Co-op By The Numbers: As Easy As 1-2-3

The story of co-op is clearly the story of young people learning and growing over a century's worth of time. But just in case you like lists, below are some stats and figures.

Date: 8/16/2005 12:00:00 AM
By: Mary Reilly
Phone: (513) 556-1824

Year founded
1906

Average earnings of a UC co-op in 1906
10 cents an hour

Average earnings of a UC co-op today
$1,700 to $2,500 per month

Total amount earned by UC co-ops last year
$30 million

How much it would take to generate that much in scholarships
A $750-million endowment would be needed to generate $30 million in scholarships

Combined co-op earnings of students at the top five U.S. co-op schools
In excess of $100 million annually

Number of current UC co-ops
3,500 working in 35 states and 16 foreign countries

Where we work

Co-ops work as close to home as the university itself (with about 60 on co-op on campus at any given time).

The farthest from UC any co-op has ever worked is Auroville, India. In the U.S., UC co-ops are most likely to work in Ohio, Kentucky, New York and California.

Foreign nation with the most UC co-ops annually
Germany with 41 UC students

Number of employers hiring UC co-ops
1,500

Rankings
U.S. News & World Report ranked UC’s co-op program among the Top Ten best in the country. (The magazine listed the best programs without differentiating between them.)

Approximate number of U.S. schools with co-op
500

Approximate number of universities and colleges worldwide with co-op
1,500 in 43 countries (500 in the U.S.; 1,000 abroad)

Largest co-op program in the world
University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada, with 11,500 students working for 3,500 employees

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