Dixie State College students use cooperative education to sample the job field while receiving elective credits in addition to earning money.
According to http://new.dixie.edu/career/coop_and_internships.php; "Cooperative education is an educational concept that relates the classroom to the employment community. Students with a designated major, vocational, or career interest are assisted in locating employment that relates to their classroom studies."
Karl Hutchings, director of cooperative and internship education, said co-op is an intern-style opportunity for students (usually freshman and sophomores) to learn transferable skills and identify the career they wish to pursue.
"The transferable skills that general co-op [provides are] just as important as one working in their field," Hutchings said.
The co-op and internship programs help to bridge the graduation gap for students.
"An internship is the main way a company likes to hire," Hutchings said.
Specified programs on campus use the program to jump start general education students into the next step.
"In the past, 100 percent of every student getting into the dental hygiene program had taken a co-op [class]," Hutchings said.
Chelsea Hickerson, a junior dental hygiene major from Evanston, Wyo., said: "Work co-op is a way to prepare yourself for the program [of your choice]."
For Hickerson, the benefits are broad.
"It teaches me what dental hygiene is; things that you wouldn't know through studying," Hickerson said.
Karmen Aplanalp, dental hygiene program coordinator, advises co-op students like Hickerson, who works 15 to 20 hours a week to pay for school.
The amount of hours that you work determines the amount of credit you can receive through co-op, Hickerson said.
The program requires Hickerson to complete five objectives designed to give her field experience and educate her in an environment not found on campus.
"The workbook for the co-op is designed to document specific goals which verify that the student is worthy to receive credit for the class," Hutchings said.
The workbook is relatively in-expensive, and the time required with an advisor short.
"You make expectations with your adviser regarding things you will improve, what you will learn, and things you will do to help your employer," Hickerson said.
The co-op experience prepares individuals for the aspects of a job that one might not otherwise be exposed to.
"The mouth is an awkward place to be when your not first familiar with it," Hickerson said.
Beau Bradshaw, a freshman sports medicine major from Beaver, uses his part-time work at Wingers, 188 S. River Road, for co-op credit.
"I'm getting paid, getting credits and I'm working towards goals," Bradshaw said.
The experience gained also matches the potential for hire.
"They don't just have an application as a piece of paper; they have an application with a face, with work skills, with dependability, with everything that paints a picture of that individual," Hutchings said.
For more information about co-op, contact the Career and Employment Services Office at 652-7668.
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