>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.
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.