A Study of Initial Employment Characteristics Between Co-Op and Non-Co-Op Community College Graduates

This study analyzed the concept of cooperative education as it relates to preparing students for the workplace. Community college graduates from an engineering/technical graphics program that utilized cooperative education in its curriculum were compared with graduates from another engineering/technical graphics program that was comparable except that it was not involved with cooperative education. Samples chosen from both institutions represented the years 1992-1999. Graduates were examined by measures designed to assess organizational socialization, relevance of job-to-career plans, degree of access to resources, and participation in decision-making. A questionnaire developed by Brown ( 1984 ) was modified and employed to obtain data. No significance (p <.05) was detected with any of the 4 measures with regard to the following 3 groups of community college engineering/technical graphics graduates (a) cooperative education graduates who stayed with their former co- op employer, (b) cooperative education graduates who gained employment with a new employer, and (c) graduates without cooperative education experience. In addition, statistical significance (p <.05) was not attained for the combined 2 groups of cooperative education graduates versus the graduates without co-op experience on the employee sense of power measures.