10 Online Certificate Programs for High School Students
- Stephen Turban
- Sep 6, 2024
- 8 min read
Updated: Mar 31
If you're a high school student interested in enhancing your academic profile, consider enrolling in an online certificate program! Courses and certifications can complement your learning by allowing you to explore concepts beyond your school curriculum.
Whether you want to acquire new skills or explore subjects, certifications can offer you a structured path to learn and demonstrate your abilities. This can also enhance your college applications by indicating your ability to work with advanced material in your chosen field. Additionally, online courses allow you to build on your knowledge from the comfort of your home!
Courses from established programs provide a competitive advantage, prepare you for the demands of higher education, and help you make informed decisions about your academic and career goals. Such experiences also provide foundational knowledge and practical skills that can help you initiate research projects or startups.
To help you get started, here are 10 online certificate programs for high school students!
Cost: $799
Application Deadline: Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.
Dates: Multiple four-week sessions are available. The next session begins on September 16. Each certificate program is self-paced and composed of 3 four-week courses.
Eligibility: Students in grades 6–12 can apply.
The Acting Techniques Certificate Program consists of three four-week courses for adults and teens. The course sections are designed for their respective age groups: adults (students 18 and older) or young people (students under 18). For students under 18, the Acting Techniques certificate program will also allow you to earn high school credit. The following acting courses make up the certificate program and may be taken in any order:
Acting Techniques: Monologues: This course will help you develop a solid understanding of acting and use that understanding to analyze scripts and build convincing characters for both the stage and screen. You will learn about the history of acting and acting methods.
Acting Techniques: Scene Study: The course explores how to analyze scripts to uncover the meaning of scenes and inform your performance. You'll explore essential techniques for understanding the dynamics of relationships within a scene and how to portray intentions and actions in a performance.
Acting Techniques: Improvisation: The course begins by exploring the foundational principles of improvisation and how to apply them within the context of scripted scenes. You'll then work on how to develop the character you are portraying, using improvisation to inform your character's identity, motivations, and tactics.
Cost: $13–$42, depending on the time taken to complete the course.
Application Deadline: Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.
Dates: Self-paced; 6 months at 10 hours a week
Eligibility: Open to all with no prior experience required.
The “Google Digital Marketing & E-commerce Professional Certificate Program” is a 7-course series. Throughout this program, you will gain skills that prepare you for an entry-level job and learn how to use tools and platforms like Canva, Constant Contact, Google Ads, Google Analytics, Hootsuite, HubSpot, Mailchimp, Shopify, and Twitter. You will learn to develop digital marketing and e-commerce strategies, attract and engage customers through channels like search and email, measure marketing analytics and share insights, build e-commerce stores, analyze e-commerce performance, and build customer loyalty. This program will allow you to learn from Google's experts and build your portfolio with customer personas and social media calendars to show to potential employers.
Cost: $536.94
Application Deadline: Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.
Dates: Self-paced; 2 months at 4–6 hours per week
Eligibility: Open to all with no prior experience required.
The Communication Skills Professional Certificate Program, offered by Rochester Institute of Technology, focuses on effective business communication skills, from crafting a powerful story to creating impactful presentations. The courses covered in this program include RITx: Storytelling in the Workplace, RITx: Public Speaking, and RITx: Visual Presentation. You will learn about the elements of effective stories and communication strategies and how to use them in the workplace. You will also use active listening and understand various communication styles to build rapport. Additionally, you will learn to customize your messages for a specific audience, clearly present numerical data with visuals, and integrate fundamental visual design principles into presentations.
Cost: $49–$147, depending on the time taken to complete the course.
Application Deadline: Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.
Dates: Self-paced; 1 month at 10 hours a week
Eligibility: Open to all with no prior experience required.
The “Creative Writing Specialization” course offered by Wesleyan University is a 5-course series that includes courses such as Creative Writing: The Craft of Plot, Creative Writing: The Craft of Character, Creative Writing: The Craft of Setting and Description, Creative Writing: The Craft of Style, and Capstone: Your Story. This specialization covers elements of three major creative writing genres: short story, narrative essay, and memoir. In these courses, you will learn how to write a compelling story with interesting characters in a vivid setting, using a fresh and descriptive style. You will also get to analyze and constructively evaluate peer writing. In the Capstone, you will draft, rewrite, and complete a substantial original story in the genre of your choice.
Cost: $799
Application Deadline: Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.
Dates: Multiple four-week sessions are available. The next session begins on September 16. Each certificate program is self-paced and composed of 3 four-week courses.
Eligibility: Students in grades 6–12 can apply.
The Digital Animation Studies Certificate Program consists of three four-week courses for adults and teens. For students under 18, the Acting Techniques certificate program will also allow you to earn high school credit. The following three animation courses make up the certificate program and must be taken in sequential order:
Digital Animation 101: This course deals with character design and the principles of solid drawing, staging, and exaggeration. You'll get to explore the nuances of timing, easing, squash, and stretch as you make your characters move.
Developing Animated Characters: This course covers all the key components of character creation, from exploring the foundational principles of shape language, color, and silhouette to mastering the nuances of facial expressions, body language, and accessorizing.
Animation Techniques—Expressions and Movement: This course is designed to build on your foundational knowledge of digital animation and improve your skills. You'll learn ways to communicate narratives through character body language and expressions, enhancing your ability to create visually engaging movements.
Cost: $895
Application Deadline: Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.
Dates: July 22–August 2. This course is live-streamed, allowing you to ask questions and interact with the instructor.
Eligibility: Students aged 13–18 are eligible. No prior design experience is required.
AGI’s Video Editing Course offers an opportunity for students to work with the industry-standard tools in this field—Premiere Pro and After Effects. You will use Premiere Pro to create video projects by editing videos, combining clips, adding music, and more. In motion graphics, you will use After Effects to create videos, animations, special effects, and more to make vivid designs. You’ll also learn to animate the individual components of a logo, add transitions such as fade-ins & fade-outs, and export your project to create an animated GIF. This program is a solid opportunity for high school students with a strong interest in video editing and motion graphics.
Cost: $49–$147, depending on the time taken to complete the course.
Application Deadline: Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.
Dates: Self-paced, but usually spans 2 months at 10 hours a week.
Eligibility: Open to all, but knowledge of basic code, arithmetic, and algebra is required.
The “Machine Learning Specialization” course, offered by Stanford Online and DeepLearning.AI, provides a beginner-friendly introduction to machine learning. The first course, "Supervised Machine Learning: Regression and Classification," demonstrates how to build machine learning models in Python using machine learning libraries. The second course, "Advanced Learning Algorithms," helps you build and train neural networks. The final course, "Unsupervised Learning, Recommenders, Reinforcement Learning," covers unsupervised learning techniques such as clustering and anomaly detection. You’ll learn how to implement machine learning models to solve problems like predicting housing prices or recognizing handwritten digits.
Cost: $375.95
Application Deadline: Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.
Dates: Self-paced; 2 months at 4–6 hours per week
Eligibility: Open to all with no prior experience required.
The Leadership and Communication Professional Certificate Program, offered by Harvard University, focuses on improving your leadership communication style and decision-making. The courses covered in this program include HarvardX: Exercising Leadership—Foundational Principles and HarvardX: Rhetoric—The Art of Persuasive Writing and Public Speaking.
In the first course, Exercising Leadership—Foundational Principles, you will learn how to be an effective leader and motivate your team while navigating change and tough challenges.
In Rhetoric—The Art of Persuasive Writing and Public Speaking, you will explore proven communication techniques and strategies to articulate your ideas to achieve your goals. You will also learn about the ethical use of rhetoric, dialogue, listening, and self-criticism.
Cost: $79–$236, depending on the time taken to complete the course.
Application Deadline: Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.
Dates: Self-paced; 4 months at 10 hours a week
Eligibility: Open to all with no prior experience required
The “Digital Marketing Specialization” course offered by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is a 7-course series. This specialization will help you explore the new digital marketing environment, including digital marketing analytics, search engine optimization, social media marketing, and 3D Printing. This program will help you acquire a new set of stories, concepts, and tools to help you digitally create, distribute, promote, and price products and services. Once you complete the courses, you can apply your skills to a capstone project setup in partnership with Grainger, a global B2B supplier of maintenance repair and organization supplies.
Cost: $375.95
Application Deadline: Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.
Dates: Self-paced; 6 months at 6–14 hours per week
Eligibility: Open to all with no prior experience required
The Computer Science for Web Programming Professional Certificate Program, offered by Harvard University, is a two-course program that combines CS50’s Introduction to Computer Science course with CS50's Web Programming with Python and JavaScript. It explores the design and implementation of web apps with Python, JavaScript, and SQL using frameworks like Flask, Django, and Bootstrap. You’ll learn to scale your web applications, keep track of changes made to code, coordinate code between different people, and test changes to code. You will also learn to design and implement web pages and web apps and gain familiarity with several languages, including C, Python, SQL, and JavaScript, plus CSS and HTML.
One other option - the Lumiere Research Scholar Program
If you’re interested in pursuing independent research, you could also consider applying to one of the Lumiere Research Scholar Programs, selective online high school programs for students founded with researchers at Harvard and Oxford. Last year, we had over 4000 students apply for 500 spots in the program! You can find the application form here.
Also check out the Lumiere Research Inclusion Foundation, a non-profit research program for talented, low-income students. Last year, we had 150 students on full need-based financial aid!
Stephen is one of the founders of Lumiere and a Harvard College graduate. He founded Lumiere as a PhD student at Harvard Business School. Lumiere is a selective research program where students work 1-1 with a research mentor to develop an independent research paper.