Tell me more about college work study

[newbie]

Dd has been offered work study, but I am concerned is she works, her GPA drops and its her first year.

 

I think it is 8 min hrs. per wk.

 

Any thoughts, on how your dc handled it and what they did on campus???

[JenneinCA]

My dc are too young to be in college right now, but my husband did Work-Study when we were in college. He sat in a computer lab and made sure the computers didn't walk away. For him it was not a big deal. If he had wanted to, he could have done homework during the time he was in the lab.

 

I know other jobs have other responsibilities. Maybe you could ask what the job your daughter would be given?

 

Congratulations on your daughter and college! I hope she has a great time and learns a lot.

[ZooRho]

I think it all depends on the job they can get. I also think they can pick from a list. Probably the more senior students get to pick first and then down the list.

 

My son isn't doing a work study but he has picked up a tutorin postion there. Some times he doesn't even have anyone to come in but he is there just incase, so he gets paid to do his homework those days. Not a bad job.

 

Also it can be helping in the office area. Or in admissions. Remember the students who showed you around campus those are on work study.

 

But there are also the cafeteria jobs and yard work.

 

I also do think 8 hours is too much for a college kid. Trust me there is a lot of time in a day for most college kids.

[lmrich]

I did work study. I loved it! I worked in the library for an hour a day and three hours over the weekend. My sophmore year I was also an RA and managed my hall and had to "work" in the office five hours a week and I still did the library job. It got to be too much when I added in my third part-time job as a teacher's assistant for an afterschool program and worked M_F 3:00 - 5:30 and kept my hours as an RA and at the library and pledged a sorority and started dating my future husband, but still my GPA was a 3.0. I think it meant more when I worked for it. Personally I loved working in college. At the library I got to meet a ton of people I never would have met and learned even more about the dewey decimal system than you would think is possible. The RA job was so easy and I had to attend all kinds of leadership meetings that really paid off in the long run. The TA job was the best and although I hated missing some of the "fun" of college and had to take some night classes to accommodate the work thing, I learned so much more from my job than I ever learned in any of my education classes.

 

Your daughter will be fine. There are a lot of hours to fill in a day and she can spend at least one of those working.

 

just my 2 cents.

[Renee in NC]

I supervised athletic study hall for 10-20 hours per week. It wasn't a problem as I simply monitored the study hall and got *my* studying done. I only did it one year as I needed more than a minimum wage job (the next year I worked as an accounting assistant at the local newspaper for 20-25 hours a week.)

[Kareni]

My now college freshman has a work study position. At her college, all freshman with work study are required to work in the cafeteria. In subsequent years, more options are available besides cafeteria work.

 

She needs to works close to ten hours a week to obtain all of her work study funds ($1000 each semester). Last semester, she didn't quite have it figured out, and she only made about $750 of the $1000 she could have earned.

 

I have heard that having a job during college (if it is not for an excessive number of hours) actually forces a student to better organize his or her time. I think there is some truth to that.

 

My daughter has not found ten hours of work to be onerous.

 

Regards,

Kareni

[Osmosis Mom]

Yeah, I agree with Kareni. Dd works as well and has been naturally forced to better organize her time. She also does a lot of social events and occasionally even does some studying (just joking!!). 8 hours a week is not too much plus it really makes an easy transition to feeling mroe responsible towards money and budgeting.

[JFSinIL]

Wherever he ends up, ds has been told he will do work study as part of his aid package - and I think this is GOOD. The kid has not had a job yet, and this will teach him a bit about jobs/paperwork and REAL LIFE. 10ish hours a week isn't going to harm anyone's GPA - it might cut into social time/Facebook, though ;)

[KnitWit]

I did work study. It added up to a little over an hour a day.

[Brenda in MA]

I did work study many years ago. As others have alluded -- jobs varied. They had positions in food service, the library, the computer labs, the dorms, the gym, research labs, etc.

 

I was lucky enough to get a job in a research lab for 5 - 10 hours/week for 3 years. They had me start out doing a lot of cleaning (washing pipettes) and preparing for experiments. In my sophomore & junior years, I was able to actually participate in some research and coauthored a paper with the professor running the lab. When that prof left the school, I worked in the admissions office filing paperwork and giving campus tours. The jobs gave me some good experience and 5 - 10 hours/wk was not enough to impact my studies.

 

I would suggest finding out how the student goes about getting the work study job. We received a large list of positions and had to call/visit various departments to apply. There was no one "making sure" you got a position; it was all up to the student. If you didn't find anything, then you did not earn the funds that were set aside as work study. Nowadays, I think some schools assign jobs to the student. You'd want to make sure your student understands the "system" at her school.

 

HTH,

Brenda

[Susie-Knits]

I agree with all that has been said about helps in managing time skills, responsibilities, way to make spending money etc...

 

One point that I would like to bring out that it may possibly put a caring adult in your student's college life on a regular basis. When I taught, I always enjoyed getting to know the work study students in our department. I would like to think that I was a positive influence and could bring something different from their fellow students to the college experience.

[JoyfulMama]

I did work study for all 4 years I was an undergrad. Two of those years I also tutored and was a TA, altogether allowing a max of 12 hrs a week. The last year I also had my internship, and then my final semester I also was hired for per-diem work to cover a maternity leave at the location of my internship. I graduated with high honors.

 

I had my work-study in the dept of my major, and was able to have a great relationship with the professors because of that. Friends worked the Information Desk, which was a very social job during busy times, but also offered a lot of study time for quiet shifts (early sat, sun am).

 

I can't believe no one here has mentioned the best benefit for work-study - the spending money! I was expected to use that money for my expenses during the semester, including transportation to and from home for breaks. I never called and asked my parents for money. I didn't have an allowance from my parents. I was responsible for my own phone bill, laundry quarters, and entertainment money, and to pay for books for the next semester.

[Kareni]

I would suggest finding out how the student goes about getting the work study job. We received a large list of positions and had to call/visit various departments to apply. There was no one "making sure" you got a position; it was all up to the student. If you didn't find anything, then you did not earn the funds that were set aside as work study. Nowadays, I think some schools assign jobs to the student. You'd want to make sure your student understands the "system" at her school.

 

 

These are very important points that Brenda makes. At my daughter's college, while she is permitted a work study job, she has had to make the effort to claim it. She needed to fill out paperwork, and she has also needed to sign up for the appropriate number of shifts. It would have been very easy for her to miss out on this opportunity and these funds.

 

Regards,

Kareni

[Brindee]

I agree with all that has been said about helps in managing time skills, responsibilities, way to make spending money etc...

 

One point that I would like to bring out that it may possibly put a caring adult in your student's college life on a regular basis. When I taught, I always enjoyed getting to know the work study students in our department. I would like to think that I was a positive influence and could bring something different from their fellow students to the college experience.

:iagree: I worked my way through college, as my parents had no funds to help me. I could work from 0-15 hours. If I averaged around 6-8, it left me short on my bill. If I did 15, I'd lose my grant money if I worked too many hours! So, I had to walk a fine line with how many hours I worked per week.

 

I was a desk monitor, then an RA--Loved it! The dean and I became close, and she was a very positive role model for me. She kept me on my toes to do the right things. I also did some work in the PE dept. my freshman year, since I was a PE major that year. My last two years I was doing student teaching, classes and work, but still managed to keep my grades up half-way decently. Any grade problem had nothing to do with me working, it was with choices I made to do other things instead of studying in my free time! :tongue_smilie:

 

I can't believe no one here has mentioned the best benefit for work-study - the spending money! I was expected to use that money for my expenses during the semester, including transportation to and from home for breaks. I never called and asked my parents for money. I didn't have an allowance from my parents. I was responsible for my own phone bill, laundry quarters, and entertainment money, and to pay for books for the next semester.

My parents didn't have any money either. I was responsible for everything, but I didn't see the money I earned at the school. It went straight to my school bill. I had to do extra things (like babysitting faculty kids), or go to the registrar and ask to have a certain amount out for food and laundry and clothes purposes. In a way that was good. It kept me from pulling to much out and spending unwisely, knowing that whatever I took out would just make more left on my bill to work off later. I usually worked over the summers. Then I could take either no classes, or just a couple, and work a lot more hours. That's what really helped me pay off what grants and loans didn't cover!