We recognize the recruiting calendar for internships, co-ops, and full time positions consists of stringent deadlines for both employers and students. Even with those stringent timelines, we strongly recommend that employers provide flexible timelines that fit the unique and highly competitive recruiting ecosystem for engineering and computer science students.
What We Expect
All internship offers, co-op offers, and full-time offers will be made in writing, and students will not be bound by offer time frames until the written offer is received.
Quality recruiting decisions happen when students and employers recognize the importance of time to evaluate offers. Students may request offer deadline extensions for internship offers, co-op offers, and full-time offers. We encourage employers to grant those extensions and not penalize students for their honest and ethical approach to the recruiting process.
Exploding offers for internships, co-ops, and full-time positions are prohibited. We discourage students from proceeding with recruiters deploying these kinds of high-pressure tactics. We also expect our students to end their job search and decline interviews once they accept an internship offer, co-op offer, or full-time job offer.
We refer you to the NACE Position Statement on Unpaid Internships as we discourage students from accepting unpaid internships and unpaid co-ops. We recognize that internship and co-op salaries may not be negotiable, but we encourage our students to negotiate other elements of these position when appropriate.
We strongly encourage all of our graduating students entertaining full-time offers to schedule an offer evaluation appointment with our office. During these appointments, we review their offer(s) and discuss and compare the salary component of the offer as well as additional compensation, bonuses, and benefits in order to guide students in negotiating those offers.
If your organization does not negotiate salaries, please include that in your written offer. Otherwise, please be prepared for Pigman College of Engineering and Computer Science students to negotiate their full-time offers.
FALL: We recommend that offers made during the fall semester remain open until 3 (three) weeks after being made OR November 1st – whichever is later.
SPRING: We recommend that offers remain open until 3 (three) weeks after being made or March 15th – whichever is later.
OFF-SEASON: We recommend that offers remain open at least 3 (three) weeks.
RETURNING OFFERS: For offers made to students completing co-ops or summer internships, we recommend that offers extended in the Fall also remain open until 3 (three) weeks after being made or November 1st – whichever is later. Likewise, for offers made to students in the Spring, we recommend that offers remain open until 3 (three) weeks after being made or March 15th – whichever is later. Please allow students the opportunity to fully engage in the Fall and Spring Career Fairs. Their ability to fully evaluate their career development opportunities will allow them to make well-informed decisions.
FALL: We recommend that offers made during the fall semester remain open until 3 (three) weeks after being made OR November 1st – whichever is later.
SPRING: We recommend that offers remain open until 3 (three) weeks after being made or March 15th – whichever is later.
OFF-SEASON: We recommend that offers remain open at least 3 (three) weeks.
RETURNING OFFERS: For offers made to students completing co-ops or summer internships, we recommend that offers extended in the Fall also remain open until 3 (three) weeks after being made or November 1st – whichever is later. Likewise, for offers made to students in the Spring, we recommend that offers remain open until 3 (three) weeks after being made or March 15th – whichever is later. Please allow students the opportunity to fully engage in the Fall and Spring Career Fairs. Their ability to fully evaluate their career development opportunities will allow them to make well-informed decisions.
FULL-TIME OFFERS: If an employer must defer a start date for more than three months rather than rescind the job offer, the employer should maintain regular contact and consider providing some sort of financial compensation. (If a student is honoring acceptance of a full-time job offer and the start date keeps moving, the employer is impacting the student’s financial well-being.) Rescinding a job offer means that students must begin their job search all over again and may now fall outside of the prime recruiting cycle.
If you must rescind an offer or multiple offers, please contact our office to discuss the details. We do reserve the right to discontinue access to campus recruiting services and our students on a case-by-case basis.