And remember: leadership isn't the same as a title. [Yale admissions officers](https://admissions.yale.edu/what-yale-looks-for) have specifically explained that holding a formal leadership position doesn't necessarily mean a student has made a strong impact. They're interested in what the student actually did and how they engaged with their community. ### Should I Keep or Drop an Activity? Not every extracurricular needs to follow you through all four years of high school. MIT explicitly acknowledges that interests can change - exploring something and realising it isn't for you is normal. If you're deciding whether an activity still deserves your time, try this five-question check: - Do I still care about this? - Am I still learning or developing? - Am I contributing something meaningful? - Would I do this if college applications didn't exist? - Is this taking time away from something I care about more? If most of your answers are no, it might be time to redirect your energy. Consistency can show commitment, but staying in an activity purely to accumulate another year on your résumé isn't the point. ### Find the Story in Your Activities When application season comes, don't just tell colleges what the organisation does. Show them what you did within it. Compare: Weaker: Member of Entrepreneurship Club. Attended weekly meetings and participated in events. Stronger: Helped organise a student startup competition, recruited 12 teams, coordinated local entrepreneur judges, and developed promotional materials. The second version tells us much more about the student's actual role. A useful framework is: Action → Contribution → Result - Action: What did you actually do? - Contribution: What did you bring to the organisation, project, or community? - Result: What happened because of your involvement? Results don't always need to be huge numbers or awards. Maybe you improved a process, developed a skill, helped another person, created something, solved a problem, or took on more responsibility. Common App currently gives applicants only 150 characters for activity details, honours, and accomplishments, so being specific and concise matters. ### Putting It All Together What does "going deeper" actually look like? There isn't one perfect extracurricular path, but here's an example of how a genuine interest could naturally develop over time - a student interested in business and sustainability: 1. Explore: Joins their school's sustainability club and starts learning more about environmental issues. 2. Contribute: Helps organise a recycling or waste-reduction initiative at school. 3. Investigate: Becomes curious about the problem, collects data on school waste, and researches potential solutions. 4. Expand: Interviews sustainable businesses, takes a related summer course, conducts independent research, or finds another way to learn outside school. 5. Create or lead: Uses what they've learned to propose an improvement, launch an initiative, lead a project, or help other students get involved. This is not a formula you need to copy. One student might explore an interest through research. Another might get a job, volunteer, build something independently, compete, create art, care for family members, or contribute to their community. Admissions offices evaluate students within the context of the opportunities available to them. MIT emphasises what students do with the options they have, while Stanford considers work and family responsibilities alongside more traditional extracurriculars. So instead of asking "what activity will look best?", try asking: "what am I curious about, and what's the next meaningful thing I could do with that interest?" ### Build Your Extracurricular Roadmap Choose two or three of the activities that currently take up the most time or matter most to you. For each one, ask yourself: - Why did I originally start? - Why do I still care about it? - What have I actually contributed? - What have I learned or gotten better at? - What's one way I could go deeper? - Is there something I could create, improve, investigate, or take responsibility for? - Do I actually want to keep doing this? Then look across your answers. Your next extracurricular opportunity might not be another club - it might be going deeper into something you've already started. ### The Takeaway There is no perfect extracurricular list. The strongest approach isn't: do more → collect titles → fill every application slot. It's: explore → choose → go deeper → contribute → reflect → communicate. Follow genuine interests. Give yourself room to explore. Invest more deeply when something matters to you. Look for ways to contribute. And when it's time to tell your story, focus on what you actually did and what the experience meant to you. That's a much better foundation than trying to build the extracurricular profile you think colleges want. If you're weighing up how a passion project fits into your extracurricular story, we've written a companion guide on what makes one strong and how to actually finish it: [Read the passion project guide](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/what-makes-a-strong-passion-project-for-college-applications) If you're curious about business research or AI and want the kind of structured, in-depth activity admissions officers say they value - small-team mentorship from Ivy League and Oxbridge academics, and independent work that stays your own: [Explore our programmes](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/#programmes) These ideas draw on published guidance from [MIT Admissions](https://mitadmissions.org/apply/prepare/activities/), [Stanford Undergraduate Admission](https://admission.stanford.edu/apply/overview/index.html), [Yale Undergraduate Admissions](https://admissions.yale.edu/what-yale-looks-for), and [Common App](https://www.commonapp.org/apply/first-year-students). ### How to Start a Passion Project: A 90-Day Plan You'll Actually Finish Published 2026-05-20 by Hinksey Labs. Category: Passion Projects. URL: https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/how-to-start-a-passion-project-90-day-plan-for-high-school-students So you know what makes a passion project worth doing. The harder part is turning a vague interest into something real, and then actually finishing it. This is the practical half of the guide: how to find your idea, use AI to sharpen it, decide whether it's worth committing to, and build it in ninety days. If you haven't already, it's worth starting with what actually makes a project strong, and the mistakes that sink most of them: [Read part one](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/what-makes-a-strong-passion-project-for-college-applications) ### Finding Your Idea "What's your passion?" is a surprisingly difficult question to answer directly. Instead, look for intersections between four things. - Curiosity - what do you voluntarily read, watch, research or talk about? - Friction - what makes you think "why does this work this way" or "why hasn't someone fixed this"? - Community - what problems do people around you encounter, at school, at home, on a team, or online? - Skills - what are you already good at, and what would you love an excuse to get better at? Now start combining them: interest, plus a question or problem, plus action, equals project territory. Soccer and statistics might ask whether data reveals something about a team's performance. AI and education might ask where AI is actually helping or hurting students' learning. Fashion and sustainability might ask what happens to unwanted clothing in your community. Psychology and social media might ask how a specific online behaviour affects students. You don't need your final idea yet - you need a direction worth exploring. ### Three Project Shapes Worth Exploring There is no one type of project admissions officers universally favour - [Penn](https://admissions.upenn.edu/how-to-apply/preparing-your-application/activities) specifically says it doesn't value one kind of activity over another. But three structures give students plenty of room to show curiosity, initiative and sustained effort. #### The Researcher: Investigate Something Question, research, evidence, finding, communication. If you're interested in behavioural economics, you might survey students about impulse purchasing, analyse what influences their decisions, interview someone working in behavioural science, and turn your findings into a report or presentation. You could investigate almost anything: AI bias, sports performance, local history, consumer psychology, environmental change, education, music, finance or public policy. #### The Builder: Create Something Problem, user, prototype, test, improve. If you notice students struggle to find local volunteering opportunities, you might interview students and organisations to understand why, build a simple searchable resource, test it with one school, and improve it based on feedback. The output could be an app, but it could just as easily be a physical prototype, a database, a website, a curriculum or a tool. #### The Community Problem-Solver: Make Something Useful Need, learn, act, measure, improve. If you're interested in nutrition and notice younger athletes don't understand what to eat before competitions, you might interview athletes about what they currently know, consult credible nutrition resources or an expert, develop a workshop, run it with one team, and collect feedback. These categories don't have to stay separate - research, build, test, share can become one strong project progression. ### Use AI to Brainstorm, Not to Choose For You AI can be a useful brainstorming partner, but typing "give me ten impressive passion projects for college" produces the same generic list it could give thousands of other students. Use it to interrogate your interests instead. Prompt 1, to find your intersections: "Interview me to uncover potential passion-project directions. Ask me one question at a time about what I voluntarily read or watch, problems I notice, communities I'm part of, skills I have, skills I want to develop, subjects I enjoy, and experiences that have shaped my interests. Don't suggest projects yet. After ten questions, identify five interesting intersections between my interests and real problems or questions." Prompt 2, to go deeper: "I'm interested in [topic]. Don't give me generic passion-project ideas. Generate fifteen specific questions or problems within this topic that a high school student could realistically investigate, build something around, test, document or address in eight to sixteen weeks. Explain what makes each question interesting." Prompt 3, to pressure-test an idea: "My idea is [idea]. Act as a sceptical project advisor. Score it from one to five on personal connection, specificity, feasibility, opportunity for learning, originality, usefulness and ability to produce a concrete outcome. Identify the three biggest reasons I might abandon it, and suggest ways to redesign it - without simply making it sound more impressive for college admissions." Prompt 4, to make it smaller: "My goal is [goal]. Turn this into a minimum viable project I could complete in thirty days with less than [X] hours a week and a budget below [$X]. Then show me what phase two and phase three could look like if the first version succeeds." Remember: AI should help you ask better questions. It shouldn't manufacture your interests for you. ### Choose a Project You'll Actually Finish If you're deciding between several ideas, don't choose the one that sounds most impressive. Score each one from one to five on the following, out of a total of thirty-five: 1. Would I still care about this if colleges never saw it? 2. Can I explain the question or problem in one sentence? 3. Can I start with the resources I currently have? 4. Can I complete a first version in eight to twelve weeks? 5. Will I learn something I genuinely want to learn? 6. Will I produce something concrete? 7. Could someone besides me benefit from or learn from it? - 28 to 35: a strong candidate. - 21 to 27: there's something here - refine or shrink it. - 20 or below: reconsider the scope, or explore another direction. ### Your 90-Day Roadmap You have an idea. Now make it real. #### Weeks 1-2: Explore Research your topic, read credible sources, and talk to people who understand or experience the problem. Turn your broad interest into a specific question. Goal: you can explain exactly what you're exploring and why. #### Weeks 3-4: Design Decide what you're actually going to do. Define the first output, and identify the skills, people or resources you'll need. Most importantly, define what "finished" means. Goal: you know what version one looks like. #### Weeks 5-8: Do the Work This is where the project becomes more than an idea. Conduct interviews, analyse data, run the experiment, build the prototype, write the research, develop the curriculum, film the documentary, or run the event. Goal: something exists that didn't exist before. #### Weeks 9-10: Test and Get Feedback Show your work to someone - who that is depends on the project: users, students, teachers, experts, community members, readers or participants. Ask what worked, what didn't, what surprised them, and what should change. #### Weeks 11-12: Improve and Share Use what you've learned to revise your work. Then decide how the final project should live in the world - a report, website, presentation, event, resource, prototype, publication, or something else entirely. ### Is My Passion Project "Good Enough"? Forget follower counts for a moment. See whether you can answer these five questions with something specific: 1. Why this? Why were you interested enough to pursue it? 2. What did you actually do? Not what your club, organisation or project "does" - what did you investigate, create, decide, organise, test or change? 3. What happened? What did you produce or discover? Did someone use it? Did something fail? Did your understanding change? 4. What did you learn? What do you understand now that you didn't when you started? 5. What would you do next? If you had another six months, where would you take it? If you have interesting, specific answers to those questions, you have something far more valuable than a project with an impressive-sounding title. You have a story about curiosity, action and growth - and that's the point. Ready to start your business research paper or AI project with structured mentorship from Ivy League and Oxbridge academics? [Start your application](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/application) ### What Makes a Strong Passion Project (and Five Mistakes to Avoid) Published 2026-05-06 by Hinksey Labs. Category: Passion Projects. URL: https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/what-makes-a-strong-passion-project-for-college-applications You have probably heard that you need a "passion project" for college. But a passion project isn't a box to check, and there isn't one type of project that automatically impresses an admissions officer. The admissions offices at several highly selective universities say something far more useful than any checklist could. [Stanford](https://admission.stanford.edu/apply/overview/index.html) explains that an exceptional depth of experience in one or two activities can demonstrate passion more than minimal participation in five or six clubs. [Harvard](https://college.harvard.edu/guides/prospective-students/application-tips) says it is far more interested in the quality of a student's activities than the quantity. And [Penn](https://admissions.upenn.edu/how-to-apply/preparing-your-application/activities) states explicitly that it does not look for a predetermined list of activities, and instead considers how students spend their time, take initiative, contribute and collaborate. ### Start With What You Care About, Not What Looks Good The takeaway is simple. Don't start by asking "what project would look impressive?" Start by asking "what do I care enough about to explore deeply, and what can I actually do with that interest?" There isn't a magic formula. A non-profit isn't inherently better than a research paper. An app isn't inherently better than a community workshop, and a project doesn't need thousands of users to be worthwhile. Instead, strong projects tend to share five building blocks. #### Genuine Interest There should be a believable connection between you and the subject. What makes you curious about it? Would you keep learning about it even if it weren't going on a college application? [Yale](https://admissions.yale.edu/what-yale-looks-for) looks for qualities including intellectual initiative, curiosity, creativity and an enterprising mindset, and Stanford similarly wants to understand applicants' curiosity and the ways they have expanded their perspective. #### A Specific Question or Problem "I'm passionate about mental health" is an interest. "How does late-night social media use affect sleep habits among teenagers at my school?" is a question you can actually investigate. Strong projects move from a broad interest toward something specific enough to act on. #### Initiative A passion project gives you room to make decisions. You might identify the question, design the research, build the solution, contact experts, organise participants, or work out why your first attempt didn't work. Penn specifically points to the activities section of an application as a place where admissions officers can see where a student has taken initiative, collaborated with others and contributed to their community. #### Sustained Exploration A strong project should take you beyond an afternoon of searching online. You might read research, interview experts, collect data, test an idea, learn a new skill, or revise your work based on what you discover. [PBLWorks' research-informed framework for high-quality project-based learning](https://www.pblworks.org/what-is-pbl/gold-standard-project-design) identifies a challenging question, sustained inquiry, authenticity, student choice, reflection, critique and revision, and a public product as the elements of strong project design. #### An Outcome Give the project somewhere to go. That might be a research report, prototype, dataset, workshop, documentary, curriculum, website, experiment, event or publication. The goal isn't necessarily to change the world - Stanford explicitly says it considers both the impact students have had on their surroundings and the impact their experiences have had on them. ### The Five Biggest Passion Project Mistakes Even strong ideas can go wrong in the execution. Here are the mistakes we see most often. #### Starting With "What Will Look Good?" This usually produces a project designed around an imagined admissions formula rather than a student's actual interests. There is no predetermined list of extracurriculars colleges want to see - Penn says this explicitly, and Yale emphasises curiosity, intellectual initiative, and a willingness to explore new horizons. Try asking instead: what topic, question or problem would I willingly spend the next three months learning about? #### Creating an Organisation You Don't Need You care about financial literacy, so you create "The Youth Financial Literacy Initiative," make an Instagram account, post three times, and stop. Starting an organisation can be great when an organisation is actually needed - but don't start with the title. Start with the problem. A student interested in financial literacy could instead interview fifty teenagers about common financial misconceptions, analyse the findings, build a workshop around the results, test it with students, and improve it based on their feedback. Problem first. Format second. #### Going Too Broad "Improve teenage mental health" isn't really a project yet. "Investigate how nighttime notifications affect sleep habits among students at my school" is much closer. A strong project needs a question or problem specific enough to investigate - PBLWorks similarly places a challenging problem or question at the centre of high-quality project design. #### Confusing Visibility With Impact A large follower count can be exciting, but it isn't the only way to measure whether something mattered. Thirty students using a resource you built, ten meaningful interviews, an experiment with an unexpected finding, or a workshop your school adopts can all be meaningful outcomes. Harvard emphasises the nature of a student's contribution, and Stanford says it wants to understand the impact applicants have had in their school, family, job and wider community. #### Designing Something You'll Never Finish Your first version doesn't need a large budget, an advanced team, twenty volunteers and a partnership with a well-known company. Start with something you can complete, then expand it if it works. Think small, finished, tested, improved - in that order. ### Where This Leaves You The building blocks and mistakes above tell you what a strong project looks like. If you want a practical process for finding your idea, testing it, and actually finishing it, we have written the second half of this guide: [Read the 90-day plan](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/how-to-start-a-passion-project-90-day-plan-for-high-school-students) If you're curious about business research or AI and looking for structured mentorship - academic guidance from Ivy League and Oxbridge mentors, working in a small team on a project that stays your own - explore our programmes: [Explore our programmes](https://www.hinkseylabs.com/#programmes) These ideas draw on published guidance from [Stanford](https://admission.stanford.edu/apply/overview/index.html), [Harvard](https://college.harvard.edu/guides/prospective-students/application-tips), [Penn](https://admissions.upenn.edu/how-to-apply/preparing-your-application/activities) and [Yale](https://admissions.yale.edu/what-yale-looks-for) admissions, and on [PBLWorks' research on high-quality project-based learning](https://www.pblworks.org/what-is-pbl/gold-standard-project-design). ### Research Without the White Coat: How Business Research Proves Intellectual Rigour to Colleges Published 2026-01-05 by Simon Kotlerman. Category: Research Programme. URL: https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/research-without-the-white-coat-how-business-research-proves-intellectual-rigour-to-colleges When most high school students hear the word "research," they immediately picture a white coat, safety goggles, and hours spent pipetting clear liquids into test tubes. But did you know that the business world is full of research too - work that is highly rigorous, practical, and immediately applicable? ### What Actually Is Business Research? In the scientific world, research is about discovering new phenomenons. In the business world, research is about reducing uncertainty. Business research is the process of collecting, analysing, and interpreting data to help an organisation make a difficult decision. For a high school student, this usually falls into three buckets: - Market Intelligence: Who else is solving this problem and how are they doing it? - Customer Discovery: Who actually wants to buy this product, and why? - Strategic Analysis: Should the organisation expand into a new region or pivot their product? It requires the same critical thinking as STEM research, but the feedback loop is faster. The stakes are also immediate: revenue generated, awareness created, and people affected. ### The "Real World" Learning Curve As the Programme Director at Hinksey Labs, an international business research hub for talented high school students, I've noticed a pattern. Students come into our programme accustomed to high school research, where they tackle theoretical questions. However, they quickly realise that at Hinksey Labs, they are acting as junior consultants to a real organisation. They have to shift their mindset, constantly moving between deep-dive research and the broader picture of what they are trying to prove. The biggest learning we have had working with multiple cohorts is that students are capable of incredibly high-level strategic thought if you treat them like adults. They don't need to be coddled; they need proper guidance to help frame their research process, and then they need direct access to the problem they are exploring. ### The Story of Mariana There is no better example of this than Mariana dos Santos, one of our standout alumni and a current Economics student at Dartmouth College. When Mariana joined us, she chose to conduct her research with Cynamics, a cutting-edge AI Cybersecurity startup. However, she faced a significant challenge: diving deep into a highly technical industry despite having a non-technical background. She had to understand the "Why" behind the technology without being a cybersecurity expert herself - approaching the challenge instead through a business lens to quickly master market dynamics, business models, and strategies for value creation and market positioning. Mariana immersed herself in her research, posed sharp questions to the CTO, and synthesised complex information into actionable insights and recommendations for Cynamics - demonstrating exceptional intellectual rigour and business acumen that serve her today at Dartmouth and will certainly serve her well into the future. ### Why This Matters for Students If you are a student interested in business, economics, entrepreneurship, or social sciences, you don't need to force yourself into a chemistry lab to do "research." You can look at the business world. You can analyse markets. You can solve problems for real companies. That is research. And, it is a powerful story to tell. I invite you to visit Hinksey Labs to learn more about how we support high school students passionate about real-world business research. ### Why High School Research Programmes Can Transform Your Future Published 2024-12-10 by Hinksey Labs. Category: Research Programme. URL: https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/why-joining-a-summer-research-programme-or-exploring-research-opportunities-during-the-school-year-can-transform-your-future In today's fast-changing world, being successful as a student involves more than just getting top marks. It's about developing critical thinking and problem-solving skills - skills that will prepare you to navigate complex challenges both in school and beyond. Research is one of the best ways to build these skills. Whether through a summer research programme or research opportunities that fit around your school year, engaging in meaningful research can give you a head start toward your future goals. ### Why Research Is Important for High School Students Research isn't just about writing essays or memorising facts - it's about diving deeper into questions that matter and discovering creative solutions. It allows you to go beyond the limits of your classroom learning and tackle real-world issues that spark your curiosity. Imagine researching how a company could enter a new market, analysing how emerging technologies are reshaping an industry, or exploring how an organisation could create greater social impact. Through research, you can investigate complex questions, uncover evidence-based insights, and develop ideas with real-world relevance. ### The Benefits of Summer and School-Year Research Programmes Research programmes offer unique opportunities that enrich your education, boost your confidence, and prepare you for success in the future. Here's how: #### Get Hands-On Experience Research programmes allow you to immerse yourself in real-world challenges, turning theory into practice. You'll build essential skills like data analysis, critical thinking, and project management while working on projects that go beyond the traditional classroom experience. #### Learn from Mentors and Experts Many summer research programmes and school-year initiatives connect students with academics, researchers, or industry leaders who guide you through your work. Their mentorship can give you invaluable feedback and help you develop a professional approach to solving problems. #### Build an Impressive Portfolio Completing a research project demonstrates qualities that college admissions teams value: initiative, intellectual curiosity, and the ability to work through complex tasks. Whether it's presenting your findings, producing a detailed research paper, or pursuing opportunities to publish your work, your project can showcase your interests and capabilities beyond the classroom. #### Explore Career and Academic Interests Engaging in research helps you try out potential career paths and refine your academic interests. Whether it's environmental science, technology, business, or the arts, research allows you to test your passions and build a clearer picture of where you want to go next. ### Research Programmes Can Help You Stand Out in College Admissions It's no secret that colleges look for more than just good grades. Admissions committees want students who can think critically, take initiative, and pursue their passions. A research project is a concrete way to show those qualities. If you've investigated a complex question, produced an independent research paper, or applied your findings to a real-world challenge, you have tangible evidence of your curiosity, initiative, and ability to think deeply. Pursuing research during the summer or school year demonstrates initiative and a willingness to explore your interests beyond the classroom. ### How to Choose the Right Research Programme With so many options available, it's important to find a programme that fits your interests and goals. Here are a few things to look for: Experienced Mentors: Look for opportunities to learn from academics and professionals who can challenge your thinking, provide meaningful feedback, and guide your development. Real-World Focus: Strong programmes go beyond theory, giving you opportunities to investigate meaningful questions and connect your research to real organisations, industries, or challenges. Tangible Outcomes: Consider what you'll have to show for your experience. Completing an independent research paper or other substantial project gives you something concrete that reflects what you've learned and accomplished. Flexibility: Look for programmes that fit your schedule and allow you to balance research with school and other commitments. ### How Hinksey Labs Can Help You Excel At Hinksey Labs, ambitious high school students can take their interests beyond the classroom through dedicated pathways in research and AI. For students interested in business, economics, and research, Hinksey Labs offers two research programmes designed for different levels of depth and experience. Research Scholars is designed for students ready to dive deeper into business and research, working toward a full independent business research paper addressing a challenge faced by a real organisation. Students learn in intimate teams with dedicated Ivy League and Oxbridge PhD and MBA mentors, engage with industry experts, and explore an extensive MBA-based curriculum through live online learning, office hours, and independent research. Research Fundamentals offers a shorter, foundational introduction to business concepts and research methodologies. With dedicated mentorship, students develop an independent foundational research paper that they can continue building on in the future. Across both programmes, students strengthen their analytical and research skills and leave with a tangible body of work that reflects their interests and capabilities. Students more interested in technology, entrepreneurship, and building with artificial intelligence can also explore Hinksey Labs' AI Builders and AI Explorers programmes. ### Start Your Research Journey Today Research isn't just about academics - it's an opportunity to explore your interests, ask meaningful questions, and turn your curiosity into tangible work. Whether you're looking for a summer research programme or an opportunity that fits alongside the school year, starting early gives you more time to develop your skills and discover where your interests can take you. Explore Hinksey Labs' Research Scholars and Research Fundamentals programmes and find the pathway that's right for you. ### Why High School Students Should Explore Real-World Learning Beyond the Classroom Published 2024-11-19 by Hinksey Labs. Category: Social Impact. URL: https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/why-high-school-students-should-explore-programmes-that-combine-research-business-and-social-impact High school is about more than attending classes and completing assignments - it's a time to explore who you are and what you want to achieve. It's the perfect stage to dive into your interests, discover your potential, and find ways to make a difference in the world. While traditional schooling provides a strong foundation, opportunities outside the classroom offer a chance to grow in ways you might not have imagined. Programmes that combine academic learning with real-world application can help you explore fields like business, research, technology, entrepreneurship, and social impact while developing the skills to think critically, solve complex problems, and turn ideas into action. ### Research and Real-World Application: Turning Knowledge into Impact Research is one powerful way to take learning beyond essays and exams, giving you the chance to investigate meaningful questions and explore problems with practical relevance. Imagine exploring how global companies can adopt ethical supply chains to meet sustainability goals or studying how artificial intelligence can improve access to quality education. Now, imagine your research, ideas, or solutions being applied to challenges faced by real organisations. These programmes bridge the gap between classroom learning and practical application. You won't just learn - you'll create. From research papers and strategic recommendations to applied AI projects, the work you create can demonstrate how ideas translate into real outcomes. Along the way, you'll strengthen skills like critical analysis, clear communication, and creative problem-solving, preparing you to address the challenges that matter most. ### Developing Entrepreneurial Thinking and Problem-Solving Skills Entrepreneurship isn't just about launching a business - it's about identifying opportunities, finding innovative solutions, and taking action. These programmes invite you to step into the shoes of an entrepreneur, whether you're analysing a business model, helping an organisation improve its strategy, or building a technology-driven solution to a real challenge. Through hands-on projects, you'll learn what it takes to bring ideas to life. You'll discover how to make thoughtful decisions, overcome obstacles, and adapt when plans change - all while building confidence in your ability to lead and collaborate. These experiences will not only sharpen your problem-solving skills but also open your eyes to your own potential. ### Fostering Social Responsibility and Impact Real-world learning also gives students the opportunity to consider how their ideas and decisions affect the world around them. Whether through business, research, entrepreneurship, or technology, students can explore how organisations address challenges such as sustainability, inequality, education, and global health. Think about researching how a business could operate more sustainably, developing a strategy to help a non-profit expand its impact, or building a technology-driven solution to an unmet need. Projects like these challenge you to think beyond theory and consider how your skills can contribute to meaningful outcomes. ### Standing Out in College Admissions Strong academic performance is only one part of a student's story. Meaningful experiences beyond the classroom can demonstrate qualities such as initiative, intellectual curiosity, creativity, and a willingness to challenge yourself. Creating a substantial independent project or finding a solution to a challenge connected to a real organisation gives you real evidence of your interests, initiative, and capabilities. These experiences give you meaningful work to draw on when communicating who you are, what you care about, and how you've taken your interests beyond the classroom. ### A Programme That Brings It All Together If you're ready to take your learning to the next level, Hinksey Labs offers the ideal opportunity. Our programmes uniquely combine mentorship from top academics and industry leaders with hands-on projects tackling real-world challenges. This dynamic blend of academic rigour and practical application equips high school students to seize tomorrow's opportunities with confidence. Through dedicated pathways in Research and AI, students can choose the experience that best aligns with their interests and goals. You'll work in small, collaborative groups with dedicated Ivy League and Oxbridge mentors, participate in live online learning and office hours, and apply your knowledge to develop an independent business research paper or AI project. Students looking for a deeper experience can tackle challenges faced by real organisations through Research Scholars or AI Builders, while Research Fundamentals and AI Explorers provide a strong foundation students can continue building on. This transformative journey equips students with practical skills, confidence, and tangible work that reflects their interest, while empowering them to think critically about the impact they can make. If you're ready to challenge yourself, make a difference, and take your learning beyond the classroom, Hinksey Labs is the place for you. ### Welcome to Hinksey Labs: Empowering the Next Generation of Changemakers Published 2024-11-01 by Simon Kotlerman. Category: A note from us. URL: https://www.hinkseylabs.com/blog/welcome-to-hinksey Dear Students and Parents, At Hinksey Labs, we believe that high school is not just a time for learning - it's a time for dreaming big and taking the first steps toward making those dreams a reality. That's why we've created programmes that bridge the gap between academic excellence and real-world impact, offering ambitious young minds opportunities to dive into the world of research, business, AI, and social impact. My name is Simon Kotlerman, and I'm honoured to serve as the Director at Hinksey Labs. Growing up, I was driven by an insatiable curiosity and a hunger to learn. I enrolled in countless online courses and sought out every practical experience I could find. My early career saw me pursuing the rigorous path of law, where I became a certified attorney. Yet, it wasn't until I pursued my MBA at the University of Oxford that I truly discovered the transformative power of bridging the gap between theoretical knowledge and practical application. While my legal training honed my analytical thinking and problem-solving skills, it was my time at Oxford that revealed how these skills could be leveraged in innovative and impactful ways. During my MBA, I co-founded Orzila Strategy, an initiative designed to support investment readiness for startups in emerging markets. This entrepreneurial project gave me invaluable insights into the unique challenges faced by organisations in the Global South and strengthened my understanding of how research, business, and social impact intersect. As part of this work, I also undertook a research fellowship with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Global Resilience Partnership, conducting a comprehensive analysis of blended finance strategies supporting organisations in 19 developing countries. These experiences were pivotal in shaping my belief in the power of using business as a force for good. Equally influential were my years serving on the board of Secure Future, an NGO dedicated to preventing violence among young people. Leading initiatives to promote safe and inclusive environments for youth was incredibly rewarding and gave me firsthand insights into the challenges and potential of young minds. This experience solidified my belief in the importance of empowering the next generation early on, providing them with the tools to harness their passion for positive change. In addition to these roles, I bring years of experience in consulting and start-ups, where I worked on a wide range of projects - building partnerships, advising on strategy, and helping teams bring innovative ideas to market. It was during these diverse experiences that I saw the transformative potential of equipping young people with the skills to think critically, work collaboratively, and tackle global challenges with confidence. These experiences inspired the creation of Hinksey Labs - a practical educational organisation named after the renowned Hinksey Stream in Oxford. It is designed to give high school students the opportunities I wish I'd had at their age: learning from top academics and industry practitioners in the most practical, hands-on way. At Hinksey, we empower students to dive into the stream of knowledge, learn to navigate its currents, and channel their curiosity and interests into meaningful work they can be proud of. ### Meet Dr. Aviv Yehezkel: Shaping the Vision of Hinksey Labs One of the key figures behind Hinksey Labs' success is Dr. Aviv Yehezkel, a member of our Advisory Board. Aviv is nothing short of an inspiration. As a teenager, he completed his bachelor's degree in computer science while still in high school. By his mid-20s, he had earned a PhD from the Technion, and later an MBA from the University of Oxford, all while co-founding a thriving startup that earned him a coveted spot on Forbes 30 Under 30. Aviv's journey exemplifies the qualities we aim to nurture in our Hinksey Scholars: intellectual curiosity, entrepreneurial drive, and a commitment to making a positive impact. He brings extensive expertise to Hinksey Labs, drawing on his academic and professional achievements to help shape our approach to learning and mentorship. With Aviv's insights, Hinksey Labs is more than an academic experience - it's a place for students to explore their interests, develop ambitious ideas, and turn their learning into tangible work. ### What Awaits You at Hinksey Labs Joining Hinksey Labs means becoming part of a vibrant community committed to turning curiosity and ambition into tangible work. Through dedicated pathways in Research and AI, students can choose an experience that aligns with their interests, goals, and level of experience. Across our programmes students will learn in small teams led by PhD and MBA, and MA researchers and experienced business leaders. Through this journey, you'll master essential skills in research, business strategy, AI, and social impact, all while working on real-world projects for organisations making a tangible difference. By the end of the programme, you'll graduate with a robust toolkit of skills, meaningful mentorship, a global network of like-minded peers, and independent work that reflects what they are capable of creating. At Hinksey Labs, our mission extends beyond preparing students for university applications or future careers. We are dedicated to empowering students with the confidence to explore ambitious ideas and think independently. By combining academic rigour with practical application, expert mentorship, and real-world outcomes, Hinksey Labs offers a transformative experience for students ready to explore their potential and turn their interests into action. We look forward to welcoming you to the Hinksey Labs family and embarking on this exciting journey together! Warm regards, Simon Kotlerman Director, Hinksey Labs