Co-Op Program/First Year Salaries

[ThomasCrown]

I'm considering going back to school to get my CS degree (software engineering) after working in sales in enterprise software for 5 years or so. This is kind of crazy move in that I'm doing well financially and working for one of the majors but I really want to get into the development side of the business and maybe start my own thing down the road. With that in mind, I'm looking to get a sense of how crazy a move it is financially aside from losing 4 years of employment income! What would be a realistic expectation for co-op and first year earnings coming out of U of T or U of W? I'm expecting a fairly significant drop in earnings but is 50-70K realistic coming out of university?

[knowthyself]

Here's my opinion, but first my background: I went to college previously in a slightly unrelated field (Electrical Engineering), then I worked for several years in software implementation and development (self-taught on the development side mostly). I wanted to go back to school too so that I could focus on the technical side like design, development, etc, rather than being pushed too soon into a PM or Sales role as would have happened (though it might eventually happen anyway). So now after a lot of effort and planning, I'm in my first year of CS (at Ryerson). I put a lot of thought into that same question, and other similar ones. Salary-wise, I think that many companies will recognize the experience that you have as an industry professional when you apply for jobs after University. Even though you may not have X many years of such-and-such programming languages, you bring maturity and experience to the table, which is without a doubt worth money. That being said, I think that co-op will be trickier. I suspect that most companies that plan to take on co-op students will have a set budget for how much they want to spend. You might be able to negotiate in some cases (maybe at smaller companies), I don't know really, but I would guess that if their budget is set then you might not get anywhere. From what I hear, most co-op jobs start a little under $20/hr, but I'm sure there is a wide range. Personally, I'm going to focus on finding work on my own so that I might find a company willing to pay based on my experience, not just what they 'usually' pay co-op students.

Right after graduation I think that 50k+ is doable for you. Since you are already an experienced professional, I think that even if you start out at a lower salary than you want, you will likely climb faster than usual due to more experience/maturity/etc.

Personally, I'm quite happy with my move. Going from a decent salary to having no income during school makes me appreciate careful budgeting much more, and I think now I'll be better with money in the future than I ever was before (which itself is obviously worth money).

ThomasCrown wrote:

I'm considering going back to school to get my CS degree (software engineering) after working in sales in enterprise software for 5 years or so. This is kind of crazy move in that I'm doing well financially and working for one of the majors but I really want to get into the development side of the business and maybe start my own thing down the road. With that in mind, I'm looking to get a sense of how crazy a move it is financially aside from losing 4 years of employment income! What would be a realistic expectation for co-op and first year earnings coming out of U of T or U of W? I'm expecting a fairly significant drop in earnings but is 50-70K realistic coming out of university?

[ThomasCrown]

Thanks for the reply. Good to hear that 50K isn't outlandish!