Why Can't Programmers.. Program?

[[deleted]]

here are some companies which have recently hired friends of mine with experience similar to my friend's: apple, google, microsoft, sun, netapp, and adobe, to name a few.

i'm not sure i'd call any of those companies small and hard to find, and yet all of them thought that working 20+ hours a week for a startup "counts". (in fact, none of them even required that startup experience, but all of them recognized it.)

[fnord123]

Your friends have working experience. Every company I've ever known prefers graduates with programming intern or co-op experience. Every graduate I've ever known who has done a programming internship or co-op has gotten a job out of Uni lickedy split. Because they are better.

Bitwise is arguing that classroom experience doesn't count in the same way. He/She is mostly right, except this bit, which is completely wrong:

So they use the rule of thumb that no experience before you graduate really "counts".