Minimum duration for high school job to have positive impact

ClaremontMom
Sat, 26 Sep 2015 15:12:01 +0000

In my opinion, school work should come first. If 20 hours is a lot for you (sounds like a lot to me…especially if you have a rigorous schedule), then you should cut down regardless of what it may or may not look like to colleges in your applications.

That said, I’ll tell you this. My S never had a paying job (except some tutoring of fellow students) my D only worked the summer between junior and senior year (she did NOT work during the school year). Both are at excellent schools and were accepted to other fine schools as well. Apparently,minimal/no work experience did not hurt their application process. They did, however, have a very rigorous schedule with excellent grades and lots of ECs.

As for whether it will hurt you in getting future jobs I don’t know. Of course, having work experience and references would be a big plus, but there are lots of jobs on campus that probably don’t require much in that regard. Both of my kids were able to find jobs right away.