Summer Slummin'

How true is that teen-slacker image? Only 47.6% of 16- to 19-year-olds were working or looking for work last month, the lowest June rate in 20 years. Does it matter? We asked two career experts, KATHERINE COHEN, founder of IvyWise, which counsels college applicants, and MARLYN MCGRATH LEWIS, director of admissions at Harvard College, for the most impressive ways to spend summer if you're college bound.

WORK
COHEN makes all her students get a summer job, be it an internship on Wall Street or scooping ice cream at the local mall. By working, she says, "you can show responsibility in the real world. That speaks very loudly to a college admissions officer."

LEWIS agrees that a job is a tremendous "growing-up" experience. "But if you had a summer job for pay, maybe you couldn't have spent the time with your uncle in Paris," she says. "You can't meet every train in life."

STUDY
"I recommend summer classes after 10th grade," Cohen says, to boost your GPA or prep for college. After junior year, she says, get a job.

Learn something new, says Lewis: "If you have an interest in jewelry making, for example, summer might be a good time to take a course."

DO WHAT YOU WANT
Cohen advises finding a productive way to enjoy your interests. If you're a sports fanatic, help out with the local softball league. Or better yet, get an internship at ESPN.

"You should do what you always do in life, which is to pursue your interests," says Lewis, who's less interested in what you did than in "what it meant — what you did with it."