Cooperative Education/Internships

What Is Cooperative Education?
The Cooperative Education Program at Coppin State University offers opportunities for interested students to combine work experience with classroom instruction. The work experience relates directly to the students' major field of study.

What Type Of Experience?
You will have the opportunity to use the knowledge and skills you obtained in college. The work experience may be in industry, business, government or service-type organizations.

Why Cooperative Education?
Cooperative Education bridges the gap between the classroom and the world of work. Students learn about their chosen field of study, gain career experience, and earn a substantial portion of their university expenses.

Why?
Because it makes sense.......Co-op employees are generally bright, highly motivated, eager to prove themselves, willing to learn, well educated in current theories and technologies, enthusiastic, and hard working.

Who Will Train Me?
Your employer trains you while you work on assignments in your career and academic field. One co-op "basis" is that there are some things that you can learn only by working, things that you can seldom learn from a university course.

For Instance...
Translating theory into practice, applying your knowledge to solving real business problems. Developing rapport with fellow employees, testing your ability to handle pressure and deadlines. Learning about company politics and policies.
Adjusting to working eight hours a day, five days a week, and then finding the energy and motivation to work late to meet a deadline or handle an urgent request.

What Happens When I Graduate?
Many employers train co-ops in hopes of hiring them when they graduate. This is one reason why many employers want you to keep returning for more semesters. Other employers have no planned entry level openings. But they can still give you valuable training that you can offer to other employers.

Does Co-Op Education Get Results?
Yes...This year more than 200,000 Co-op students from over 1,000 higher education institutions earned approximately 1.5 billion dollars.