My understanding is that Coops are not required for graduation. That’s what the college web site states. A few years ago one of my kids were accepted and it was clear then that coop is encouraged but not mandatory.
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Thanks for clarifying!
Correct. Six months of “experiential learning” is required as explained on the website.
- I said tech wasn’t doing great.
- If all the kids at northeatern only want to work at Tesla and Google we have a real problem.
My oldest was looking for internships one summer. Everyone was looking at the obvious companies like Google, Apple, etc.
I told him to look at small to medium sized companies. Had numerous offers. One was some type of dairy distributor. They were happy that someone from Georgia Tech applied. He felt bad turning down offers. He ended up at a smaller company but fantastic, hands-on experience.
The key is to get that first internship somewhere, anywhere to get experience and learn and show you’re work ready.
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That was the advice from my D’s career center - go talk to the companies no one has ever heard of and has no lines. It was especially good advice for younger students. When the big companies all cancelled their internships and co-ops during Covid (or went remote), the smaller companies went ahead with them.
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my D24 is at a school where co-op is required for graduation (RIT). The parent FB group is full of posts of frantic parents whose kids have had difficulty landing one (CS seems to be the worst offender for this), and it does delay graduation. The biggest complaint is that people feel the role of the coop office in assisting with placements was greatly oversold to prospective students. I’m thankful that I started following that group before she made her decision to attend, so she could go into it with eyes wide open on that front.
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Speaking from the perspective of corporate America (or at least my little perch)–
It is HARD to provide coops. The benefits outweigh the costs when the talent market is tight; it’s the reverse when companies are going through lay-offs or delaying promotions, hiring freezes, etc.
Do YOU want to be the person bringing on 10 coop students as the company is laying off 1200 people? No, you do not want to be that person.
Students assume that everything they bring to the table is additive. Yes, enthusiasm. Yes, in some cases, new skills that the employer needs.
But students need to be supervised. Students don’t know the norms of the workplace (pro tip- don’t show up for your Monday morning staff Zoom in pajamas). Etc.
So it shouldn’t be a surprise when the labor market shifts that the time-intensive employees (i.e. the short term coop students) become less of a priority.
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My oldest applied to several co-op friendly schools (Northeastern, Drexel, GT). The schools told us co-op’s weren’t guaranteed when we asked, but they didn’t seem to be going out of their way to advertise that nugget of information.
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