If you work at a co-op college, be sure your admissions office staff sees the helpful 6-minute video I created just for them.
“A co-op college?” you might be thinking. “What is that? And why would an academic strategist with 25 years of experience be recommending this kind of college so strongly?
Here are 7 reasons to put co-op colleges right at the top of your teen’s “apply to” list.
1. Co-op colleges load students up with real-world work experience well before college graduation.
Not just a day or two of “job shadowing,” where students simply watch people do jobs. I’m talking multiple full semesters of real-world full-time paid work experience that provides the actual in-field job skills coveted by real-world employers.
2. Co-op colleges make in-field work experience a central focus of the college experience.
Ordinary colleges—like the ones you might currently be considering—might or might not mention to students: “Oh, you may want to go get yourself an internship—you’re on your own to find those.”
Co-op colleges, on the other hand, intentionally provide the infrastructure that makes real-world work experience happen for students. Co-op colleges have offices and departments that help students identify career goal early on, focus on classes and majors that lead to those career goals, and, <<<drumroll please>>>, get placement into the full-time work they’ll be doing for multiple semesters during the college years.
(Parents, when you take your 10th or 11th grader to visit a co-op college, make visiting the co-op office a high priority. Emphasize to your child that it’ll be important for him or her to visit this co-op office again their very first semester on campus.)
Look carefully at what I’ve written about co-op college programs on pages 161–165 of my book, LAUNCH: How to Get Your Kids Through College Debt-Free and Into Jobs They Love afterward.
3. Co-op colleges strategically design the academic experience so full-time work fits seamlessly in between academic semesters.
At the University of Cincinnati, for example, students stay right in their college dorms and apartments while taking entire semesters away from academics to work full-time for Cincinnati area employers such as Proctor and Gamble, Paycom, Cintas Corporation, and GE Aerospace. Other UC students pack up and move cross-country to temporary full-time full-semester co-op jobs working for Disney, NASA, or Apple. They then bring the richness of work experience back into the rest of the college classes they take.
At Kettering University in Michigan, students alternate school and work terms—attending classes one semester, then moving out of the dorms to do full-time paid work somewhere in the U.S. for a full semester, and then returning to college classwork the following semester. Students repeat this cycle over and over again—straight through summers—with breaks scattered throughout the year. These students typically graduate from college in five years with 2.5 years of work experience right in their fields.
One Kettering student told me he was an exception. “I had taken some real college classes in high school, so I graduated from Kettering in just four years. At job interviews in the months before my college graduation, employers asked me, “How is it that you’re 22 years old, you have a four-year degree and 2.5 years of work experience right in your field, and you are already a firewall engineer?”
4. Co-op college students save money.
The co-op positions I’m recommending are paid positions.
Many co-op students use the money they earn “on co-op” to pay a good chunk of their own college expenses—and then they invest what’s left over.
Contrast this with 4-year state universities, which can cost students dearly when crowded conditions result in taking 6 years to graduate. I’ve written about this deeply worrisome problem with state universities here.
5. Employers hire co-op college students into full-semester, full-time paid positions—even when those students haven’t yet completed very many college courses.
At the Kettering University co-op job fair I attended, I was stunned to see more than 70 employers lined up to recruit and hire Kettering students for co-op college jobs before they’d even graduated from high school. (I am not kidding.) Kettering staff told me, “We actually have hundreds of employers looking to hire these students. We just can’t fit them all in the cafeteria.”
Why would employers do this? Are they just trying to be nice? Nope. They do it for business reasons. Smart employers see the value in having the opportunity to shape the workforce of tomorrow.
If you’re an employer at a large or small company—or at a start-up, nonprofit, healthcare system, trade association, governmental agency, or other type of entity, call the co-op offices at these colleges and find out how confident, high achieving co-op college students can enrich your workforce now and for decades into the future.
6. Higher education is changing. Co-op college programs are the future. I’m convinced of it.
I strongly emphasize the benefits of co-op college programs when I teach this 3-session online class to parents and students across the country.
In April of 2026, I spoke at the Cooperative Education and Internship Association (CEIA) Annual Conference. “The co-op education you’re working so hard to provide is your university’s greatest selling point,” I told attendees. “When parents find out about what you do, it’s going to boost enrollment and retention at your college through the roof.”
I feel so strongly about the benefit of co-op that I’ve made it my personal mission to spend more of my time promoting co-op college programs. If you work at a co-op college, be sure your admissions office sees the helpful 6-minute video I created just for them.
See the organized list of co-op colleges I’m currently compiling on my website here.
7. Many high-achieving students are passing up the Ivy League in favor of co-op college programs.
“Employers want college grads with real-world work experience,” students say. “We know that. Why wouldn’t I want to attend a college that’s all set up for that?”
(You’ll find my article on why you might want to talk your kid out of applying to the Ivy League here.)
If you want support for your journey as your teen moves toward a co-op college, join my TRIBE Membership. Doors open for just 5 days twice each year, but you can join the waiting list now.
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Learn more about co-op college programs on pages 161–165 of the book I wrote:
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Who is Jeannie Burlowski?
Jeannie is a full-time academic strategist, podcast host, and sought-after speaker for students ages 12–26, their parents, and the professionals who serve them. Her writing, speaking, and podcasting help parents set their kids up to graduate college debt-free, ready to jump directly into careers they excel at and love. Her work has been featured in publications such as The Huffington Post, USA Today, Parents Magazine, and US News & World Report, as well as on CBS News.
Jeannie also helps students apply to law, medical, business, and grad school at her website GetIntoMedSchool.com. You can follow her on Bluesky @jburlowski.bsky.social.
This article was written by a caring human expert. AI tools may have assisted with research or editing.
This article was updated on April 19th, 2026.