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What do cutting edge research, state-of-the-art laboratory facilities and unparalleled access to professional scientists and engineers have in common? The AEOP High School Internship. Spend your summer in a university research lab or in one of the U.S. Army Research Laboratories and Centers through this unique internship opportunity. You will experience firsthand the innovation and research that is driving the future of our country. Do something meaningful this summer to prepare you for competitive college admissions and the next step in your STEM journey. Submit your application today for a chance to participate in the AEOP Internship Program. The impacts of this transformative experience will last a lifetime.

AEOP Internship Benefits

  • Stand out from your peers by making the most of your summer. The experience of an AEOP internship looks good to college admissions officers.
  • Be in the room where it happens. Apply classroom knowledge and feed your curiosity by immersing yourself in the research world. Not only will you be exposed to high-tech equipment and cutting edge techniques, but you will learn the sounds, smells, and the pace of the lab. Learn the culture of STEM.
  • Mentorship is the special sauce. There is so much to learn from the people in the lab. As an AEOP Intern you will receive formal mentorship from a professional scientist or engineer. In addition to this, there will be multiple opportunities for you to learn from the STEM practitioners, of varying levels of experience, around you. Receive guidance and coaching and start building a network that will make all the difference in your STEM journey.
  • Research that matters. U.S. Army-sponsored research addresses the Nation’s biggest challenges. An AEOP internship provides the opportunity to be part of the long history of discovery and innovation for the benefit of our country.
  • Ongoing support. Connect with a community of like-minded peers, other AEOP interns from throughout the country in virtual office hours with Near Peer Mentors. Near Peer Mentors are just a few steps ahead of you. They provide “real talk” and answer intern’s most pressing questions. Take advantage of the AEOP’s ongoing webinar series that highlights hot STEM careers, research areas, and additional opportunities with the AEOP. Or, attend a workshop to build college-readiness and professional skills.
  • Earn a stipend. Not only is participation in the AEOP free, all AEOP intern receive an educational stipend in recognition of their work.

Information for Applicants

  • In collaboration with universities and U.S. Army Research Laboratories and Centers, the AEOP is proud to offer summer internships for high school students throughout the country.
  • Internships take place onsite unless otherwise noted. (In the case of location closures due to COVID-19 restrictions, internships may be offered remotely or cancelled depending on individual location circumstances.)
  • AEOP High School Internships are designed for commuters. Transportation, meals, and housing are not provided. It is important to keep this in mind when selecting locations in the application.
  • Applicants must meet eligibility requirements, complete the AEOP High School Internships application, and submit recommendations (if required) by the due date in order to be considered for an internship.
  • Locations may require that applicants meet specific age or grade in school requirements (not negotiable). Prerequisite coursework may also be required.
  • In the effort to ensure equitable access to STEM education, some sites target participants from underrepresented or military connected families.
  • Please review the application FAQ for application tips and answers to frequently asked questions. We strongly recommend that you write the essay and gather materials (transcript, etc.) before starting the application.
  • There is no application fee and participation in AEOP Internships is free.
  • All interns earn an educational stipend in recognition of their participation. The stipend amount varies by internship location and program duration. If selected for the internship, information about the stipend will be provided in the award letter.
  • More information about AEOP Summer Internships and the application can be found here.
  • Click here to review all available opportunities.

Interested in High School Internships? Applications for Summer 2024 are now open. 

Stay up-to-date with our application and future opportunities by joining our mailing list here.

Eligibility

All participants must be current high school students who are U.S. citizens or permanent legal residents. Additional eligibility requirements vary by location.

In alignment with the federal government, AEOP supports diversity, equity and inclusion in STEM and is interested in broadening participation from underserved populations. To support this effort, some (but not all) AEOP High School Internships have been specifically designed for participants from underserved groups. (AEOP Undergraduate Internships are open to participants from all backgrounds. Candidates from underserved groups are encouraged to apply.) The information provided by applicant, will be used both to statistically understand AEOP’s reach and to determine if you meet AEOP’s broad definition of underserved. Later in this form, you will be asked for more detailed demographics. The information you provide will be treated as confidential and submission is voluntary.

For these specific sites, applicants must meet at least two of the criteria list below:

  • Identify as Alaskan Native or Native American, Black or African American, Hispanic, and/or Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander
  • Identify as female and am pursuing research in physical science, computer science, mathematics, or engineering
  • Have or previously had a disability; physical or mental impairment, medical condition, or learning disability (ADA)
  • The primary language in their home is not English (ELL)
  • They are a first-generation college student; none of their parents or legal guardians graduated from college (1stGEN)
  • At least one of their parents or legal guardians or my spouse is an active member or veteran of the U.S. military, National Guard or Reserves
    • Military child – dependents of members of the Active-Duty Armed Forces
    • Military-connected – military child plus the dependents of members of the National Guard and Reserves
    • Military-affiliated – military-connected plus the dependents of Veterans
    • Military-connected schools – schools where a minimum of 15% of the student population is military-connected
  • Attend a rural, urban, or frontier/tribal school
  • From a low-income household (FARMS)

Important Dates

December 4, 2023
Summer 2024 High School Internship Application Open

The 2024 application will have rolling opportunities
Internship opportunities will be available on an ongoing basis. Please make sure you pay attention to when sites are closing; applicants will be able to go back and add sites to their application at any time.

Apply Here

Summer 2024 High School Internship applications are open. Click here to review all available opportunities and apply here.

Interested in This Program?

If you are interested in this program email us or call 585-475-4529. We'd love to hear from you!

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    Program Locations

    Click a highlighted state to find a location near you

    Tempe, AZ
    Site: Arizona State University
    Subject area: Material Science
    Description: High school interns will participate in hands-on experiments that will introduce them to the idea of integrating concepts from material chemistry, mechanics of materials, and composites to understand what causes materials to fail. They will also assist the Undergraduate Interns in testbed preparation while learning the importance of quantifying material strength and stiffness, and how these properties are affected by the environment.
    Registration opens: Dec 4, 2023
    Registration closes: Feb 29, 2024

     

     

     

    Los Angeles, CA
    Site: University of California (Los Angeles)
    Subject area: Material Science
    Description: Interns will be actively engaged in the hands-on characterization of AlN films. They will receive comprehensive training in atomic force microscopy (AFM) operation, probing techniques, and basic IV measurements for diode characterization. Additionally, they will be adeptly instructed in the use of Python and MATLAB to craft scripts for efficient data visualization.
    Registration opens: Dec 4, 2023
    Registration closes: Feb 29, 2024

    Playa Vista, CA
    Site: U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command Army Research Laboratory – ARL West
    Description: ARL regional sites create strong, enduring S&T partnerships–working together to solve the Army’s current and future challenges. ARL regional sites leverage regional expertise and facilities to accelerate the operationalizing of science for transformational overmatch. Technical Focus Areas: Human Information Interaction, Contextual Analytics, Hybrid Human Interfaces, Integrated Analysis and Assessment, Joint Human-Agent Decision Making, Cybersecurity, Embedded Processing, Intelligent Systems.
    Application: rolling basis

    New Haven, CT
    Site: Yale University
    Subject area: Material Science
    Description: The high school interns will develop DEM simulations to investigate the stress history of packings of frictional and non-spherical particles in 3D. Through the High School and Undergraduate Research Internship Program, the students will learn to use numerical simulations to model geological flows and have significant exposure to scientific programming, the Unix environment, and running large-scale simulations on high-performance computation clusters. The students will also be trained to communicate their research to a broad range of audiences. Interns will gain insight into STEM careers, graduate school applications, and DOD graduate fellowships. We expect that the students will be coauthors on a peer-reviewed publication and present their work at an internal summer research symposium and a scientific conference.
    Registration opens: Dec 4, 2023
    Registration closes: Feb 29, 2024

    Miami, FL
    Site: Florida International University
    Subject area: Computer Science
    Description: The intern research will be focused on five overarching research projects, 1) robust deep learning systems against deep fakes, 2) extracting forensic event signatures using network science techniques, 3) big data digital forensics, 4) drone forensics with machine learning-based fingerprinting and blockchain security, 5) extracting digital signatures and information through the development of new or improved digital forensic tools. Our large projects will be broken down into small task segments to provide a full research experience for each of the interns. This is dependent upon the overall research project status when students arrive. Each of these subprojects will be directly related to “real world” research in which the principal investigators and key personnel are engaged but tempered to provide a suitable and full research experience.
    Registration opens: Dec 4, 2023
    Registration closes: Feb 29, 2024

    Champaign, IL
    Site: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Engineer Research and Development Center Construction Engineering Research Laboratory
    Description: Under the guidance of mentors, you will conduct research alongside staff and primary researchers. Through your participation in the AEOP program at ERDC laboratories, you will be introduced to a real-world laboratory environment as well as modern research technologies and techniques. This experience will inspire you to continue to pursue STEM disciplines as a career pursuit. 
    Research Areas Includes: military installation and contingency bases sustainability, enhancing socio-cultural understanding in theater operations, improving civil work facilities and infrastructure, resilient facilities and infrastructure, smart sustainable materials, installation decision support and Urban and Stability Operations. 
    Application: rolling basis

    Chicago, IL
    Site: U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command Army Research Laboratory  – ARL South
    Description: ARL regional sites create strong, enduring S&T partnerships–working together to solve the Army’s current and future challenges. ARL regional sites leverage regional expertise and facilities to accelerate the operationalizing of science for transformational overmatch.
    Technical Focus Areas: High Performance Computing, Impact Physics, Machine Learning / Data Analytics, Materials and Manufacturing, Power and Energy, Propulsion Science, Quantum Science
    Application: rolling basis

    Baltimore, MD
    Site: University of Maryland
    Subject area: Immunology
    Description: Interns will do both theoretical and experimental components in basic concepts in Immunology relevant to Army research.  Interns will learn how to understand the hypothesis and design experiments. and will eventually, will individually complete research on molecular and cellular experiments.
    Registration opens: Dec 4, 2023
    Registration closes: Feb 29, 2024

    College Park, MD
    Site: University of Maryland
    Subject area: Physics
    Description: The intern will learn to engage in theoretical work on cold-atom quantum simulators. Projects might involve, simulating many-body localization in cold-atom systems, exploring topological phases using numerical techniques, and investigating quantum phase transitions in cold atom systems.
    Registration opens: Dec 4, 2023
    Registration closes: Feb 29, 2024

    Washington, D.C.
    Site: The University of the District of Columbia
    Subject area: Mechanical Engineering
    Description: The Center of Excellence for Acoustic and Seismic Sensing of Urban Environments (CEASSUE) summer interns will study land-atmosphere interactions in dense urban environments, by studying the effects of these interactions on propagating acoustic/seismic signals. The urban environment can modify surface exchanges with the atmosphere on a larger scale and thus affect flow fields in the area. Recovering mean profiles of wind speed, standard deviation of the vertical velocity, and turbulence intensity from acoustic propagation measurements is a well-known approach. However, the urban environment’s complex reverberation, multipath, diffraction, and signature masking by building structures make this a very harsh environment for robust acoustic measurements. Therefore, coupling acoustic measurements with seismic sensing data, to identify building structure and near-surface ground properties, would enhance the accuracy of the recovered flow field parameters.
    Registration opens: Dec 4, 2023
    Registration closes: Feb 29, 2024

    Adelphi, MD
    Site: U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command Army Research Laboratory  – ARL Adelphi Laboratory Center
    Description: DEVCOM ARL seeks to remain at the forefront of executing the highest-quality research possible, building leaders in the scientific community, setting a bold Army-relevant science agenda and pushing beyond existing boundaries in search of new ideas. ARL fully integrates our internal and external foundational research efforts to shape future concepts with scientific research and knowledge, and deliver technology for modernization solutions to win in the future operating environment.
    Application: rolling basis

    Aberdeen Proving Ground, MD
    Site: U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command Army Research Laboratory  – ARL Aberdeen Proving Ground
    Description: The U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command, known as DEVCOM, Army Research Laboratory is the Army’s research laboratory strategically placed under the Army Futures Command. ARL is the Army’s sole foundational research laboratory focused on cutting-edge scientific discovery, technological innovation, and transitioning capabilities for the future Army.
    Application: rolling basis

    Site: U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command-Aberdeen Proving Grounds, MD- Bi-Directional Adaptation
    Description: This project aims to revolutionize communication between Soldiers and systems, going beyond traditional methods. By focusing on real-time multimodal interactions, it will explore innovative solutions for team-level trust calibration, cohesive team dynamics, dynamic information presentation, and optimizing human-system performance in real-time. This will involve researching and developing technologies that enable Soldiers to communicate with systems as naturally and efficiently as they do with fellow humans, utilizing speech, gestures, and other forms of body language. Army Research DirectorateCompetency: Human In Complex Systems. 
    Application: rolling basis

    Site: U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command-Aberdeen Proving Grounds Estimating and Predicting Human Behavior
    Description: Focusing on the variability of human behavior within complex systems, this project will develop techniques to sense, interpret, and predict change in human states such as stress, fatigue, and intent. By understanding these human elements, the project aims to adapt technologies more effectively and infer the operational environment contexts, thus enabling intelligent systems to better comprehend and collaborate with their human counterparts.
    Application: rolling basis

    Site: U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command-Aberdeen Proving Grounds – GNC Research with the Julia Programming Language
    Description: The Julia programming language aims to solve the “two-language” problem by being as easy to write as python and as fast to run as C. However, it is not widely used in guidance navigation and controls (GNC) communities. Transitioning work in flight simulation, control theory, state estimation, image-based navigation, reinforcement learning, and other areas goes far beyond syntax differences. We’re looking for candidates with strong coding and problem-solving skills to help us figure out how to do GNC research with this new tool.
    Application: rolling basis

    Site: U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command-Aberdeen Proving Grounds – Human-System Teaming
    Description: This project seeks to understand and leverage dynamic interactions within human-system teams. It will develop principles for effective collaboration between Soldiers and intelligent systems, focusing on emergent team properties, variability in performance, shared situational understanding, and dynamic task allocation. Special emphasis will be on adapting to changing conditions, such as loss of capabilities, shifting goals, and adversarial interference.
    Application: rolling basis

    Site: U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command-Aberdeen Proving Grounds -Hybrid Human-Technology Intelligence
    Description: The focus here is on anti-disciplinary research to enhance human-system teams in multi-domain operations. This involves pioneering hybrid approaches that integrate human cognitive capabilities with advanced technology. The project will study the bottlenecks in human cognition, develop technological solutions to overcome these, and explore new methods to leverage human neural processing for creating or enhancing intelligence within human-system teams.
    Application: rolling basis

    Adelphi, MD
    Site: U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command  – Adelphi Laboratory Center – Develop real-time, In-Situ Aerosol Detection System
    Description: Develop innovative real-time, in-situ detection systems for discriminating and identifying harmful biological and chemical aerosol, such as coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), bacteria, from complex atmospheric aerosol particles using multiple optical methodologies.
    Application: rolling basis

    Site: U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command – Adelphi Laboratory Center- Human-Guided System Adaptation
    Description: The Julia programming language aims to solve the “two-language” problem by being as easy to write as python and as fast to run as C. However, it is not widely used in guidance navigation and controls (GNC) communities. Transitioning work in flight simulation, control theory, state estimation, image-based navigation, reinforcement learning, and other areas goes far beyond syntax differences. We’re looking for candidates with strong coding and problem-solving skills to help us figure out how to do GNC research with this new tool.
    Application: rolling basis

     

    Cambridge, MA
    Site: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
    Subject area: Biology
    Description: Interns will learn the organization of species that will be precisely controlled through DNA hybridization. They will evaluate its impact on biofilm formation and metabolism with the modification of Geobacter and Shewanella with different sequences of DNA and patterning electrodes with complementary sequences. Optimization of this patterning protocol will be the goal of the summer research. When combined, metabolic and redox state analysis will provide a foundation to address our hypotheses regarding the impact of interspecies spacing and orientation on nutrient sharing and metabolite transport. From these data, we can inform and refine both our approach to patterning and the specific patterns chosen to investigate emergent phenotypes observed or engineer the coculture for specific applications.
    Registration opens: Dec 4, 2023
    Registration closes: Feb 29, 2024

    Boston, MA
    Site: U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command Army Research Laboratory  – ARL Northeast
    Description:ARL regional sites create strong, enduring S&T partnerships–working together to solve the Army’s current and future challenges. ARL regional sites leverage regional expertise and facilities to accelerate the operationalizing of science for transformational overmatch.
    Technical Focus Areas: Materials & Manufacturing Sciences, Artificial Intelligence & Intelligent Systems, Cyber & Secured Comms at the Tactical Edge
    Application: rolling basis

    Ithaca, NY
    Site: Cornell University
    Subject area: Chemistry
    Description: The interns will conduct DSC (Differential Scanning Calorimetry) measurements to determine the freezing points of these fluids as a function of pore size and mineralogy. Interns will work collaboratively to elucidate the crystallization of fluids in confinement, as discussed in a recent article on benzene crystallization. The anticipated scientific outcomes include the determination of the changes in freezing points as a function of pore size, fluid chemistry, water-hydrocarbon mixtures, and the crystallization behavior of confined fluids. During the first half of the 10-week summer experience, the interns will investigate the freezing behavior of single-component fluids. In the second half, the interns will build on this understanding and extend these studies to include two-component fluid mixtures.
    Registration opens: Dec 4, 2023
    Registration closes: Feb 29, 2024

    NY, NY
    Site: New York University
    Subject area: Computer Science
    Description: Interns will research single qubits, the idea of this topic is to familiarize interns with key concepts of quantum mechanics and learn to transpose them in terms of circuits using Qiskit. After getting familiar with what a qubit is, the intern will learn how to represent it and how to control it using Qiskit, we move on to a larger system. Interns will then look into Quantum State Tomography, this is how one can determine the effect of a circuit on an arbitrary state. Fully characterizing the state of a quantum state requires performing a tomography of the state. Finally, interns will learn about the impact of noise on a qubit with the methods that can be used to characterize a qubit. In the second half of the summer program, we focus on experimental realizations of basic quantum tools.
    Registration opens: Dec 4, 2023
    Registration closes: Feb 29, 2024

    Buffalo, NY
    Site: State University of New York (SUNY)
    Subject area: Computer Science
    Description: The intern will be learning the basics of simple and well-established neural networks. Interns will be tasked with custom-designing a neural network that performs a distinct task. The task assigned will focus on simple classification tasks, i.e., the ability of a neural network to be trained to identify a category of one input by examining its features. Interns will then test their network and report on their findings.
    Registration opens: Dec 4, 2023
    Registration closes: Feb 29, 2024

    West Point, NY
    Site: U.S. Military Academy at West Point
    Description: At West Point, intern research is organized and executed through centers and institutes. These centers and institutes, along with the Academic Research Division provide the infrastructure necessary to tackle the Army and nation’s most challenging problems. Ongoing research is focused on solving current and future Army challenges using a diverse, interdisciplinary team of experts.
    Application: rolling basis

    Oxford, OH
    Site: Miami University
    Subject area: Physics
    Description: High school and undergraduate intrns pair will build a diode laser system capable of detecting nuclear spin in alkali atoms. The interns are provided the optical components, machined mounts, and required electronics for current-driving, temperature-stabilizing, and frequency-scanning the laser diode, and are asked to build the laser system from scratch. Manual-style written instructions are provided to them. In 2024 we will add another extremely useful device to the list – the Spatial Light Modulator (SLM), which enables real-time manipulation of the amplitude and phase of an electromagnetic wavefront, and is widely used in laser pulse shaping and microscopic laser surgery. The EOM, AOM, and SLM are invaluable tools in the burgeoning field of quantum information processing, and we have set aside 2 weeks to train the intern pair on them.
    Registration opens: Dec 4, 2023
    Registration closes: Feb 29, 2024

    Memphis, TN
    Site: University of Memphis
    Subject area: Mechanical Engineering
    Description: High school interns will research IR-based grain surface temperature. By designing a measurement method for mm-sized objects whose temperature can be independently measured using thermocouples. To develop a reliable technique to measure grain surface temperature, a surface temperature measurement method that uses measured flux of IR photons from a mm-sized sphere will be designed by the high school student intern. The thermal energy balance of the object will be used to guide the design of a surface temperature method to predict conditions where the most sensitivity (or highest signal-to noise ratio) may be obtained. Standard techniques to analyze IR images of single grains will be used to infer surface temperature (along with uncertainties) from the measured IR fluxes. The results of such a surface temperature measurement technique would allow validation of the temperature predictions produced by modeling in the parent ARL award. The detection of IR photons emitted by grains will be used to infer the average temperature of the grains and the surface temperature of individual grains.
    Registration opens: Dec 4, 2023
    Registration closes: Feb 29, 2024

    Site: U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command Army Research Laboratory  – ARL South (South, Austin/San Antonio/College Station)
    Description:ARL regional sites create strong, enduring S&T partnerships–working together to solve the Army’s current and future challenges. ARL regional sites leverage regional expertise and facilities to accelerate the operationalizing of science for transformational overmatch.
    Technical Focus Areas: AI/ML for Autonomy, Energy/Power, Cybersecurity, Bio, Materials & Manufacturing. 
    Application: rolling basis

    Fairfax, VA
    Site: George Mason University
    Subject area: Computer Science
    Description: Interns will implement efficient and robust mmWave communication protocols that include robust beam sweeping and beam hopping schemes, Low-probability-of- intercept, and low-probability-of-detect communication schemes with active obfuscation on the mmWave signals. In the beam sweeping phase, Tx and Rx aim to find a set of best tx and rx beam patterns (sectors) at both sides to achieve a good tradeoff between high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and spatial diversity. In the beam hopping phase, Tx and Rx will hop among different beam patterns in order to achieve a low probability of detection against Eve and a low probability of disruption against the jammer. Various online learning protocols will be implemented, including multi-armed bandit (MAB), Q-learning, safe reinforcement learning (RL), etc. These learning algorithms aim to deal with the uncertainty brought by the dynamics of the environment as well as the jamming behavior. The safe RL algorithm aims to meet a quality-of-service (QoS) performance (e.g., short-term BER or delay lower than a threshold) during the entire exploration and exploitation process. Different system parameter settings will be examined, including transmission power, distance between different parties and their relative positions, Tx/Rx patterns, learning and exploration rates, static and mobile scenarios, etc.
    Registration opens: Dec 4, 2023
    Registration closes: Feb 29, 2024

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