Not just anyone should be a co-op supervisor as we want to give our co-op students the best possible learning experience. The position is unpaid for our co-ops so we really don’t want to waste their time. Professor Teertstra (representing the SDC’s co-op program) has some evaluation criteria for co-op supervisors, but we’d like to do the filtering internally to ensure all our co-ops get a great experience!
To be a co-op supervisor we strongly prefer some managerial experience. This can include being a project maanger manager or subteam lead at WARG. management is hard and we don’t want our managers to be learning for the first time on co-op students. in the past this has usually been subteam leads, but this really isn’t a requirement. Note that for F24 we are expanding into general members and advisors as possible co-op supervisors, but this needs to be backed up with clear signs of readiness.
Co-op Students need to be given fun projects for a good experience. They need to be given lots of mentorship to learn. Essentially it's a lot of time for a supervisor, they should be aware of this commitment. We don't wanna be a "co-op mill" where people come to get the credit and accomplish/learn absolutely nothing bc they spent their time doing boring stuff.
managers need to be able to give critical useful feedback and assign meaningful projects with clear tasks to ensure co-op student learning
for F24 we are expanding into general members and advisors as co-op supervisors.
some criteria to help leads select who is a reasonable supervisor and who is not qualified enough should be added here. Professor Teertstra has some evaluation criteria, but we’d like to do the filtering internally to ensure all our co-ops get a great experience!
Being an upper year helps significantly in this because it ensures you have some technical expertise. Having this technical expertise is important so you can have some pieces of knowledge to pass along to your co-op student. Having strong co-op experiences (i.e. Cali) is also useful in supplementing this because you have seen how some tech companies operate so you can teach your co-op student those best practices.
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This criteria essentially encompasses everything in Project Manager Promotion Criteria while adding in technical expertise, capability to get much more hands on in teaching, etc.
Co-op managers should demonstrate an ability to confidently lead in some way with respect to the team. Be that as being a solid lead, advisor, project manager, etc. but at least in some form is preferred. If you often find yourself unable to make time for WARG meetings then there is no chance you will be able to provide the proper time commitment that a co-op student needs to succeed.