If I’m reading Kelsmom’s post correctly…schools want 0% unfilled work study jobs…so they don’t lose that funding in the future.
@kelsmom ??
Somebody needs to bookmark this thread the next time the “small is better” crowd starts crowing that the only way to give your kids a proper college education is at a small LAC.
I have never heard of a large U having trouble matching up students to WS positions. And often a large number of WS positions go unfilled because departmental jobs in research, etc. pay much more.
My kids were not WS eligible and I was amazed at the campus jobs they were able to find. Research, fact checking a professors book, ghost writing articles and blog posts for departmental faculty, etc. Well paying, some were “do it when you are available” types of work, some were “show up in the lab at the following times to take a shift” but ALWAYS better both financially and professionally than cafeteria (not that there’s anything wrong with cafeteria- my spouse and I both had menial type jobs in college and they taught us tons).
I feel sad for families that assume that WS is abundant, convenient, and available if that’s not the case on a small campus.
@blossom , I think it’s a combination of small LAC and small town (and possibly how the school chooses to fund things?). In a larger city or a resort town (Saratoga Springs?), I’m guessing many students go off campus to work. I went to a medium size research school and I earned money (or the equivalent) being a Resident Advisor, Research Assistant and Teaching Assistant. It seems like fewer colleges these days compensate for Res jobs (I got full room and board) and small LACs pride themselves on not having many TAs, so that leaves fewer job categories (especially the lucrative (but time consuming) ones. I had friends who made a killing at fancy restaurants downtown, but you would needs a car to do that at D’s college.
And sometimes it works the opposite way. My older kid applied for a job that he really was well qualified for at his college. Unfortunately, the funding for it was ONLY work study money, and he was not a WS eligible kid. Not one single other person even applied…and they really wanted to hire him…and needed someone qualified in the position. They tried to get the funds from elsewhere…but could not. And this was a large university.
He got a great off campus job instead…but that other job went unfilled that whole year.
Yes, @thumper1 - schools do want all FWS money to be spent. I DO award more money than we have jobs … it’s just that in the last 2 years, so many students choose to work very little or not at all. If they all worked - or if most of them worked - the 10 hours a week I award, we would be way over budget. Schools do the best they can do with a very difficult to work with program. But of course, I probably don’t need to worry about that … because the new proposed federal budget contains a severe cut to FWS funding & possibly the elimination of FWS at the grad level.
I agree that this is an important thread and it brings up an important question that families need to ask in the process of choosing or budgeting for a college. I’d note that i don’t think this is common. My son had a hard time finding a position at the small LAC where he started, but it was not impossible. It was just that he ended up with a lower paying job with inconvenient hours. And in his case I do think it was partly attributable to lack of effort, as my son definitely was prone to procrastination at the time.
But my daughter experienced no problems at all at Barnard, which is a peer college to MHC and fellow seven sister. Obviously its urban location and association with Columbia creates a very different setting – but there were plenty of administrative jobs for various departments and offices-- and MHC’s endowment is 3x as high as Barnard - surely they can find a way to disburse their work study dollars to create more jobs. I don’t think all of those work study jobs are critical for campus function – that is, there probably were other people who could have operated the office copy machine if my daughter couldn’t work on a given day — but I do think there is a perhaps an expectation that departments will be allocated money to hire students to perform menial tasks.
Both my kids did have problems meeting the full amount of their allotments, especially the first year, but that was mostly due to to scheduling issues. My d’s biggest mistake in hindsight was opting for an admin job where work was only available during weekday business hours. the same time frame that she often had classes. She was ok because she had other, non work-study paying work she could do evenings and weekends … but I do think that scheduling can always be an issue - and one more thing for parents and new students to be aware of.
Anyway, I’m just reading this thread and have no knowledge whatsoever of what is happening at MHC… I just think that at most colleges there will be jobs- the more typical problem is finding a way to schedule the hours. If if a college has the WS money available and they are aware that students are having difficulty finding positions, it seems to me they could find a way to put more students to work.