Spotlight for Recruiting Professionals
How does your organization source its interns and co-ops? If it is like those responding to NACE’s 2018 Internship & Co-op Survey, two primary sources stand out: open applications and contacts at college career centers.
Employers source approximately half of their interns and co-ops from open applications, while they source about 40 percent from direct contacts at career centers. Meanwhile, only slightly more than 8 percent of interns and co-ops are sourced through direct faculty contacts. (See Figure 1.)
In addition, the target schools that employers select at which to recruit their interns and co-ops tend to meet key criteria, including:
- Recruiting experience with the school;
- The majors offered;
- The location of the school; and
- The perceived quality of the programs.
These four top criteria are not only the most widely used factors, but they are identified as the most important by employers. (See Figure 2.)
Data for the 2018 Internship & Co-op Survey report were collected from November 8, 2017, to March 2, 2018, from NACE employer members; there were 309 respondents representing 29.1 percent of all eligible respondents. The survey report will be available later this spring.
Figure 1. Sources of intern and co-op hires
| |
Mean 2018 |
Mean 2017 |
| Interns |
Open applications |
55.2% |
50.5% |
| Direct career center contacts |
36.6% |
40.0% |
| Direct faculty contacts |
8.2% |
9.5% |
| Co-ops |
Open applications |
51.7% |
47.0% |
| Direct career center contacts |
39.3% |
43.9% |
| Direct faculty contacts |
8.2% |
9.2% |
Source: 2018 Internship & Co-op Survey, National Association of Colleges and Employers
Figure 2: Target school selection criteria for interns and co-ops: 2018
| |
% Used |
% Important |
| Recruiting experience with school |
98.1% |
88.4% |
| Majors offered |
97.8% |
93.6% |
| Quality of programs |
96.8% |
85.4% |
| Location of school |
96.8% |
81.4% |
| Reputation of school |
94.5% |
62.0% |
| Diversity of student body |
90.9% |
74.9% |
| College/university ranking |
86.4% |
50.8% |
| Interest of school’s graduates in your organization |
84.6% |
56.9% |
| Success of school’s alumni in your organization |
83.8% |
55.8% |
| Accreditation of school |
83.4% |
75.1% |
| Helpfulness of career services staff |
81.2% |
48.6% |
| Executives are alumni of school |
79.2% |
28.6% |
| Retention history of school’s graduates |
72.9% |
58.3% |
| Size of school |
67.1% |
22.4% |
Source: 2018 Internship & Co-op Survey, National Association of Colleges and Employers