[heurist]

I've had mostly negative experiences hiring new grads. So far, even though they were all smart with a lot of potential, they've all demanded more time and money than they were worth and left as soon as they felt any dissatisfaction, no mind or loyalty to the company or mentorship we've provided. They're fully within their rights to do that but it's happened to me enough times that I've decided new grads are not worth my effort right now. And I understand where they're coming from. I treated my first job out of school as a "throwaway" company while I earned experience and worked on establishing my personal life. Do that at a big company where you're a small component, not a startup where everyone relies on everyone else.

Another perspective: startups don't have capacity for mentoring, in most cases. Startups are high-throughput environments and bad design by inexperienced coders (i.e. most new grads) will slow a project down significantly. New grads are often treated as cannon fodder because they can't be used for anything else, and that leads to frustration and burnout. Do you want that? Wouldn't you rather establish your career under an experienced mentor, unlimited resources, a low pressure environment, and a high salary? Most new grads will do best by paying off student loans first, building a base of experience for a couple years, then jumping into startups from there. 2 years of enterprise experience at a company with a strong engineering culture (not even the "elite" ones) will make you infinitely more valuable to a startup than trying to break in right out of school.

My two cents. Not all new grads are the same :)