Most CS programs do not have 99% placement. There are a few reasons
1. Some people who graduate with CS degrees can't write good code. It is shocking how little you can learn while still graduating.
2. Some college graduates are lack the social/organizational skills for office work
3. Industry has a limited appetite for junior engineers because they're often a net drain on the company for the first 6-12 months and once they become productive can usually get a pay bump by switching jobs.
Many new grads have exaggerated expectations and refuse to consider or accept "lower" than working in big tech.
Related to this, there are also the new grads that have some extremely niche role that they want to fill. I recall from a bit ago a new grad on reddit that wanted to do machine learning to save the whales while traveling on a research ship. Coming to the realization that most jobs aren't in the "safe the world" category was something of a shock / disillusionment for them.
At least traditionally, many new grads have refused to consider other geographic areas. The "I want to do software development, but I am not willing to move out of {local area}." Some of this may be changing with remote jobs being more feasible - though there may still be restrictions on "you must reside within {some state} to qualify for WFH". This may be changing a bit, for some companies... but I still suspect that some companies are still going to require a "you may need to come into the office occasionally with a 24h notice."
To point 3, even with the "they are a net drain and they job hop soon" there's also the "we need to add more capacity in the mid and senior levels before we add additional juniors to these teams." There are a lot of places where it's "here's a new junior, there's the code - go for it" because the mid and senior devs don't have the capacity to mentor them.
I also suspect there is a common thought process of new grads that the quantity of applications is more important than the quality of the application -- sending out hundreds of applications even if there significant mismatches between the resume and the job posting that could be trivially corrected.
> I also suspect there is a common thought process of new grads that the quantity of applications is more important than the quality of the application -- sending out hundreds of applications even if there significant mismatches between the resume and the job posting that could be trivially corrected.
In fairness to new grads, the minimum requirements on job posting are often wildly out of line with what the job requires and what the employer will accept. I still meet plenty of junior engineers getting their first gig by applying to jobs that say 2+ years of experience when they have 0.
1. Some people who graduate with CS degrees can't write good code. It is shocking how little you can learn while still graduating.
2. Some college graduates are lack the social/organizational skills for office work
3. Industry has a limited appetite for junior engineers because they're often a net drain on the company for the first 6-12 months and once they become productive can usually get a pay bump by switching jobs.