Internship and JOb PLacement for Engineering Students

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Alabama
1

Could someone give me insight into the help that Alabama gives in getting Internships during Undergrad and Job Placement during Senior Year?

I went to ISU and the Job Placement office was excellent to help secure a position before graduation. Many companies interviewed on campus. Almost all graduates, that were not going to Grad School, had Job offers by early March of Senior year. I know that I had 3 offers to choose from.

To me, these are two key elements of any engineering school that must be strong. :slight_smile:

2

My son has completed both an internship and 2 work sessions of a co-op position.

There is limited help from the school in locating internships. However if you are willing to put effort into locating an opportunity, they are out there. My son completed his internship the summer after his first year of classes. Internships are decreasing in popularity in the business world because of the ROI. Businesses have to invest a substantial amount in recruiting, hiring, and training interns, and then some only stay for a single summer, so co-ops are becoming increasingly popular.

The co-op office at UA is wonderful and I can’t say enough good things about it. In a co-op, students alternate semesters of full time work with semesters of classes and it can add an additional year to a students graduation, but they will graduate with a full year of work experience and all co-op positions are paid positions. The co-op office has an interview day in both the fall and spring and bring many employers to campus. The co-op office meets and works with students prior to interview day and stays in contact with them throughout their experience. My son was initially reluctant to consider a co-op, but I encouraged him to attend interview day and once he was offered a position, he opted to accept it. I’m extremely glad he did, it’s great experience on his resume, a well paying position every other semester, and I don’t have to expend the effort of helping him find internships each year ;).

The university has both a fall and spring job fair which has some internship opportunities, but is primarily for full time positions after graduation. Each semester there is one for business and general positions and a second for engineering, computer science, and technical positions. I think the opportunities for some branches are limited. My son is a civil engineering major and he attended the fall job fair as a freshman and only found 1 company seeking civil engineering students (another that registered didn’t show up and another had left before he had the chance to get there). Some other similarly sized schools hold job fairs for specific branches of engineering, but to be fair to the university, those are generally not hosted by the university, but hosted by the branches professional organizations.

Engineering has grown substantially at Alabama over the past several years and they have and are continuing to make improvements. Hopefully organizations like ASCE (American Society of Civil Engineers) will recognize the growth and work to recruit more businesses for the high ranking graduates the school is attracting.

3

Thanks @jrcsmom

Co-op was not a big deal when I was in engineering school 35 years ago in the Stone Age. I think they are much more important now because employers like to see work experience. I agree about ROI on an intern because they are not there long enough to make any impact.

Did your son work at the same place for both Co-op sessions? Do you know how Alabama is on placing Seniors?

What did your son do about his housing situation at Alabama considering he was there only one semester before doing his Co-op? I roomed with someone who was a Co-op in Chem E at Dow and I had a room to myself for a semester (very nice). He was the only Co-op I knew because, as I said, it was not a popular path.

4

All the co-ops are 3 work sessions with the same employer. The rationale is that as the students gain more experience, they will be given more responsibility each semester. That really depends on the employer. I think my son had the same responsibilities during both his work sessions, but he was given a lot of responsibility from the start and has a company vehicle assigned to him during his work periods and his company has paid for him to travel out of state on two occasions.

I don’t know the percentage of graduates that receive job offers. I’m not certain I’ve ever seen the number published. Since my son is extending graduation due to his co-op, he won’t be graduating until May 2017, so I don’t have personal experience with him looking for a permanent position yet, but I do know that a substantial number of the co-op students do get offers from their co-op employers and the co-op office works with those that don’t. We met with the co-op office prior to my son attending Bama and the head of the co-op office told us a story of how Mercedes has a lot of co-op students each year, but doesn’t offer many full time positions, however every year Honda would call her office and ask for a list of the names of students that had co-op’d at Mercedes because they wanted to hire students with work experience.

My son’s co-op position is conveniently right in Tuscaloosa, so he simply stays in his student apartment during work periods. Many of the employers that require students to relocate provide housing assistance or housing stipends. It can also work for a student who has classes in the fall and co-ops in the spring to find a student that co-ops in the fall and has classes in the spring to split a lease with, although I don’t know how often that happens.

5

Thanks @jrcsmom

Very enlightening. I like the idea of three Co-op sessions with one employer. What year in school did he start hi Co-op?

Does he make enough to cover his school expenses? The person I knew when I was in college did it to be able to pay for school. He was from NY and went to ISU.

I know that for sure I would prefer to hire a graduate with experience.

6

My son interviewed for his co-op during his 2nd year and started the fall of his 3rd year. His journey has looked like this:

fall 1st year - classes
spring 1st year - classes
summer after 1st year - internship

fall 2nd year - classes
spring 2nd year - classes
summer after 2nd year - home/2 online courses

fall 3rd year - co-op work session 1
spring 3rd year - classes
summer after 3rd year - co-op work session 2

fall 4th year - classes
spring 4th year - final co-op work session
summer after 4th year -

fall 5th year - classes
spring 5th year - final semester of classes

Since he has a full tuition scholarship + the engineering stipend, technically yes, he earns enough during his co-op to pay for his living expenses (he does not earn enough to pay for out of state tuition, so we are thankful for the scholarship). However since I previously agreed to pay for his college costs, I have continued to pay his living expenses and allow him to spend/save the money he earns. He has recently been able to use it to purchase a new car and he also has been able to start an IRA as well as having money in a savings account which will help him get established after graduation.

7

@jrcsmom

Are you OOS? I would be OOS. What made your son choose Alabama? What other schools did he consider?

At first I thought it was crazy to consider Alabama but the more I talk to people the more I become intrigued.

I was definitely in the mind of nothing is better than UMN, OSU, ISU, UIUC, Purdue. I am definitely getting a different vibe now that will make me more seriously consider.

Old time engineers like me are stuck in our ways. (:expressionless:

8

My kids did internships and REU’s rather than co-ops. Neither of them wanted to extend their time in undergrad. Really, it’s not necessary to co-op, but if you want to, the opps are there.

Bama engineers have a very high rate of being employed after graduation (unless they go on to grad/med schools).

9

What are REUs?

10

Yes, we’re OOS (Indiana) and started looking at Bama because of the scholarships. We had never been in or even passed through the state before our first visit to campus.

My son decided on Bama partially because he wanted to go out of state and spread his wings and partially because of the scholarship money, but primarily because of the personal attention he received. We initially met with our area recruiter at a crowded job fair and then when we went to an area recruiting event she remembered our entire family, called us by our names, and personally introduced us to the Dean of the engineering department. We visited campus twice and both visits were personalized to what my son was interested in and included one on one meetings with members of the engineering department and honors college. We toured many other schools, but Bama made my son feel like they wanted him to be a student there.

(We toured UIUC and had a horrible experience and son didn’t like the campus at all and he opted not to apply, he applied and was accepted to Purdue, but even as an in-state student they didn’t offer him any merit aid, so I wasn’t too upset when he opted not to attend, he was also accepted to Rose-Hulman but decided it was too small and too close to home. The only real competition in his mind was his application to MIT, but although he was deferred during early admissions, he was rejected during the regular round).

11

@jrcsmom

Thanks. I have heard that many times about courting high stats students.

12

And BTW an REU is a ‘research experience for undergads’. They are offered on college campuses and generally provide students with housing and a stipend. Students can apply to opportunities at other schools, as I believe there is a requirement for schools to accept a certain number/percent of students from other schools. There is a site that lists them and I’m sure M2K will provide a link when she gets an opportunity.

13

You may want to review the First Destination/Placement reports put out by the UA Career Center. It’s based on survey data, but will give you a sense of job placement rates and salaries…

http://career.ua.edu/students/firstDestination.cfm

14

The salaries and placement rates are pretty good. Some outliers on the low end. What was striking to me is that the class size was only 300 in 2014. Much smaller than UMN/ISU class sizes of 700+.

15

Correction. If I take December and May together, class size is 400+. Still lower but not as dramatic. Looks like they are trying to build up the engineering school. Class May 2011 was 198; Class May 2014 was 296, a 50% increase. How many Freshman were admitted into Engineering in 2014? That would be interesting.

Is it also possible to find out the middle 50% ACT/SAT scores and Class Rank for 2014 enrollees for engineering?

16

@Gator88NE Sorry, forgot to address you on the above. By the way, did you go to U of Florida?

17

I have much to say, but it only pertains to the Aerospace Engineering degree. Some of this is counter to what has already been said; all of this is only my opinion based on our experiences, and your experiences may differ. So, with that disclaimer, here goes.

My son visited UA in Nov of 2011. We spent 3 full days there and left no stone unturned. Because we were coming from IL, and had spent considerable $$$ traveling there at short notice (i.e., hefty plane fares, rental car, and hotel), we wanted to make it worth our while, as we were unlikely to return until enrolling. We spent 2 full days with wonderful people and were thoroughly impressed and charmed from the get-go. We then met with the Co-Op office. The Co-Op office meeting was a disaster and a huge disappointment. The person we spoke with pretty much within 2 or 3 minutes told my son that he would never get a co-op in the aero field, and that, furthermore, this person couldn’t remember the last time he had placed any aero student in a co-op that had been arranged through UA. He basically in one fell swoop turned my son against UA, and against his major (which he is intensely passionate about). As a result, my son took this very personally and was ready to completely forget about UA right then and there. This person went on to explain that the aero field is ‘dying’ (“don’t-cha know?”), and my son should consider something else to make himself more marketable. My son was practically in a fetal ball at this point.

We had been led to believe by major engineering program representatives at other universities that co-ops are vital to getting job opportunities (turns out they are NOT - they are often, in my cynical view, designed to get students to extend their already expensive college education at these major universities by 1-2 years…), and that getting an aero-related co-op at UA would be necessary to receiving a job offer (it is NOT - read more below).

These other universities had brain-washed my son into thinking that a co-op was vital, and so obtaining a co-op with UA was going to be a deal-breaker for him attending UA. Meh. UA has a small aero department, and the JR and SR classes are taught only as a cohort (all together, and courses are offered only 1x/yr), so having a co-op with alternating semesters off would require a substantial extension in the time required to get an undergrad degree. We understand that now. The co-op person at UA could have mentioned that as a possible reason that he has not placed any aero majors in co-ops…I don’t know if that is the reason he hasn’t placed anyone, but it might be, so I’ll stop that sad story…*

I’ll cut to the chase. I have an exceptional student who works hard and is incredibly dedicated and passionate about the aviation industry and in aerospace engineering, so it was extremely naive on both of our parts that he would have trouble getting any internships, let alone job offers. The summer between his FR and SO years he had an engineering internship. The summer between his SO and JR years he had an engineering internship with a different company, and at the end of that summer, he was hired by that company and placed on an ‘educational leave of absence’, meaning that he was already hired (yes, as a Sophomore), and he would return to that company the following summer (between JR and SR years), which he did this past summer. This is, in effect, a co-op during the summer months only, and is the best of all worlds, with no time extension needed to graduate. This is an unusual circumstance, I acknowledge, and is testament as much to my son’s hard work at school as it is to his tenacity to find these opportunities outside of school.

So, to recap. What the co-op office told my son (and others have said above) is correct: you possibly and more like probably will need to find your own opportunities at UA, depending on your engineering major. That being said - this is NOT a scary deal-breaker at UA. ANY engineering student worth hiring will from the very start at UA be actively thinking ahead and planning his/her own path…and these students worth hiring will not be relying on a university co-op office, or career center, or on-campus career fair to make their way in the world. The career center is in a weird Catch-22 situation in my opinion: great students will always find internships/co-ops/job offers (often on their own without assistance from the university); mediocre students, who are the ones who really need career assistance from the university, are the ones that companies are not really interested in. The cream rises to the top. It rises at UA just like it does at any other university.

  • Suffice it to say that UA is dedicated to helping its students succeed, and it will bend over backwards for those students who show initiative and promise. Those students are, after all, a reflection on UA, and this further strengthens an already great program. Helping them, helps UA, helps them, helps UA.... PM me if you want details about the aero program at UA, which has been great for my son, and has given him the foundation very early on to prove he is more than capable of succeeding in this 'dying' aerospace industry. ;)
18

CyclonesGrad, my oldest graduated from UMN in ME in May 2014 and he did not have a job on graduation even though he went to the job fair. Although there were companies from all over, a good majority were from the Minneapolis area and he decided he wanted to head back home (Chicago-Milwaukee corridor). He loved his time at UMN and loved the urban environment, but his classes there were big. I think the engineering/math graduation ceremony had 1000 students walking, and he had 100+ in his senior engineering classes. My son found his internship on his own (closer to our area) and did not co-op. He did say that most of his friends who had jobs at graduation were those who co-oped as those companies offered them full-time positions. (My son found a job in our area a month or so after graduation using a headhunter.)

I have two students at UA, one a 4th year CS/Math major and one a 2nd year EE/Physics major. My senior had almost a full-ride at UMN, but wanted a milder climate so chose to go to UA. (His younger brother fell in love and ended up here too.) The class sizes at UA have been averaging between 25-100 for my kids (except for a film class that had over 200) with most near the 25 range. They both have had excellent experiences at UA so far. Neither have found internships through UA, but my oldest is interviewing for a job this week that a professor recommended him for. Otherwise he found an internship the summer between his 2nd and 3rd year on his own through the internet, and last summer he was recruited through a programming competition that his UA team entered. My younger son could not find an internship this year, although that is not unusual for those entering their 2nd year no matter what the school. Neither of my kids have gone to the job fair so I cannot comment on the companies there. I have encouraged my 2nd year EE son to go to the co-op fair this fall. He really doesn’t want to be away from the school for 2 semesters and delay graduation, but he said he would check it out. I have heard that other schools might have a bigger job fair than UA offers and that if you don’t want to live in the Alabama area, you might have a harder time finding a job through their fair. However, I am not worried about that as there are many other ways to find a job if you are a good engineering student graduating from an ABET program…it just might take you a little longer.

19

This link is one of my faves for engineering data: http://profiles.asee.org/ With enough sleuthing, you can get bums-on-seats data and see fairly exactly how many students are in each program and how many graduate year to year (use the year search button within each profile to compare #s year to year). This is a useful site for comparing different schools side by side - you don’t have to hunt in each school’s website for these same data.

Further, on this link: http://www.asee.org/papers-and-publications/publications/college-profiles#The_Profiles_and_Data_Book , about half-way down that page is a section called “Engineering Statistics” - this is updated every year (yay, 2014 data are in!!!). This leads you to a PDF called “Engineering By The Numbers”. It is a great compilation of the top 25-50-100 programs around the US based on pure #s (i.e., not ranking/reputation).

Whoa…I just looked at this PDF. This is amazing!!! Use your own computer’s search box (CNTL F) to find “Alabama” within that PDF. UA’s program now has the 25th highest # of engineering students in the nation, at 4780 enrolled.

Another great site is this one, since @kjcphmom mentioned ABET: http://main.abet.org/aps/Accreditedprogramsearch.aspx This was useful when my son was first looking at aerospace engineering programs. At that time, aside from the military, there were 65 accredited aero programs in the US. Who knew? Given that finite #, it made narrowing down his schools to research very easy, given his other parameters.

Good luck with your decisions. :wink:

20

Others have given you very detailed and helpful responses, so I will just add my son’s experience anecdotally. I know it was helpful to us when we were looking at Alabama to hear as many positive stories as possible. We are OOS from PA, Philly area. My son is a junior CS major in the STEM MBA program and also the CBH program. I’m pretty sure he has never been to any of the career fairs or even the career office. On his own, he secured a summer internship with NASA after his freshman year, and one with Lockheed Martin Space Systems this past summer. He was recently awarded the Hollings Scholarship through NOAA, so his internship next summer will be with NOAA. However, NASA and Lockheed both wanted him back so he would have been fine either way. He was also directly recruited by Facebook for this past summer, but was unable to pursue that because of the STEM MBA (they wanted students with CS terminal degrees). As aeromom said, I think this is all a direct result of his being ambitious and highly motivated, and my guess is he would have been equally successful at pretty much any school.

He has loved every minute of his Bama experience, and says he can’t imagine being anywhere else. We can’t imagine a better deal - he will be graduating in 2018 with both a BS and an MS in CS, as well as an MBA. Three degrees, all completely tuition free. I have to pinch myself sometimes. :slight_smile:

If you have any other questions feel free to PM me. I remember being exactly where you are and thinking I was nuts for even having my son consider Bama, but now I am so grateful we found CC and this board (and especially @mom2collegekids!) to lead us there.