The other day I had an interview with a highly respected engineering firm for my area. They practically offered me position and made me fell like I had the upper hand so I could turn and counter offers. The only issue is that it is a 6 month co-op and I would have to stay home next fall semester. As a civil engineering student. I am looking at graduating a semester late as of now. This will push it back a full year. I do have other interviews for internships but I heard they simply don’t offer the amount of expirence as a co-op does. What are you thoughts and comments? Thanks!
Graduating late due to having a co-op job earning (presumably good) money and not paying tuition for a semester is not that big a deal, particularly when the co-op work experience can be a significant advantage in seeking post-graduation jobs. The only issue would be if your school offers some important required courses only in the fall semester. Of course, economic and industry conditions could be different at the different potential dates of graduation, but you won’t know beforehand which date would have a better job market for you to be looking in.
What do you mean you have the upper hand? Why does the company need you?
While interviewing me they’ve dropped subtle hints and at the end to establish I need I told them about other interviews I had, the conductor then gave me her personal cell phone number in case I was pressured into going someplace else and said she’s never had a candidate rank so high by her recruiters and the “desire is there”
They money isn’t horrible but it’s not great compared to some co-ops people online talk about. I was told with civil engineering, no one really hires because it is so strongly based on the construction season. So graduating a semester late puts me in the winter and might have me twiddling my thumbs for a bit. So in the meantime, I could pick another minor or take this position.
Did they make an offer? Do you think you will learn a lot from the project they are working on? I talked to 2 intership students at my company recently: one is happy because he really works with ME design, the other one is not learning and unhappy because he is assigned to run software tests (both major in ME). If the intership position is really good then can work for the entire year and graduate in 5 years. If you start the intership in the summer and find that you won’t learn much then you can quit and go back to school full-time or find another intership.