UW alumnus here, IMO the PEY makes very little sense to both the student and employer. From the employer side, you're committing yourself to 18 months of full-time employment for someone who is an unknown value - I've heard this from multiple employers that the four-month terms are more attractive, since it's not nearly as damaging to make a bad hire. Worst case scenario you let the kid sit around and twiddle their thumbs for the last month or two. Long terms lead to more conservative hiring, leading to less placements overall.

From the student side, co-op isn't just about learning how it is to work in-industry, but also to gain a breadth of experiences and find out where you want to be (or more cynically, where you stand a chance). I had 6 co-op terms spread over 5 companies, and it's been a huge career accelerant - I started off working at a no-name code shop, which paved the way to a brand-name code shop, which convinced someone at a highly algorithmic code shop to take me on for 4 months, and that finally got the Big Boys (Goog, Facebook, Amazon, MSFT, etc) to take me seriously enough to hire me. I simply could not have achieved the end result after graduation if I was limited to only a single co-op term.

The way I see it, UW's co-op system takes your first few years of ladder climbing and compresses that into, well, almost no time at all. I've been able to bypass a great deal of the drudge work right off the bat simply by having good names and solid reviews on my record.

Correct me if I'm wrong but there is no employment obligation for 18 months. You go through the same interview process and you can get fired just like any other employee. This is no different than hiring any other employee.

> Long terms lead to more conservative hiring, leading to less placements overall.

I would argue that less higher-quality placement is a Good Thing.

> From the student side, ...

As a student, your goal is to start building your value and getting proportionally compensated as quickly as possible. Since most value as an engineer is gained well after the first few months of ramp-up you experience at every new job, you end up getting very minimal value out of a bunch of 4 month terms. Not to mention you won't be getting paid nearly as well as someone who is not labelled as a "student".

18 months is marginally better because you're actually growing your skillset, integrate as an important and dependable part of the team, and gain valuable engineering experience. On the other hand, you're still under-compensated and it's trickier to switch jobs half way through if you realize that you've made a mistake.

Finally, my argument is that the most optimal path is skip coop/PEY and find a relevant job right out of school. Even if it's not the best job in the world. You'll be far better off sticking around for 12-18 months, quitting, and getting a second real job, than to do 18 months of PEY and getting your first real job. Both in terms of real valuable experience and compensation.

When big companies look at your "industry experience", the counter doesn't start until you're no longer a student. I've been building and selling software since I was 14, but none of that went into account with HR of big companies when they were deriving the offer for my salary or position. Negotiation and positioning, on the other hand, did make a big difference. But that's another story.

The best value for coop/PEY/internships is to students who lack confidence or experience in finding a job right out of school, or they simply have no idea what they want to do when they grow up or want to drag out their student status for as long as they can. These are all very valid reasons.

I think you'd be surprised to see how much responsibility is given to co-op students after their first or second work term, and how well they are remunerated for doing so. My last work term was in Sunnyvale, came with a $5,000 US a month salary, $1000 monthly rent allowance, $400 a month car allowance, plus a travel allowance for 2 trips home. Upon graduation, most of my class went into "real" roles at their companies, none of this entry level bullshit that usually beckons for new grads who have never shipped code before and can't be trusted to handle anything north of double checking bug reports. Finally, the variety of work experiences helps you find a niche in terms of the types of projects and companies you'd like to be associated with post graduation. It's a giant red flag to see employees move on to new gigs every 4 months after graduation, so even if you hate your job you're somewhat obligated to stick around for at least a year to prove you're capable of fulfilling a "commitment". Why not start off doing something you already know you'll enjoy, with people you've worked with before, and a pay cheque that gives you proper credit for what you've already proven you can do?

There's no single correct answer here, because each person operates under unique long-term goals.

If your goal is to build a large business network, then -probabilistically- more jobs is better than fewer. By virtues of UW CO-OP, whenever I meet someone new in silicon valley, very frequently we have mutual friends.

What does an 18 month co-op give you that graduating earlier and starting work doesn't?

The thing I liked about 4-8 month co-ops at UW was that I didn't necessarily know what I wanted to end up doing. This way I got to try working in a whole bunch of situations to find what I ultimately enjoyed most. I did co-ops in southern California, Silicon Valley, NYC, and around Canada. I worked for startups, big companies, and even the government. I hopped around in different industries too: semiconductors, fuel cell research, mobile devices and internet. Ultimately by the time I graduated I had tested the waters of industry in a variety of ways, gained a ton of life experiences, gotten really good at having a big impact at work in a short period of time, and had an offer to return full time to my last (and favourite) co-op employer.

See the response I gave to potatolicious. Because you didn't know what you wanted to pursue and wanted to sample around, I'd say you're within one of the cases where coop is a good value.

Before graduating from Waterloo, I had the opportunity to work in three different countries (Canada, USA, Japan), on everything from web services to embedded C. While I was a good student, and I doubt that I would have had any trouble finding a job with or without co-op, getting the breadth of experience was incredibly valuable - this would be something much harder to get after graduating.

I generally dislike competition of school brands (ie. Waterloo vs. Toronto), because I am fairly certain that education is 95% work ethic. The co-op program I firmly believe is exceptional, however.

Alright, I am convinced that Waterloo students get more joy out of doing four four-month jobs than Toronto students get out of doing one eighteen-month job.

What I'm not convinced of is the resulting value-add to the student's career. The way I see it, the best things you can do to your career, in order of bestness:

1. Graduate as quickly as possible while freelancing summers, get the best job you can, quit after 18 months and get another different job to experience some diversity.

2. Take a year off in your 3rd year, work at a startup, then do the rest as #1.

3. Do an 18 month PEY term while being a student, get as much valuable experience out of it as you can, then graduate quickly and do the rest as #1.

4. Do four 4 month coop terms while being a student, experience as much diversity as you can, have as much fun as you can, then do the rest as #1.

5. Take a year or two to travel while being a student, have as much fun as you can, start collecting a jar of wisdom, then do the rest as #1.

> "quit after 18 months and get another different job to experience some diversity"

You really can't sample very much after you graduate. Let's be honest, in almost all places in this industry, hopping around every 1-1.5 years looks ugly after a while. You can pull it off once or twice before it starts reflecting in your interviews.

That's the point other posters are making - more, shorter co-op terms is basically the penalty-free way of job-hopping and sampling everything. It's also a way of rapidly expanding your professional network and filling it with people who can vouch for your work.

I can only speak for myself, but my 4-month coop terms are the only reason I managed to graduate. I studied computer engineering at UW, and it was more intense than anything I've had before or after university. I definitely would have burned out by third year without my coop terms.

It also helped that coop paid for everything: tuition, rent, food, etc. (Although, I don't smoke/drink/do drugs/drive/have expensive tastes...) I graduated with a net (albeit tiny) profit instead of the massive debt most students seem to end up with. An 18-month placement probably would have been financially equivalent, but I would have had to take on debt before my third(?) year to benefit. Judging from my friends in other programs, having money troubles or taking on jobs while in school is extremely stressful.

(Aside: One could argue that since I admit to struggling to get through without frequent rest that I am under-prepared for work, but having been in a full-time position for some time now, I can see that university was artificially intense. Nobody in "real life" expects the same rate of output. Although, now I feel somewhat under-challenged because I had just managed to get used to the amount of effort required to do well by the time I graduated!)

To be clear, unless they've changed it recently it is six four month co-op terms, not four. Also to be clear, students do frequently spend two co-op terms at the same company.

If you're really ambitious, nothing will hold back your career. An ambitious person will use co-op for exactly #1 and #2. A lot of (or at least many) people spend their six terms at six different start ups in NY, SF and other technology hubs, and meet a ton of people. The nice thing about being a student is that everyone just wants to help you, and you get a heck of a lot of business cards.

The reality is that there also a lot of people who are smart and get things done, but don't necessarily have the motivation or are too risk adverse to really reach out there and try things. Or some people still have a sense of loyalty, and once they've accepted a job they don't want to jump around every 18 months. Or after they graduate they are ready to start a family. The beauty of co-op is that it lets smart people experience a lot without needing that career ambition, and it exposes a lot of people to things that they would otherwise not get the opportunity to experience. This also inspires entrepreneurship, as people can tour software companies (and not software companies!) and really see what culture is like, what they like, what they don't.

Internships are great too, but the risk of an internship is that you end up with a bad placement. I had a friend who got a job as a tester (they lacked the self confidence and interview skills for something more), and that shattered them - they went from timid yet smart computer scientist to burned out in the 18 months (I am sure that there are people with great internships too). With co-op, there are bad placements, but you get many chances to get it right.

>I'm generally anti-coop for people who would have no trouble finding a job when they graduate without coop.

I don't care how good a coder you are when it comes to personal projects, or how well you do in ACM comps, the skills you gain from working on large-scale projects are invaluable to employers. True, the top 5% of CS students might have no trouble finding work anyway, but co-op can turn the next 30% from risky hires into pretty (relatively) sure bets.

Agreed, and I worked on some really cool large-scale projects when I got my first job right out of school.

I didn't have great grades, I didn't have the top scores on coding sites, but I did have some personal projects and I networked, interviewed at a lot of companies, got a few offers and chose the best one.

Another issue with the 18 month coop is that, at least from the UW students I speak to, most go with startups. All of the UW students I personally speak to are receptive of doing a coop with a startup.

It is significantly harder for startups to commit to 18 months of anything. Having any form of structured work environment, guaranteed capital, or even if they will still be around.

On the flipside, I find less of the UT students are willing to coop with a startup vs. a larger firm.

(This is just my experience, so chalk it up how you like. Clearly, it may not be indicative of the students as a whole).

Going by List of acquisitions by Google [1], and from my knowledge of the founders (which is not complete by any means):

Reqwireless - UW founders

BumpTop - UT founders

Zetawire - Uvic / UT founder

SocialDeck - UW founders

Pushlife - UW founder

PostRank - UW founders

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[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_acquisitions_by_Google

Mhmm, though I'm certain this is not a complete list, and SocialGrapple was listed under USA until I corrected it. :P

Waterloo grad here - The 4-month co-op is the rule, but that doesn't mean the school isn't flexible. There were placements in Japan that required 8 month co-op terms (you just switch "streams" when you get back to school and can still graduate on time). I did a 12 month co-op in Japan and they had no problem with it. Great experience.

"I've always experienced the vast majority of learning during the 4-12 month range of my employment periods."

I've had 4 4 month co-op terms and 1 12 month co-op term as well as 5 full time jobs since graduation. In every single case I learned more in the first 4 months than I did subsequently.

I don't know where you're getting this 18-month number from. The maximum co-op term on PEY is 16-months, and a large number of people have opted for 12-month terms. They have also accepted terms as low as 8 months in some circumstances (lay-offs, overseas, other employment, etc.)

Exactly. Waterloo have had some solid pops, just as everywhere else. Waterloo simply seems to be some of the most visible.

My error, I believe this was true at one point, however. We do account for the majority, however. Fraser's post below me gives a near comprehensive list.