Software
Engineering
2021 Class Profile
University of Waterloo
2021 Class Profile
University of Waterloo
Software Engineering (SE) at the University of Waterloo is an interdisciplinary
program supported by both the Faculty of Mathematics and the Faculty of
Engineering. For 5 years, all 92 graduating students of the class of 2021 (SE'XXI or SEXXI)
spent 8 semesters in school with similar schedules as well as 6 co-ops.
Undergraduates in the Software Engineering program are awarded a Bachelor
of Software Engineering (BSE) degree (by request, the diploma may say Baccalaureate of Software Engineering) at the end of their 4 &
2/3rds year journey.
SE is commonly compared to Computer Science, and is often seen as its more-constrained,
Engineering-oriented counterpart. Prospective students may wonder whether SE
is the right fit for them, and whether they’ll enjoy the environment. This
profile attempts to showcase who SE 2021 students are, what they've done, and
how they had experienced university.
This profile is not affiliated with the SE program or the University of Waterloo
in any way.
The findings in this report were derived from the results of a class survey.
In total, 66 out of 92 (72%) graduating students, and 7 who were in SE but
transferred out, responded.
Respondents who had transferred out of SE had completed at least
2 years (4 study terms) in the Software Engineering program with the SE 2021 cohort.
An addendum survey was also sent out, where
45 more responses were retrieved, likely from a subset of previous
respondents.
SE classes can vary significantly depending on the year, so generalize from
this survey to other classes at your own risk.
Study terms are defined as 1A, 1B, 2A, up to 4B (8 terms). 4 month co-op terms
occur after every study term starting after 1B and ending before 4B. Government
shutdowns due to the Covid-19 virus began in March 2020, partway through the 5th
co-op term. The 4A and 4B study terms were both done remotely due to the pandemic.
The final co-op term was also conducted remotely for most students.
All analysis involving income is expressed in Canadian dollars (CAD). A
constant rate of 1 USD to 1.3 CAD was used to make comparisons consistent and
simple. As this rate varied over time, 1.3 was chosen due to its being an
approximate average USD to CAD exchange rate over the past 5 years. All
income totals include monthly housing stipends or the monthly cost of corporate
housing if applicable.
The content of this class profile was inspired by the many profiles across Waterloo
Engineering that preceded it, with the presentation being a variation of the
2018 Software Engineering one created by Andy Zhang
.
It is our hope that the groundwork set by Andy & others will be iterated on by
future classes, as we did, in order to take future profiles to new heights.
During our time at Waterloo, the Software Class of 2021 (a.k.a SEXXI) experienced many firsts and witnessed various noteworthy events, which we list for you below.
Gender, ethnicity, high school, family
Grades, attendance, courses, factors affecting grades
Companies, locations, salary, factors affecting salary
Extracurriculars, travel, food
Exercise, physical health, mental health
Parents, friends, love life
Budgeting, investments, loans, expenses
Decision-making, experience
Reddit usage, academic burnout, conflicts,
Students who transferred out of SE
Rating, preferred program, paths
Post-graduation plans, full-time compensation
This class profile can be a bit long showing various unique insights into our class. The concise version offers a more summarised version with a few graphs omitted.
Women make up 21% of respondents and students in the class, which is less than the percent of women in tech (25%).
The class saw a 3% increase in women representation from 1A to 4B, in first year,
18% of the class were women.
There are many on-campus communities that support the success of women in
Computer Science and Engineering at UWaterloo. For example,
Women in Software (WiSE),
Women in Computer Science (WiCS),
Women in Engineering (WiE), and
Women Who Code Waterloo.
76.4% of respondents were born in 1998.
Students come from many different ethnic backgrounds.
There is a significant number of respondents who identify as Caucasian or East Asian
Asians. There is also more ethnic diversity among men than among women respondents,
as most women respondents are East Asian.
There are many on-campus communities that support ethnic minorities on campus
such as
National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE),
UW African Students Association (UWASA),
UW Indonesian Students Association, and
UW Black Association for Student Expression (UW BASE).
Interactive: Click on a provided filter to view the plot for that filter.
At least 6.9% of respondents are part of the LGBTQ+ community.
4 respondents preferred not to disclose.
There are many on-campus communities that support LGBTQ+ community
such as
Engiqueers, and
Glow.
This is not to say that only non-heterosexual people are part of the LGBTQ+ community.
8.4% of respondents are international students, however, according to the official headcount
12.9% of the students in the class are international students.
The class saw a 2.1% decrease in international students from 1A (15%) to 4B.
This could be due to the higher tuition costs for international students, especially in Engineering.
International term tuition fees, prior to the academic year 2018/19 where it was subject to a 62.1% fee increase,
were around $15000 for Computer Science students. This made the Computer Science program more cost beneficial to
international students.
International students came from countries such as China and India.
35.7% of all respondents, and 39% of respondents who are domestic students, immigrated to Canada. Immigrated students are students who are considered domestic students for tuition purposes, and, among others, are naturalized citizens or permanent residents of Canada. Immigrated students came from countries such as Belgium, China, England and India.
65.3% of respondents came from Ontario, of which 66% came from the GTA/Toronto area specifically. In Canada, students also came from other provinces such as Alberta, British Columbia, New Brunswick and Quebec.
45% of respondents' mother tongue is not English. There was a significant number of respondents who spoke English and Mandarin as their first language, but overall, there is a wide variety of languages spoken by students.
63% of respondents speak at least two languages. The most common languages spoken, other than English, are Mandarin and French. Among respondents who spoke 3+ languages, French was a common spoken language.
More than half of respondents come from families whose income is higher than the median Canadian family income ($96,080). These numbers represent the income the students' family had prior to starting University. The majority of respondents have a family income between $50,000 and $200,000.
There are more parents with Master's and Doctorates combined than those with Bachelors. Compared to our parents, only 3 respondents are planning on attending grad school. This could be a generational shift, or could be because entering the software industry does not require a Master's or Doctorate.
The majority of students have at least 1 sibling. There is also no clear correlation between familial income and number of siblings. The median for 0 and 2+ siblings is in the 100k to 150k income per year bracket and the median for 1 sibling is in the 150k to 200k income per year bracket.
The OSS average for the class was 96.5% and the OSS 10th decile was 94.3%. Although it is recommended to have a high 90s average to get accepted into the program, 11.3% of respondents had an average less than 95%.
Just over half of the respondents did not take part in an Enriched Program. The most popular Enriched Programs among respondents were AP and IB.
All students from Quebec attended CEGEP partially, meaning they did not graduate. Among respondents, no students from outside of Quebec attended CEGEP.
The students who attended CEGEP took part in a wide variety of programs related to Science, Mathematics, and Computer Science. Unlike other universities, CEGEP students enrolled in an Engineering program at Waterloo cannot convert any of their CEGEP course credits into university credits. An exception exists for Calculus courses which can be counted as a credit toward Math 117 (Calculus 1 for Engineering) in some cases. You can find more information here.
5.6% of respondents did not know how to program prior to starting at UWaterloo. Programming knowledge is a required admission criterion to join the Software Engineering program at the University of Waterloo. The non-zero amount of students who had no prior coding experience could be due to transfer student responses, among other reasons.
Starting in 1B, class average gradually increased over time.
We can also notice that B terms tend to yield a slighly lower average; this is
likely the result of hard courses being scheduled on B terms, such as ECE 106, ECE 124,
SE 380, etc.
4A and 4B term averages appear to be significantly higher among respondents. This can be
due to several reasons; starting in 4th year SE students are able to pick 3-4 electives per term.
It may as well be the result of the transition to an online delivery for courses or because only 19
respondents disclosed their 4B term average.
Note that this data may not be necessarily representative of the class. The official median
for each term is as follows:
Attendance consistently drops term by term, except after 3B. This could be because respondents enjoyed their 4A & 4B classes more as they get to select almost all of their classes, or possibly because respondents preferred attending courses asynchronously.
34% of respondents failed at least one midterm and 14.5% of respondents failed at least one course. Failing a midterm does not necessarily mean that the course will be failed as well.
2 respondents completed an option.
Graduating with an Option can be complicated to do in Engineering. With a restricted number of elective slots,
most students will need to either overload a term (or multiple terms), or complete courses over co-op, to meet
all the requirements for the Option and for graduating in SE.
You can find a list of all enrichment opportunities avaible to SE here.
Some students joined the class later into their degree. All respondents who transferred into the class came from within Engineering. Computer Science students do not appear to be interested in transferring into the class. Some possible explanations is the freedom provided by the CS program and the possibility of taking a Digital Hardware or a Software Engineering specialization.
The most favourited professor with 14% of the votes is Martin Pei.
For this section, respondents were only able to select one professor among all the
professors they had during their academic career.
Some professors listed in this section did not teach a core course, which means
not every respondent had the opportunity to be taught by said professors.
SE 350 (Operating Systems), CS 343 (Concurrent and Parallel Programming), and MATH 239 (Introduction to Combinatorics) are the most popular core courses. The top favourited courses were all taken between 2B and 3B. This can either be because respondents don't remember much of their first 3 terms' courses, or because respondents enjoyed higher level courses.
SE 463 (Software Requirements Specification and Analysis),
ECE 106 (Electricity and Magnetism)
and SE 380 (Introduction to Feedback Control) were the most disliked core courses.
Some Linkage Electives were also not liked among the class such as SMF 101, SPCOM 100, and SPCOM 223.
It's important to note that courses that were disliked do not imply that
respondents find the content useless. Instead, a variety of factors, such as
personal interests, final grades, and workload, may have come into play.
For example, Operating Systems (SE 350) is considered useful by 96% of students
according to UWFlow, despite being nominated as a least favourite course.
CLAS 104 (Classical Mythology), CS 444 (Compiler Construction), MUSIC 140 (Popular Music and Culture), and MUSIC 246 (Soundtracks: Music in Film) were the most popular electives. None of the favourite electives were among the communication electives or science electives lists.
Among core courses, SE 350 (Operating Systems) and CS 343 (Concurrent and Parallel Programming) were the courses with the largest workload. Among electives CS 444 (Compiler Construction) was the course with the largest workload. Although these courses involved a high workload, most of them were also popular among respondents.
Overloading is popular among the class with 28 respondents (53%) overloading at some point during their academic degree. The 3A and 4A terms are the most popular ones to overload. The SE curriculum encourages students to overload in their 4A term to have a lighter term in 4B, which can be busy with graduation traditions and FYDP work on top of courses.
The most popular reasons to overload were to have a lighter term and to take more electives than prescribed.
The preferred residences in first year was V1 and UWP. From first year on, Lester Street was the most popular street to live on in Waterloo. The likely popularity of Lester St. is probably due to how close it is to campus. Note that CMH opened to students in the class's 2A term.
Interactive: Click on a term number to view students' location for that term.
When COVID hit, most respondents still decided to move back to Waterloo in their 4A term. Students likely were hoping that measures would loosen over the summer or to occupy student housing already rented for the year. However, in 4B, most respondents decided to move back home.
Interactive: Click on a term number to view students' location for that term.
There is no clear correlation between self-reported attendance and grades, although it appears that attending all classes benefited respondents academically.
Parent's education did not appear to impact the median overall average among respondents.
Enriched Programs did not appear to benefit respondents academically, even in first year. On average, respondents who took part in an Enriched Program performed worse in first year than respondents who did not take part in an Enriched Program. To be clear, this does not suggest that doing an Enriched Program is not beneficial to students, instead, it suggests that Enriched Program do not give an evident advantage in comparison to students who did not take part in such programs in High School.
Interactive: Click on a provided filter to view the plot for that filter.
Respondents who had an entrance average of 95%+ appear to perform better than respondents who had a lower entrance average. This could imply that students who have a 95%+ entrance average are slightly stronger students academically. Regardless of grades, all respondents were in at least Good standing by the time they graduated.
Interactive: Click on a provided filter to view the plot for that filter.
On average, respondents performed slightly worse if they slept more than 8 hours. Note that all respondents slept at least 5 hours. Although there seems to be some correlation between sleep and grades, this does not necessarily mean that one causes the other. Also note that the recommended number of hours of sleep for young adults is 7 to 9 hours.
At least 150 companies have hired an SE student.
Students had the opportunity to work in many different types of environments,
including working at a 5 person startup, writing code in Shanghai,
researching with professors, and working at a big tech company.
While a majority of students were software engineers during their co-ops,
some explored other areas such as game development, product management, security and trading.
The benefit of having 6 co-op terms is that students get to explore different
company sizes doing different positions in different cities. This is
invaluable for students because it helps students figure out what they want
upon graduation.
77% of respondents co-oped in at least 2 different countries.
The majority that co-oped in the US worked in California.
One of the reasons for this is because of Silicon Valley, which is the headquarters for many
large tech companies that hire software engineers, such as Google, Facebook,
Apple, etc.
Every odd co-op term, there was at least one student working outside
of North America. This included locations in Europe and Shanghai.
Although the University of Waterloo did not authorize any co-ops outside of Canada once the pandemic hit, 35.4% of respondents
said they worked in the US for their last co-op. One explanation is that in order
to graduate from Software Engineering only 5 (now 4 as a result of the pandemic) out of 6 approved co-ops need to be completed, so students
may have ignored the restrictions. Another reason is respondents may have decided to provide the location of the office they would have
worked for if it wasn't for the pandemic.
Interactive: Click on a location to hide or display the plot for that location.
68% of respondents' favourite work location was in the US and 39.6% was specifically in California.
While California is still preferred by most, this suggests that it is not
for everyone. The infamous ‘Cali or Bust’ mentality and the pandemic could have hindered
some students from exploring opportunities in other cities that may have
been better suited for them as well.
This also shows that Canada's brain drain is real and Canadian cities
are failing to attract and / or retain Canada's top talent.
Median hourly compensation increased over time until the pandemic hit. By the last co-op term,
compensation had on average tripled in comparison to the first co-op term.
Average hourly compensation per co-op term were $21.48, $32.07, $32.18, $55.35, $57.47, $60.36 (in CAD).
The difference could be explained by the exchange rate between the USD and the CAD, as more respondents
started working in the US, and an increase in salaries and
stipends to compensate for the difference in living costs between different
locations. For example, San Francisco housing typically costs between
$1,500 to $2,500 per month. In comparison, Waterloo housing costs approximately $700 per month.
The median hourly compensation may be lower in the last co-op because respondents were not able to work in
the US or worked for US companies on a Canadian payroll and received lower compensation as a result.
Note that some of these values include other types of compensation such as stipend and others may not.
As respondents gained work experience, they applied to fewer jobs over time
and found more jobs outside of WaterlooWorks.
Respondents applied to 3 times fewer jobs by their last co-ops. The number of interviews
respondents had every term varied between 3.62 and 8.20, and the number of offers received
every term varied between 1.6 to 2.84.
Around 30% of respondents found their job externally. In particular, 60% of respondents found their
job externally on their last co-op term. There could be several reasons for this increase: perhaps
students were interested in jobs not listed on WaterlooWorks; or, the pandemic
could have encouraged students to apply on more than one job board.
Note: The average number of external applications is only based on respondents who looked
for external jobs.
Most respondents had an "Outstanding" or "Excellent" co-op rating. 52% of respondents received an "Outstanding" co-op rating and 96.5% received at least an "Excellent" co-op rating every co-op term.
91% respondents worked as a Software Engineer / Web Developer every term. Among other types of jobs not listed, a few respondents worked as Information Security Analyst, TA/Instructor, Product Manager, Trader, CTO and Game Developer.
Over the coop interview cycles, students sometimes missed an interview or were late to an interview.
"I waited in the TC lobby and at T+5mins my name hadn't shown up so I double checked and it was actually a phone interview. By some miracle I had my laptop in my bag, so I barged in a random office in TC and pleaded to use the room. Luckily the office worker let me use the room for 30 minutes. Pulled up a chair and somehow aced the interview. Ended up getting the offer and taking it."
Alarm Mishaps"I missed my alarm and woke up at 8:20 for an interview at 8:30. I quickly got dressed and ran to TC as fast as I could. My name was already called and the receptionist was trying to get a hold of me through my phone. Finally ran up the stairs, 15 mins late to my 30 min interview and burst into the room. The interviewer was surprisingly very kind and understanding and allowed me to catch my breath. Finally, I somehow aced the interview and got the offer."
"They requested a paper copy of my resume, so I had to print one. So [I] went to the interview from V1, was even going to be early, got to the Environment buildings and realized I forgot to print the resume, so [I] had to go back. [I h]ad issues printing, and then when I got back to my room I couldn't find my keys (for some reason I had hung them on the light switch so I found them after I had given up looking and was just going to leave). Finally got there about 30 seconds after they had called me to the interview, but it felt like I was going to be 10 minutes late. (also it was raining so I was a soggy mess by the time I got to the interview)."
With 5-6 co-op experiences under their belt, we wanted to see what companies were among students' favourites and why.
Among 31 respondents, we grouped the written responses among the 8 categories below to see which factors weighed most when choosing their favourite companies.
Interest in work was the most common factor affecting students' enjoyment at a company. When students are engaged and interested in their work and projects, they get more enjoyment from their co-op experience.
Following that, factors such as salary, work benefits, culture, and co-workers were roughly equally important factors.
"Finally getting an offer in California"
"Making some (hopefully) lifelong friends during the [co-op] of summer 2019"
"I got to participate in a DnD one-shot hosted by a coworker, and our party's first reaction to any encounter was to try to burn the place down first. Our DM designed the final encounter to take longer than what we ended up taking (it was supposed to be in a house full of booby traps and whatnot), but our arsonistic nature forced the final boss and his henchmen to abandon their base and fight us out in the open"
"Yosemite camping "
"Drinking beer at work with my boss"
"Too many to pick. A funny one is once someone leaked [company X's] internal [U]ber/[L]yft codes and we were taking unlimited $500 Uber Luxe XLs across California."
"Most of them were great but my time in California was definitely the most memorable since I met so many new people and experienced a lot of fun things for the first time. Great weather, great activities, great trips to new cities and great people made for an exciting [co-op] term!"
In order to rank jobs appropriately, salary is used as a proxy metric to measure job opportunities. Due to the limited expressiveness of this metric, the following results should be taken with a grain of salt because higher salary does not imply higher job satisfaction.
There is no clear correlation between grades and salary.
In other words, having a high cumulative average does not imply that the student
will get a good salary in the upcoming co-op term. This suggests that there
are more important factors than grades when it comes to finding a good job.
Some companies do use grades as a cutoff to filter large candidate pools.
However, many companies are aware that grades are not a good indication of how
performant a student can be during co-op.
This suggests that if a student wanted to optimize for getting the best co-op
possible, aiming for a higher grade may not yield the desired results, and
their efforts could be redirected towards other involvements such as side
projects.
Interactive: Click on a co-op number to view the plot for that co-op.
Women are paid less than men on average for co-op terms.
Although the data trends from our survey indicate that women are paid less than men,
it is difficult to determine which portion of the compensation difference is due solely
to gender bias, as opposed to other causes. The other variables include a difference in
interests (in terms of work location, type of work, etc.) among men and women
respondents in the class.
Note: There were about 30-42 men and 8-9 women who responded to co-op salaries.
However, this does not suggest that there is no gender bias in the long term.
In fact, according to a
Glassdoor study,
"younger workers face a smaller gender pay gap than older workers." This
finding is not exclusive to the tech industry.
Respondents who attended at least one hackathon earned 33.6% more on average than those that
didn't attend any.
In other words, students who show passion for building projects get better job
opportunities than those that don't. Alternatively, this result could be
because students that attended a hackathon cared more about getting a higher
paying job.
Respondents who attended more than 5 hackathons did not earn more than those who only attended at least 1.
Respondents who built side projects earned 8.8% more on average than those who
didn't build side projects.
The more time that a student invests into side projects, the more they are likely
to get paid. Side projects are often seen as the closest thing to software
work experience, making it a great time investment to compensate for any lack
of work experience.
It is important to mention that side projects and hackathons are not the only way to find
a job. There have been many less-practiced methods students have used to
find job opportunities such as referrals, networking, etc.
It is just as important to note that students who are not involved in software-related
extracurriculars still find great jobs. In fact,
many SE students and faculty encourage pursuing interests besides software.
Respondents who had an admission average above 95% earned 3.7% more on their 1st co-op and 23.8% more overall than those that had a lower entrance average. Based on the co-op average in first year, it is unlikely that admission averages are a causal factor for average co-op salary.
Interactive: Click on a provided filter to view the plot for that filter.
Python is the most popular programming language.
Python has diverse applications such as prototyping, web applications, machine learning, and scripting.
These are common areas faced by Software Engineers, making Python an ideal general purpose language that is easy to pick up.
C++ is one of the first languages that SE students encounter in their courses.
It provides a strong programming foundation and is highly portable, making it an ideal choice for multi-platform development.
It also has applications in enterprise codebases, so students may encounter it over co-op as well.
Many students encounter web development either during co-op or for side projects.
This may explain why many students pick up JavaScript and TypeScript.
Visual Studio Code was the most popular editor. Trailing farther behind were Vim and IntelliJ. Visual Studio Code provides large extension and theme ecosystems which makes it easy to use and set up for various types of projects. According to this Stack Overflow survey, VSCode was also rated as the most popular development environment.
iOS was the favourite mobile OS, used by 63% of students.
Interestingly, Android dominates the worldwide market share, running on around 72% of devices compared to 26% for iOS.
However, in North America, we see 53% of devices running iOS and 45% using Android, which is a similar proportion to what is seen among SE students.
Walmart won the hearts (and stomachs) of most SE students, followed by a near equal split of the remaining stores. Costco seems to have the least appeal, and T&T has grown quickly considering it opened halfway through the program (just before the 3A term).
A minor in culinary studies. SE students cooked often, with ~77% doing so on an almost daily basis. That being said, this does not mean that respondents are master chefs.
Kinkaku's AYCE sushi proved to be a fan-favourite amongst SE students. Beer Town, Baba Grill, Kabob Hut, Bao Sandwich Bar, and Shinwa were also liked by visitors.
A class of food critics. Purchasing food was a common occurrence, with only ~8% of respondents making dining a special event.
Students clearly value sleeping at reasonable times.
The most popular answer was 2 AM, at which point ~84% of SE students
have gone to sleep. However, some students still prefer sleeping late,
possibly due to work or personal reasons (gaming).
Sleeping after 6 AM might sound crazy, but then again, some of these students
also willingly go to 24 hour hackathons.
S.R.E.A.M - Sleep Rules Everything Around Me. Future students will be glad to see that studying SE does not mean sacrificing sleep. In fact, ~77% of respondents sleep >= 7 hours on average, which is the recommended amount for adults by the CDC.
Via co-op and exchange, Waterloo SE students have had many opportunities to travel across the world. California and Europe as large regions are commonly favoured, likely due to their dominance for co-op and exchange respectively.
"When travel restrictions will be lifted, which country/city do you want to visit the most and why?"
La Paz, Mexico for fishing.
South Korea for the amazing food.
Scotland for golf.
Australia!
Japan! It's always been on my bucket list. I want to go
for the food and the culture.
Iceland, heard it is very beautiful.
New Zealand, I have just always wanted to go there. It's
beautiful and has extremely interesting geography.
China as it's home.
Modena, Italy for the sick food.
Patagonia to hike the W Trek.
Himalayas, India for the views and culture.
Norway for the scenery.
Greece!
Unlike high school, just over half of respondents were not involved in any
extracurriculars during undergrad.
However a substantial amount did get involved for a few academic terms.
We hope that future SEs will buck this trend of disengagement by past classes.
Engineering design teams were not pursued.
Only 24% of respondents joined a student design team, with none being
part of one for more than 3 terms.
A likely reason is that software projects can often be done in isolation,
allowing a more flexible schedule for students looking to sharpen their skills.
SE respondents who exercise enjoy sports and weight training the most. Hiking and running are the two next most favoured exercise methods.
Making time for fun. At least 38% of respondents went out/partied once a month, with ~18% doing so a few times a week. Only 11% said they never partied. This somewhat goes against the stereotype of SE students being antisocial, however this is still not an overwhelmingly outgoing group.
"Friends are the artists who paint happy lips on your face." - Richelle E. Goodrich Spending time with friends made SE 2021 the most happy, followed by cooking and/or eating food. Enjoying familial presence came in third.
Did cooking as a hobby lead to cooking often, or was it the other way around? Cooking was the top stated unique hobby, but sports dominated the hobby landscape. One person responded that they felt that they had lost hobbies, instead of picking any up, in the past 5 years.
We try hard to stay healthy, but, inevitably, 90% of respondents fell sick or got injured at some point. Students faced a variety of incidents from the common cold to shoulder dislocations. However, over 60% fell ill only 4 times or less, showing a fairly low rate of illness per year.
Accidents happen and it's important to be covered.
At least 55% of respondents reported their health insurance plan helped cover some of the costs associated with their sickness or injury.
Depending on where the incident occured and the severity, the coverage may differ. But some coverage is better than none.
Mental health is a vital part of our well-being that needs continuous monitoring.
Half of the respondents reported struggling with mental health problems before and during university.
The majority of those reported developing mental health struggles after starting university.
Starting post-secondary education can bring a lot of change and excitement to a student's life.
With that change, there are many factors that can also cause students to struggle with their mental health.
It's important to look out for yourself and one another as everyone is fighting a different battle and may need support at any moment.
The most common mental health issues were anxiety, low self-esteem, and depression. Trying to manage academics, co-op, and social lives can take a toll on us. It's important to take some time to focus on ourselves and do the things that are important and relaxing for each of us. This can help us find balance and remind ourselves of our own accomplishments.
Over 80% of respondents felt imposter syndrome over their university years. Impostor syndrome refers to an individual's internal experience of believing that they are not as competent as others perceive them to be. The Software Engineering program is very competitive and has one of the highest admission averages in Waterloo. This can place students in a pressure-to-achieve environment which might have led to students feeling like an imposter.
By the end of their university career, around 46% of respondents do not feel imposter syndrome, while 30% of the respondents sometimes do, and 24% of the respondents still do. This shows a growth in the respondents' confidence over the years as they overcame their academic hurdles, experienced the real world during co-ops, and found their calling in Software Engineering.
Active bodies and active minds.
Around 40% of respondents would find some time to exercise throughout the week,
while over half of respondents would exercise less frequently than that over the months and terms.
It's important to keep our bodies active as it can boost our overall health. In certain cases, aerobic exercise has been shown to reduce anxiety and depression.
Strengthening our lungs and muscles.
45% of respondents reported doing strength-related exercises, like weight-training and calisthenics.
And 38% reported doing aerobic exercises like walking, running, hiking, biking etc. Anything to get the heart pumping.
It's important to find the form of exercise that brings the most enjoyment to get the most out of it.
47% of respondents have participated in intramurals. Intramurals are a great way to get active in some organized sports and even learn a sport you haven't played before. It's also been a great way to meet people and have fun with friends while breaking a sweat.
Like dynamic variables, our weights change over time.
66% of respondents experienced an increase in weight over the years while 18% experienced a decrease.
Everyone's body and goals are different. It's important to determine your goals and so you can work towards them.
54% of respondents reported using some form of controlled substance for recreational purposes. Alcohol and marijuana were the most common. 40% reported having alocohol and 30% reported trying marijuana.
A good chunk of us spend time with our family, either digitally
(88.7 %) or in person (71.67 %).
Before the pandemic, most of us lived near campus and away from family.
The average amount of time spent digitally in a month with parents
was 5.10 hours.
Respondents spent on average 1.17 days with their parents physically, with 63 % spending less than an entire day per month.
Before the pandemic, 85 % of us lived more than 50 kilometres away from our families. The furthest someone lived away was 20 000 kilometres away. That would explain why 63 % of respondents spent on average less than a day with their parents in person.
On average, a softie made 4.36 new friends over co-op, and 3.05 over a school term. They would lose on average 1.30 friends over co-op, compared to 0.55 over a school term. Thus, the net gain in friends over co-op is about 3.1 friends, while the net gain over a school term is 2.31 friends.
Interactive: Click on a provided filter to hide or display the plot for that filter.
From classmates to friends..? We asked SEs to recall what the most touching thing a fellow classmate had done for them. The following responses are either directly quoted or rephrased from the original submissions.
Sticking by my side since day 1.
Pulling an all nighter to help me with an assignment they had already finished.
Reaching out during COVID. The number of people (myself included now!) who've
just touched base to have little catchup calls, who I probably wouldn't have
talked to too much in person, has been really sweet.
To help me travel home on St Patrick's day when I was blackout drunk.
Supporting me when I needed help in a foreign country.
To give me notes.
When one classmate introduced me to his friends and made me feel super welcome
when I transferred into SE. It was super awesome of him to do so and those
[friends] were the friends I stuck with throughout SE.
Hosting a surprise party for my birthday.
Staying up with me after a breakup.
One time my classmate bought us a PS5 so we could play Call of Duty in between
assignments.
So many, I can't even think of what was the "most" touching.
About 33.9 % spent at least half of their degree in a romantic relationship. Out of 56 respondents, 25 % of them spent their entire degree single. About 33.9 % spent at least half of their degree in a romantic relationship. Only 1 person was not single throughout their entire degree.
SEs most commonly had only 1 relationship throughout university. One respondent answered that they had 20 romantic partners during their degree. What a casanova (omitted as to not skew the graph)!
Did SEcest -- a term coined by a previous class profile -- happen in our year? 1 out of 8 respondents said yes.
A majority (62.26 %) of respondents said that they never had a sexual partner before university. That changed to only 26 % of respondents saying that they never had one during university. Someone even boasted having 9 sexual partners during their undergraduate studies.
Spilling the infideli-tea. A good 14.8 % of the 54 who answered were involved with cheating. A breakdown of how they were involved can be seen below. Respondents could select more than one involvement cause.
"How has your understanding of relationships changed in the past 5 years?"
The people who we cared most about in our lives who we
have parted ways with are not gone. They exist as memories,
as voices of our consciences, and as layers of the characters
we are today.
Understanding compromise.
Yes.
They take time to nurture and maintain. That's not
meant to sound overly pessimistic, but if you have a
busy schedule, you need to think consciously about the
relationships you want to keep and those you don't to
have a happy social life.
The USD, which bases on the American economy, is more
stable than most relationships.
People are like plants: some need more water, others
less, and watering them is your responsibility. Maybe
this plant needs more than you can give, maybe that
one you like less; ultimately you decide who you want
to keep in your life and water that relationship.
I've learned more to love in my own way, instead of
mimicking the relationship of my parents.
Oh so completely different with my parents and family.
Treated completely like an adult and I swear I've been
helping parent my little brother.
63% of respondents did not budget their money. Of those who did, the majority didn't use complex budgeting techniques or tools. Interestingly, the majority of students also didn't have much debt and were able to pay off their school expenses.
85% of respondents invested their money.
Index Funds and Managed Services were the most popular methods of investments, used in 60% of responses.
These methods provide an easy, diversified, and low-cost way to invest, making them a useful tool to get started with investing.
"With great wealth comes great responsibility"
80% of respondents received some funding from their family.
For Canadians, a popular source of funding is a Registered Education Savings Plan (RESP).
Other methods of funding could include assisting in tuition payments, rent payments or contributions to other living expenses.
This may suggest that the families of the majority of SE students had already planned for their children to attend post-secondary education.
All respondents spent some money on school materials at some point.
54% of respondents spent less than $500 CAD on school materials.
It's likely that courses over the first 2 years had greater amounts of required additional materials.
The amount of required materials decreasing over the years may relate to why few respondents paid over $1,000 over 8 terms.
Over 50% of respondents did not take any student loans.
80% of those who took out student loans also received funds from their family.
Co-op provides the oppurtunity to have an income every 4 months. This may be a factor allowing students to avoid the need for loans.
65% of respondents graduated debt-free.
The co-op program can help students earn money to pay off debts and expenses as they work towards their degree.
In 2019, the average student debt in Ontario was around $19,000 compared to $20k - $30k average debt among this survey respondents.
Engineering at Waterloo is also a more costly program.
The average undergraduate tuition for Canadian citizens studying in Canada is around $6,500/year compared to $17,100/year for SE.
The average undergraduate tuition for international students studying in Canada is around $29,700/year compared to $61,200/year for SE
Had there been more information about going on exchange, namely to address graduation concerns and course flexibility, and an easier application process, more softies would have gone on exchange. The exchange program was briefly introduced to us in our second year, during an optional seminar. It's then no wonder that, of the 54 responses received for the exchange section, 85 % did not go on exchange.
Of the 46 who said they had not gone on exchange, 16 said that they would have gone had:
- there been more exposure to the exchange program;
- the exchange application process been easier;
- global events such as Covid and the Hong Kong unrest not been a thing.
When asked whether they would suggest going on exchange to future SEs, 7 out of 8 said yes. SE students who have gone on exchange usually went on a study term after their 3A term. A good amount went on exchange in their 3B term. All but one respondent recommended that future SEs attempt going on exchange. All respondents went abroad for only a single term. The sister universities SEs attended were all in Europe (UK, Netherlands, Switzerland) or Asia (Singapore, South Korea).
Interactive: Click on a highlighted country to see the sister schools and the number of people who attended.
"An invaluable opportunity to travel and to immerse yourself in a different culture." We asked our exchangees to provide us some insight into their exchange experience. Many of the sentences are directly quoted or rephrased from the original submissions.
The paperwork and the course planning.
The language barrier - the area is mostly French-speaking.
Finding a co-op for the next term, especially if the term start/end dates did
not match the typical UW start/end dates.
Connecting with the locals and making friends in a meaningful capacity. Some
exchange schools have a more mature program than others where it is easier to
make friends. If I were to do exchange again I would opt for a school where a
lot of international students go and where the program is well established.
Balancing schoolwork/wanting to graduate at the same time as the SE cohort with
taking advantage of being in a new country. Oh, and the timezone differences when
communicating with friends, family, group project members and North American
interviewers was a pain.
Applying for exchange.
Less time spent on school, more time available for travelling.
Having fun was easier.
Studies at my exchange program were significantly easier than at UWaterloo.
Exchange is an invaluable opportunity to immerse yourself in culture and
travel abroad.
It's a great opportunity to travel around and experience a different culture.
Exchange was by far my favourite term while at UW. I would highly recommend it.
It was hard to find the next [co-op]; everything else is fantastic!
Exchange was an invaluable experience for me. I was left to my own devices in an
alien country with a different culture and had to learn to live like a local. I
learned various aspects of the local culture which I have sought to incorporate
into my own life. I also got the chance to travel to many countries in Europe
where I met a ton of new people and had many great experiences.
I think the biggest benefit of exchange is to be removed from the regular groove
of familiarity and being placed in a completely different landscape which forges
new connections and patterns of thinking. It can also be a ton of fun!
Definitely go on exchange if you have the chance/want to, but do your research
in earlier years so that you can plan for an exchange term accordingly. It's nice
to discover other cultures and to live in a different country for an extended
period of time. Another plus is to be able to take some courses not offered at
UWaterloo (NLP anyone?).
We made it through Waterloo Engineering, but not without some hurdles along the way.
On average, respondents felt burnout in 3.34 of 8 academic terms (~42%).
The median and mode were both 2.
The results are heavily skewed towards the lower levels, meaning that
most respondents found the academic aspect of SE manageable.
No one was involved in a physical fight outside of a martial arts setting during their degree. This question was asked to get some signal on conflicts that SE students may have been involved in. All 49 respondents said they had never fought outside a sport setting.
The University of Waterloo had the world's most populated university subreddit until recently. Needless to say, we're big redditors. Here is a breakdown of how many hours were spent by respondents on the platform.
Most respondents are dog lovers! 🐕
Reflecting on our time at Waterloo means more than making some graphs. Here are some stories over the past 5 years.
"In my second [co-op] term, I snuck into Google's headquarters in Palo Alto with
my good friend [redacted] on a weekend, and no one was around so we stole their
campus bikes and went sightseeing around the area. My phone's camera had broken
autofocus so we couldn't get nice pictures, which is the sad part. We were good
boys so we returned the bikes. Finally, in an attempt to catch the free Palo Alto shuttle, we ran for a good
few kilometres.
[This] stands out as one of my favourite days in SE since it was the
day I learned about [redacted]'s interest in entrepreneurship, which also made
me more optimistic about it, which has now led into us building out our FYDP
venture."
"Sometimes I regret choosing SE, but then I remember how lit the Pronto parties were."
"The closest friends I made, I made them in the Software Lounge. I don't know if its the room or the people who also thought the lounge was a great place to hangout, but I had so many fond memories there. I worked there all the time and sometimes cried there too, played a lot of games, goofed around, slept on the couch (which is definitely a must) but also that's where I got to meet my FYDP team. Find a Software Lounge in your life and oh my your University Degree is gonna fly by."
"Shinwa hits different when you’re celebrating 🥳"
"I got drunk at a work party on[e] time in San Francisco on a work term. I don't
remember anything that happened that night but I woke up in a hospital with
vomit on my jeans, and was told I was found on the side of some street.
Hospital and ambulance bills ended up costing me over $6000 USD, and my
travel insurance didn't cover it because it was a 'self-inflicted injury'.
Thankfully I had work insurance and only ended up paying $2000. I went in
to work the next day.
The team's parties no longer serve shots."
"After a party with some other SEs, we thought it would be a fun idea to climb some buildings, ended up with me falling off said building."
"Back in first year, when the Facebook group chat was active, someone changed the group chat name to SE2022 because of the brutal ECE105 final we just had (interesting discussions were had, including considering switching to CS/Management/Arts)."
"Proud to be part of SE21 which is full of brilliant and competent people."
Coping with all that life throws at you at these very developmental years is
a difficult task.
Everyone expresses themselves differently and crying is a natural, common,
but unfortunately minimized method.
Of those who responded, Waterloo SE students cried once a term on mode and median,
1.7 times on average.
It is difficult to determine how these results map onto the total SE student population.
A non-answer could imply a (low or high) extremity.
The majority of SE students considered switching to another major. This relates to the age old question asked of Waterloo students: What's the difference between Computer Science, Computer Engineering, and Software Engineering?
Most SE students had no doubts about completing their bachelor's. Only 4 respondents pondered leaving university.
Results from the previous two graphs came from mostly SE grads. 44 of the 50 respondents are SE graduates of this year. This represents about half of the total graduates (92).
All respondents who transferred out of SE went into the Computer Science program. Of the people surveyed, approximately 9.5% of students switched out of the Software Engineering program.
The majority of the respondents switched out of the program in their second or third year. The data here was a combination of both the survey and the SE board results. We see that a majority of students switched programs in their second or their third year. It is also interesting to note that almost always a plurality of transferring students left SE in an Excellent academic standing.
A flexible course schedule is the main reason for switching out of Software Engineering.
The Engineering program has a relatively rigid course schedule which offers students the flexibility to choose courses usually only in their fourth year.
The Computer Science program, on the other hand, is less restrictive and allows students to customize their schedules freely.
Other reasons for transferring included avoiding a course, graduating early, and accommodating for an exchange term.
ECE 105 and ECE 106 were the disliked courses among transferred students. All the disliked courses of transfered students were part of the course requirements for SE. As seen earlier, students likely transferred in order to have a more flexible schedule for future terms and to take courses better suited for them.
None of the transferred students surveyed regretted their decision. The Computer Science program was successfully able to provide the transferred students with a better place to align themselves with their university goals.
70% of respondents would choose SE again if they could go back to high school. Computer Science is a popular alternative because it has more course flexibility. Unlike SE, Computer Science does not have a cohort, which makes it harder for CS students to meet others.
Being a part of Software Engineering was life-changing for most of the class, and equally enjoyed by both women and men. 51% of the class rated SE a max score of 5, and 87% of the class rated above a 4 out of 5. Shoutouts to the Software Engineering faculty and the class for creating such a great environment for students!
90% of respondents had already accepted a job offer two months prior
to graduating.
However, only 52 of the 92 SE graduates, and a few who transferred,
answered this question. The only take-away is that most students had
the opportunity to accept a job offer prior to graduating.
Respondents pursuing further education will be doing so at Columbia University,
Stanford University, as well as back at the University of Waterloo.
Big tech and trading firms hired many of the SE grads. Unfortunately, only 51 students answered this question, so just over 55% of the total graduating class. It is likely that the full breadth of companies and industries is larger when considering everyone's future.
The co-op experience acts as a great pipeline for hiring young talent for companies. It also enables students to find a workplace they enjoy, as shown by the sheer amount of students opting to return to a co-op employer rather than accepting an offer elsewhere.
Students do not feel the need to become accredited as Professional Engineers. Most students have no intention to pursue a license with the PEO. This is required to have your job title include the term "Engineer" within Canada. Very few industries restrict hiring to accredited engineers and instead employ "software developers".
Students believe in the value of their FYDP projects. More than half of respondents may or will continue work on their FYDP. Hopefully this shows that students have selected projects in areas they are interested in or that they believe will be beneficial to pursue further.
Respondents are very content with their post-grad plans, with 52% feeling that the latter are perfect and 91% rating their future a 4/5 or higher. Given the state of the world at this moment, it is reassuring to see SE students being satisfied with their situations.
The compensation for the first year of full-time work for respondents
will average $284,728 CAD, with a median of $260,000. This number
includes all forms of remuneration eg. signing bonuses and equity.
The exchange rate used for this question and the ones that follow was 1.3
CAD per 1 USD. That rate was accurate at the time the survey was shared,
but the rate is 1.2 as of writing.
Since 77% of respondents will be relocating to the US, we can estimate
the new average and median earnings to actually be $267,882 and $244,600 CAD.
The hourly wage / salary will have an average and a median of $105 and $81 CAD respectively. We can again estimate this to be $99 and $76 CAD with today's exchange rate.
There's a huge discrepancy in profit sharing for new grads,
with the average and median being $95,392 and $32,500 CAD.
"Profit sharing" here is used to encompass stock options, RSUs,
and other forms of equity-based compensation.
There are extreme outliers that skewed the mean and median greatly.
With the new exchange rate, the results are $89,742 and $30,505 CAD.
Signing bonuses were common for respondents, with the average and
median being $62,979 and $40,000 CAD.
The modal response was $0 for a signing bonus with 15 responses out of
the total 47.
Adjusting for the new exchange rate, we find the average and median to be
$59,248 and $37,630 CAD.
An enjoyable workplace and a good compensation were the biggest factors in
accepting full-time roles.
It is great to see the class value a positive environment above compensation.
In contrast to most other industries, software recruitment has remained
relatively unaffected in the face of a global pandemic. Only 1 respondent factored
job security in their decision-making.
27% of respondents plan to return to their home country after having moved away.
Moving away is a big change. There's a fairly even split among students who would like to return home or stay abroad, while the rest of students haven't decided yet.
This goes to show that everyone has different goals and each student should find what's important to them.
One common tip from alumni is to pursue what makes you happy and aligns with your values.
This way, you can find the most happiness in what you do, whether that's close to home or abroad.
The following is a summary of the advice shared by students with the
intention of being shared with both prospective and current SE students.
Many of the sentences
are directly quoted or rephrased from the original advice.
The best drink you can have is Burgundy's at Wilfs. I will
be coming back for [them].
If you want to be super organized when packing and moving
around, store photos of various layers of your packed bags.
Then, when you need to go on a similar trip (whether it's
2 weeks in a tropical location or moving to a new city for
co-op), you know exactly what to pack and where, and it
basically requires no time at all to get ready!
Take the same courses as the people you live with.
If you don't collect air miles you're missing out on
$10-$50 per flight.
Talk less, listen more.
Surround yourself with successful people who will naturally
push you to do your best.
Be empathetic.
Have confidence. You deserve to be here.
Overworking yourself never works! You reach a point
w[h]ere putting more work doesn't yield the cost benefit
necessary, instead you will feel much better and
perform as well or better by being involved in something
you enjoy.
Don't take everything so seriously. Take the time to
learn even if it means lower marks, and take some time
to explore projects, hobbies and have fun!
I don't think my first-year self would have taken my
advice.
Spend more time having fun. Always keep well being and
quality of life in mind.
Don't limit your co-op applications to one place - especially
in first year. It's better to apply to a variety of jobs
in a variety of locations -- use that as an excuse to
lightly travel when on [co-op].
Stop sending cringey snaps when drunk.
Buy doge coin.
People are less intimidating than you think.
Take more risks throughout university.
Be yourself.
Compassion.
How important reflection time is. Taking time to reflect
on how I'm feeling about all parts of my life has led to
some of the biggest, most positive changes I made during
undergrad.
Failing a class.
Not all things are worth doing.
How to learn complex ideas quickly.
Figure out what you want and don't be afraid to go
against the norm. Don't strive for something just
because other people do.
Stress baking helps a lot, surprisingly.
The importance of being confident in yourself and what you can do.
Cramming last minute works fantastically, unless it doesn't.
Mental health is as important as physical health. In tandem,
your productivity doesn't define your self worth. It's fine
to have a day where you don't get anything significant done.
Humility.
We hope you enjoyed reading the University of Waterloo Software Engineering 2021 Class Profile!
This project wouldn't have been possible without the help of some great people:
Andy Zhang for allowing us to fork the 2018 profile site, saving us time and letting us focus on making this profile more personal than ever before. Also for reviewing our pre-release draft and being available to discuss the profile over messenger.
Patrick Lam, Derek Rayside, and all other SEs for providing input throughout the process of making this profile!
Kashish Goel for starting discussions and early efforts on this class profile back in the fall of 2018. Though you transferred out, we appreciate your contributions and wish you didn't leave us!
Andrew Xia for sharing resources, ideas, and updates as you worked on the ECE 2021 Class Profile alongside us. We loved exchanging ideas and collaborating with you!
Roxane Fruytier, Nader Sabahi, Jaxon Lin, Jenny Wills, Aravind Segu, and Akshay Pall for volunteering their time to work on this profile over the past several months.
Software Engineering Program Homepage https://uwaterloo.ca/software-engineering/
Co-op at UWaterloo https://uwaterloo.ca/co-operative-education/
Academic Calendar https://ugradcalendar.uwaterloo.ca/page/ENG-Software-Engineering
Software Engineering 2018 Class Profile https://classprofile.andyzhang.net/
Software Engineering 2020 Class Profile https://uw-se-2020-class-profile.github.io/profile.pdf
Biomedical Engineering 2019 Class Profile https://medium.com/uwaterloo-voice/university-of-waterloo-biomedical-engineering-2019-class-profile-5e54e8371ed1
Systems Design Engineering 2019 Class Profile https://ndey96.github.io/syde_2019_class_profile.pdf
Mechatronics Engineering 2020 Class Profile https://tron2020classprofile.github.io/
Management Engineering 2020 Class Profile https://uwaterloo-mgte-2020-class-profile.github.io/mgteprofile.pdf
Electrical and Computer Engineering 2021 Class Profile https://ece2021profile.github.io/report.pdf
2018 Class Profile Code https://github.com/andyzg/classprofile
2021 Class Profile Code https://github.com/sexxis/classprofile/
Patrick Lam's SE Materials https://patricklam.ca/se-materials/