Do classes you take in college make or break your chance at your first job?

[oiprocs]

In other words, would it be possible to get to an interview where everything goes smoothly, they like everything about you, but the only reason that you do not get an offer is because you didn't take a specific class? Or, instead of taking some tough classes and/or related to your major (engineering), you chose to take something that interested you?

I'd like to believe that an internship would hold more clout than having taken any certain class, but I want some reinforcement on this idea.

 

[gevorg]

Most employers do not go into details of your education such as which classes you took. Relevant internships and especially work experience is much better than a similar class, so you're right on that one.

 

[TheVrolok]

Internships >>>>>>>> Classes (Experience > Education) taken in the experiences I've seen.

For myself, I'm going to medical school, and my GPA was definitely not stellar (of course, it wasn't bad either) but it was below average for most medical schools, however I did well on the MCAT and have a large resume of relevant experiences (in research/EMS/hospital work/etc.) that I think weighed heavily into my application.

For a quick story that may be more relevant I have a friend who's a mechanical engineer; he started at Pitt, ended up getting the boot after having a 1.9 or so after his first two years. He just didn't do well there, period. However, he did pick up an internship in ME during the summer after his freshman year. He worked hard at the internship and did well, he went back to the same company after his sophomore year and worked some more. After getting the boot from Pitt he moved home and finished up his ME degree at a combo program run by Temple/the community college in our area. While he was here, though, he continued to work where he had the internship. Long story short, he has more experience and is trusted with more responsibility by the engineering supervisors than are the new hires. He recently just got accepted into the engineering management training program and after relocation, has a 65k/year + benefits (obviously garbage for ATOT members, but hey) seat waiting for him. Not bad for a guy who went to essentially failed out of school and went to community college. But he got his hands dirty in his field, and did well there.

 

[FleshLight]

Classes lead to grades/networking, which lead to internships, which lead to jobs.