There should be a way for companies to invest in promising interns, paying some of their tuition costs in exchange for a certain number of years employment with the company afterwards.

While this wouldn't work for many fields, it would certainly help in cases like this (and tech in general). It would seem that with as much as companies pay for head-hunters and recruiters (and how much they whine about the lack of quality candidates), it would be a no-brainier.