A recent thread here has me wondering/worrying about post-grad job opportunities at both schools. S19 will be touring both UA and UAH in a few weeks and plans to learn more about their engineering programs Would love to have input from recent engineering grads or their parents with regards to their experience finding a job. S19 seems most interested in mechanical engineering right now but has also at times expressed interest in aerospace. He is high stats so will qualify for significant merit at both (Full tuition/housing at UAH and Presidential Elite at UA) which make them both highly desirable. Thanks! (Will cross-post in UAH forum.)
The career center and career fairs never seemed to work out for my son and we did most of our searching for opportunities on our own (except for his co-op which he did get through the interview day at the school).
He’s a recent civil grad and was able to get an internship after his freshman year in a Chicago suburb, then completed his co-op and stayed at that employer for an additional summer (4th term) right in Tuscaloosa, and completed a 2nd internship after his final full year of classes back in his home state of Indiana. He returned to that final position after he graduated in December for permanent employment.
He has a good friend who got a mech-E degree from UA last May who is now employed in Connecticut (not his home state) with a very good starting salary. (Unfortunately I don’t recall the company name, but could ask my son).
My son graduated from UA in 2014 with an aerospace engineering major. He didn’t have much luck at the career fairs.
The company in our home state he had interned with for three summers had a hiring freeze at the time, so he didn’t have an offer from them to fall back on at graduation.
We had encouraged him to start looking in fall of his senior year because the industry my husband works in tends to hire in large groups and has made all of their offers by October for students graduating the following May. The aerospace industry didn’t seem to work that way. They weren’t hiring until second semester and the jobs all seemed to be for one person only. Several times it seemed like his resume was just going into a black hole but he had no geographic restrictions and ended up interviewing in Iowa, Ohio, Wisconsin and California. Three days before graduation he got an offer from Lockheed Martin and was testing the F35 (a dream job for him) at an airforce base in California for a couple of years before he moved into more of an office job with them. Most of his aero friends who didn’t have jobs at graduation all had them by the end of the summer.
DS is currently a junior. I am also hearing that the career fairs don’t seem to be the way many find their internships.
I was hoping he would get one locally, but no positions even open, we even had connections. So far he has been rejected from the ones he has applied to online. It is starting to concern me. He has friends who are in co-op schools, 5 year plans going in, and they are now working at various companies.
We couldn’t afford the $100K+ price tag at these schools, but they do seem to offer exactly what many companies require today; I think it is a shame these kids are 18/19 years old and the pressure to get that experience before graduating is tough.
I wonder if this is a difference between interning and co-oping? My ds graduated with chemE degree from a lower ranked school than UA, but he co-oped for a yr. He graduated in 2011 in the middle of the recession and had multiple job offers. It is often the case that coop students have direct project responsibilities which equate to more real on the job type experience than interns.
I don’t know if that is the difference, but iit might be a question worth asking if your student is not yet a sr.
@Mom2aphysicsgeek good point! I believe both UA and UAH offer co-ops? What year was your DS when he had his co-op? Did he find it through his school?
He cooped between his jr and sr yr. He opted to coop for 12 straight months so that he could increase his direct project experience and bc it meant that he didn’t have to worry about getting out of class sync. Yes, he did apply to coops through his university. But, I know there are students who coop at the same company that are from UA bc we have spoken to them.
Here is a link to UA’s co-op program info: http://coop.eng.ua.edu/aboutcoop/ It doesn’t sound like they allow the 12 straight month option that our ds had, but require the alternating semesters.
I think a lot of students are under the impression that just interning for summers is good enough. For ds’s friends from his school who didn’t co-op, employment was equally difficult. For the coop students he knew, all that had GPAs above 3.5 had job offers prior to graduation. (That GPA filter is pretty typical.)
This link is helpful: http://coop.eng.ua.edu/faqs/
@Mom2aphysicsgeek – thanks again, so helpful! I did also wonder about the GPA aspect and you have confirmed what I have read on other, older threads.
You may find the post graduation surveys of interest.
https://career.sa.ua.edu/employers/first-destination-reports/
It will have the % that responded (knowledge rate), the % that have found a job or are continuing their Education (Career Outcome Rate or Placement rate), and the median and average starting salaries (and Salary Range).
For example, looking at the College of Engineering Undergraduate class - May 2017:
Of the 528 graduates, 87% responded to the survey. Of which 88% have found a job or are continuing their education. (data is collected beginning at graduation and continuing 6 months post-graduation).
https://career.sa.ua.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/4/2018/01/EG-Summary-Report-May-2017.Bachelors.pdf
We had a great experience with the UA Co-op program. Son started the fall semester of his 3rd year and did the alternating semesters for 3 terms and then stayed on with that employer for an additional summer. The business was right in Tuscaloosa so he stayed in his same apartment with his friends and didn’t even have to sacrifice a football season ;). The business even let him work part time during his class semesters as his scheduled allowed.
I’m sure if he were interested he could have stayed there for a permanent position, but civil-e is a VERY broad discipline and the position wasn’t in the specialty area he wanted to be in long term.
He graduated with a 2.94 and still had a pretty firm job offer before he graduated (they wouldn’t provide a firm offer until he supplied proof of degree), so I’m very much of the belief that having work experience is very beneficial when seeking a post-grad position.
@jrcsmom thanks! When did your son graduate? Did your son feel like co-ops were a better option than internships? Based on what I am hearing, co-ops seem to be the way to go.
He just graduated about 6 weeks ago in December.
He did both internships (2) and a co-op. I think he preferred the internships because they just gave him a short-term exposure to figure out if he liked the company and the position. I preferred the co-op because since we did the job searching on our own that was several semesters when I didn’t have the stress of making sure he found an opportunity. I also think that having over a year of work experience with the same employer gave him the opportunity to have some greater responsibilities and was a very strong addition to his resume.
@jrcsmom thanks so much! You have definitely put my mind at ease. S19 is very flexible in choosing colleges and honestly just wants to make sure opportunities exist for internships, co-ops and future employment. UA checks off so many boxes for him — can’t wait to visit in February!
Co-ops and internships both have their pro’s and con’s.
The main disadvantages to Co-ops, are that they can delay graduation by up to 3 semesters, and that they can lead to a disruption of campus activities and social ties while working.
For example, the co-op commitment makes it hard to participate on a design team, or to take on a leadership role in a student organization.
On the other hand, an internship is often being used as an extended interview. For that reason, it may be harder to find an internship as a freshman or sophomore (or even a junior), than a Co-Op.
The number 1 reason my friends did Co-ops, while I went to school, was the money. It allowed them to pay their way through college. With a generous merit scholarship from UA, you will have a lot more flexibility in choosing between a co-op and an internship.
@Gator88NE great insight! Lots for S19 to think about in the coming months…
Well, DS is looking at internships, but the career fairs & career center aren’t necessarily going to provide that co-op experience either, as I know quite a few who had to find them on their own.
Everything at UA seems to require planning months if not a year in advance. Kids living off campus commit to leases and if a co-op occurs, then they are often stuck w/ 2 rents, at the co-op location & in Tuscaloosa. Yes, they are getting a paycheck to offset it, but it is a loss, and depending on the area & the rental it can be a huge loss… So going in, it would probably be best to take over a 6 month sublease, then to commit ahead of time to anything.
And timing of the classes is also critical. There are some courses that are only offered in certain semesters, and if they are a pre-requisite, then the schedule are then offset by several semesters in some cases.
They are not insurmountable issues, but it requires thinking and planning ahead.
Quite a few parents w/ kids in the engineering program have felt the difficulty in procuring these internship/co-op opportunities is one area where UA is lacking. I don’t know if this has always been the case or a result of the rapid growth over the past few years.
Like @jrcsmom, I am trying to help DS in the search for opportunities; not expecting a lot from the Career Fairs/Center.
DD is a mechanical engineering major at UA. She has had 3 internships and will graduate this year. She has job offers but is going to grad school. I am sure that being a female with very high grades has helped her but I wanted to let you know that it is possible.
As mentioned in another thread, schools only know where their students become employed and their salaries if the students tell them. About 6 months after grad, Bama sends out a questionnaire and hopes to capture employment info and salaries, but as you can imagine, only some students take the time to respond.
I run a facebook premed/prelaw/preprofessional group and I remind people to let their schools know where they are accepted…because schools want that info and it’s not just provided to them. That’s something many don’t understand and think somehow the schools are notified about all these aspects…they’re not. They need the students to tell them.
@mom2collegekids thanks! Someone posted a link to the UA post-grad employment rates and I found them to be comparable to other engineering programs S19 is considering. All of the great information provided here has helped firm up my understanding of the process and my son’s role in the process. Now it will come down to fit - visIting in about 2 weeks!