Good Co-Op program selections

College Search & Selection
1

I am a rising senior and I am really interested in going to a school that offers a good Co-Op program for engineering.
I want to study engineering/CS in college and the work experience that I would gain would be very beneficial when it comes to finding a job after college. I was hoping you guys could take a look at my current information and tell me what good co-op programs I could get into.

GPA:
UW: 3.91
W: 4.275
Class rank: 34 out of 661

Sat-2160
(800 math)
ACT-32

EC’s
Sports: Varsity 3 Years- XC -2014 State Qualifier
Varsity 3 Years - Track- 2015 State Qualifier
3 Years on Board for Key Club- over 200 volunteer Hours
DECA - national Qualifier(top 30 nationals) (3rd In state for my event twice and 1st in state for test score for my event)
MUN- Committee Chair for State Conference
National Honors Society Member
Summer Internship at OSU as a Sophomore- 300hours -Research in chemistry department.
Taekwondo Black Belt
Intern at Intel

Please recommend any good programs I should look out for and ones I would have a good shot of getting into.
Thanks!

2

Cost constraints and state of residency?

Coop programs are rather common, so you can just web search for information at each school’s web site.

3

The University of Cincinnati has a very well-established, well-recognized Engineering co-op program.

4

Northeastern university is known for their co-op program.

5

I’ve heard great things about Rochester Insitute of Technology’s co-op program

6

Cincinnati, Northeastern, and Drexel build their curricula assuming that students do co-op programs, but many other schools offer optional co-ops. Even when there is no formalized co-op program, many colleges have lenient withdrawal and readmission policies (assuming that one is in good standing at the time) allowing the student to roll his/her own co-op program (semester + summer off school working at a paid job).

For example, various universities in Oregon have this co-op arrangement: https://www.mecopinc.org/ . Oregon State has its own information at http://engineering.oregonstate.edu/paid-internships .

Ohio State’s co-op program is described at https://ecs.osu.edu/ecip .

Oklahoma State’s co-op program is described at https://studentservices.okstate.edu/cs/co-op .

7

I live in Washington and max my parents would probably pay is 25-30 K. Also do you think I should take my SAT again in October? And finally I have only 1 Sat 2 under my belt, will that hurt me when it comes to applications?

8

Marquette also has a co-op program.

9

I am going to second Northeastern University. Their Co-op program is incredible. It is pretty much the reason why they are ranked #1 in career services.

10

At schools with optional coop programs most students don’t participate because they feel that they will be missing out on something while working on coop: friends, classmates, needed courses etc. The school’s culture is geared to the traditional two semester and summer off pattern.

Even at a coop school like Northeastern many prospective applicants ask how they will be able to “make up” what they missed while on coop. At Northeastern the open houses and admitted students days emphasize how the campus culture revolves around coop and that nothing is “missed”.

11

In Ohio, the previously mentioned University of Cincinnati and the University of Toledo have mandatory co-op programs. The advantage to it being mandatory is that the program is established around the co-op program and you will not find yourself out of sequence for classes. Most engineering programs will support cooperative education. Some others which are mandatory are Northeastern, and Kettering University. I’m sure there are others.

12

https://www.engr.washington.edu/current/coop
http://vcea.wsu.edu/careerfair/

13

Thanks for all the help guys, the drexel co-op program looks amazing same with northeastern. Do most people who do the Co-op programs end up graduating in 5years?

14

There are some that offer accelerated plans to make 4 years. Usually that means a co-op or two less, and you will need AP credit. So in general, expect five but know you can try for four at many places.

15

Students at most schools apply to co-ops and internships. Some schools, like RIT, require students to participate in a co-op. While some large employers exclusively recruit engineering co-op students through selected campus visits, most students have to hustle if they want a job with a company that does not visit their campus. Google, Microsoft, Boeing etc. don’t visit every campus in the country. That’s where online applications come into play. Students from Lake Jr.'s engineering school have participated in co-ops at Intel and NASA for example, even though those employers didn’t visit the campus.

16

Unless the student comes in with a lot of useful credit (from AP or college courses taken while in high school), doing a co-op will extend the calendar time to graduation (i.e. 4.5 to 5 years to graduate) but not usually require any additional tuition-paying school semesters or quarters (i.e. still a total of 8 semesters or 12 quarters if you take full course loads, follow your major’s course plan, and do not fail anything). However, if your major at your school has tightly sequenced prerequisites which are not offered every semester, you need to be careful about choosing your semester off to avoid missing a once-per-year key prerequisite. In some cases, it may make more sense to do two separate co-ops in order to reset the fall/spring sequence so that you are in-phase with the usual offerings.