From co-op placement to employment status
Hands-on work experience established while studying can help grads land jobs
Adria Danyluk has been working since last October as a junior staff accountant in Toronto with the accounting firm Deloitte. She qualified for the position by earning a bachelor of accounting and financial management at the University of Waterloo.
But in addition to her on-campus learning, she did four terms of co-op placement — the initial two with a manufacturer in Vaughan, the latter two with Deloitte’s offices in Kitchener and Toronto.
“Definitely one of the reasons I chose to go to Waterloo was for the co-op program,” she says.
On the second last day of her second placement at Deloitte, the firm offered her a full-time job.
“It’s kind of understood once you’re in a co-op program, if the employer likes you, they’re likely to hire you at the end,” says Danyluk.”
Her co-op placements gave her valuable work experience, she says, and because each work term is only four months, if a student discovers the type of work is not for her, she can change direction in future placements
“I know people who did all of their placements with one company,” says Danyluk, “but I felt I benefited from the experience of working both on the industry side and on the public accounting side.”
Co-op placements are growing in popularity among undergrads. Once the purview of community colleges, co-op programs are increasingly becoming a staple at most universities. The state of the job market is a major reason why.
“Students coming out of co-op programs — certainly our students — are getting employed faster than students who are not in co-op programs,” says Rocco Fondacaro, interim director of career action and cooperative education at the University of Waterloo.
Waterloo, with 18,300 students doing co-op annually, boasts the world’s largest program.
“It’s in our DNA,” says Fondacaro. More than 60 per cent of undergrads participate, engaged in work terms that can total two years in a four-year degree. For some degrees, such as accounting, architecture, pharmacy and engineering, co-op is mandatory.
Parents’ desire to see their children enrolled in programs with a co-op component has also contributed to its popularity, says Fondacaro.
“They want to see students have that added advantage in what’s getting to be a more competitive world,” he says. What makes a positive co-op experience are the same factors as for any job, he says.
“You want a sense that your employer trusts you, that they empower you and value your contribution,” Fondacaro says. “And on the other side, there should be guidance from an employer and mentoring.”
“The provincial government is certainly encouraging more post-secondary institutions to offer more experiential learning opportunities, and often that takes the form of coop programs,” says Stefan Kerry, manager of Ryerson University’s coop office.
In the last two years, Ryerson has seen an additional 100 to 150 students participating in co-ops each year, bringing the annual total to about 700 students. In the next three years, Ryerson will be adding from the Ted Rogers School of Management alone another 250 to 300 students in co-op programs. “There is probably greater demand than there are spaces available,” Kerry says.