Congratulations on hiring your new co-op student! Included in these pages are suggestions intended to guide you through the co-op work term process. We hope this manual will also serve as an effective planning tool, enabling you to get the most out of your student while s/he is with your organization.
We encourage you to contact your Co-op staff member if you have any questions or concerns.
Co-operative Education Defined
The Role of the Employer
The benefits of hiring co-op students are numerous. Your organization is able to maximize its recruitment strategy by tapping into the best and the brightest students that universities have to offer. Extended periods of student availability will enable you to have students until the end of your project while assessing their potential as future employees.
As an academic program, co-operative education is unique in that its rotation of study and work terms permits for integrated learning between theory and practice from first to final year. Your opportunity provides students with invaluable insight into the world of work both in terms of specific content-area knowledge and the soft skills necessary to succeed in industry today. Students graduating with a co-op designation will not only have successfully achieved all of the academic requirements of their degree, but also have systematically assessed their
contributions and performance in the workplace and consequently, their career objectives and direction. Your role as the student’s lead while on a work term is to provide an environment for this learning to occur. This handbook is intended to assist you in creating this environment, thereby maximizing the productivity of your student and ensuring that s/he is given all opportunity to complete a successful and fulfilling term within your organization.