High School Graduation Gift Ideas for College-Bound Students

Every spring and summer, high school seniors (or their parents) throw graduation parties where friends and family mark the achievement with gifts, usually sums of cash. In fact, the generosity demonstrated at high school graduation is on par with that of a wedding, birth, or bar mitzvah. For the more academically inclined high school seniors attending college in the fall, cash gifts are incredibly useful, but they don’t always have the same permanence or meaning once the students are away at school. Money is a practical idea, but it’s not very creative. Your cash gets lumped with everyone else’s to buy any number of things, and the sentiment may get lost after the receipt is tossed. If you want to bestow a stand-out high school graduation gift that a college-bound student will remember, consider the following ideas.

1. New York Times subscription. Regardless of a college student’s major, this world-class newspaper makes an intellectually-minded gift. In fact, some first-year classes (often political science, sociology, and English courses) even require students to read this newspaper! Regardless, the very process of reading such sharp writing tends to rub off on the student’s own writing and vocabulary. And perhaps most important, a major daily newspaper keeps the student abreast of current events while inside the college “bubble.” Even if the student only has time to read it once or twice a week, the Times makes a sensible high school graduation gift. [Practical note: For students living in a college residence hall, most housing offices provide a mailing address to the student during the summer. Also, be sure not to start the subscription until the student moves in.]