I was granted work-study that would pay just a bit under $3,000 per year.
It is part of the financial aid package my school gave me.
Without the work-study amount, they gave me around $69k, which is still a full ride to the school and pays for housing, meals, tuition, health care, etc.
However, it leaves me with the possibility of not having much in terms of recreational or personal spending, such as mony for transportation, extracurricular stuff, and textbooks/supplies. WashU estimates that with recreational expenses, books, supplies, and transporation costs, a year at WashU would cost around $71k.
With the work-study, I have $71k, but without it I’d have around $69k, which is still amazing but I would need to find a way to get extra money to cover books, supplies, and of course recreational and other personal expenses (buying shampoo/toiletries and other necessities, clothes, going out to eat, whatever).
So basically, I’m trying to find the pros and cons of me doing this work-study…thoughts? Any advice is appreciated:) Thanks in advance!
Yes, do,work study. It will give you some job experience which is always valuable in the long run. In addition, it will provide that money you need for personal spending.
There are also studies that show that students who work a modest amount per week…say 10 hours, actually do better than students who don’t work. You will,learn to budget your time well.
You will still have plenty of time to study, and socialize.
In addition, work study employers are usually understanding if you need time off because of exams and the like.
The ‘pros’ of doing work study is that it will give you money to buy shampoo, toothpaste, clothes, an movie tickets.
The ‘pros’ of not doing work study is that you will have 10-15 hours extra every week, but, your hair will be dirty, you’ll have no new clothes (and the old ones will be dirty), and you’ll miss all the movies everyone else will be going to.
You have a fantastic package. Why would you question having to work 10-15 hours a week?
The only reason I would discourage someone from doing workstudy is if they are really struggling with classes and keeping up. Otherwise, I agree with thumper. It’s good to do some work, it gives you experience and money. And yes, most on campus jobs are very accommodating of your academics (at least that has been my kids’ experiences).
I’m not sure why you are questioning this. But since you are, why don’t you go ahead and look for a job and start some work. You have control of how many hours and whether you want to continue. If you decide it’s too much you can cut back or quit. Nothing says you have to earn the full amount.
You have control over what kind of job you take as well as your hours – it’s just like applying for a regular job (except that it’s pretty much guaranteed you’ll get something) – but the point is, you’ll get to campus, you’ll look at wherever the work-study job listings are posted, you will apply for the ones you are interested in.
So accepting the work study now doesn’t commit you to anything.
At this point there are no “cons” – just pros. If you decline the work study offer, you may find you have to jump through a lot of hoops if you later decide you do want to work. On the other hand, if you accept it now – but decide when you arrive in the fall that you want to hold off on getting a job until you’ve at least got a sense of what the demands of all the classes are — no problem. No one is going to force you to take a job. It’s just essentially an offer that you will be able to have a paying job on campus if and when you want one.
You should do work study. Some of the best jobs on campus are only available to WS students. You might have to work in food service your freshman year (quite a few colleges require that). But even those jobs aren’t bad. You get flexible hours, and it is a way to meet more people and make friends.
Some of the WS jobs (more likely to go to students after freshman year) even allow you to have some time to study. Like manning a desk in a library or gym or something, so you can read or study when there is no one to help. Some department jobs (like graders) can be only open to WS students.
Accept the WS – if you don’t find a job or decide you don’t have time for it, you can just let the FA office know that you aren’t going to use it after all. Nothing wrong with that. One of my kids worked during college, but the other one was really buried academically at a hard school – kid 2 was awarded WS, but ended up not having time to do it. But I don’t think that is the norm, she was just in a really hard major at a really hard school with less preparation than some of the other students.
The OP’s college doesn’t require students to work in food service – it doesn’t appear to even be an option. It certainly wasn’t an option at the colleges my kids attended. Here’s a list of work study options from OP’s school: https://sfs.wustl.edu/Pages/displayallfwsjobs.aspx – I see an abundance of options, but I don’t see “Dining Services” anywhere on the list.
Really? You make it sounds like it would be beneath them… But quite a few smaller schools have this requirement. Otherwise they would have trouble staffing all the positions in food service. All schools obviously don’t, but one of my kids’ school did, and we heard it at a few others when visiting.
The colleges my kids attended had outside catering firms managing food service — as does the OP’s college OP’s college uses “Bon Appetit” – these companies provide their own staffing (non-students who work full time and get benefits). You can see sample job listings here: http://www.snagajob.com/job-search?ui=true&q=bon+appetit&w=+63130
It’s not question of whether a job is “beneath” a student – from the company’s point of view it’s probably quite the opposite.They want full time employees, not part-time students.
But the point is that the OP is questioning whether or not to work, and you made a post that was potentially misleading about the type of tasks a work-study student might do. I don’t know – maybe the OP wants to work in food service-- if so, it doesn’t look like that type of job will be available via work study. (My D. did do catering work through college for 4 years, and loved it --but it was via a private student-run agency, not in a campus dining hall). In any case you are the one who worded your statement, “might have to” – which suggests that it was something you thought was less desirable.
But one thing the OP might not have considered is that many campus jobs offer opportunities to enhance a student’s academic interests and/or build job skills. The better jobs tend to go to upper class students rather than freshmen, but not always – if the student already has particular skills they may very well get the job.
The important thing…start looking for WS jobs as soon as you are able to at your school. This will,give you the best variety of jobs to apply to.
My feeling…it’s a job…it will pay you. No need to be picky. If your job is food service or the call center…so be it. It won’t be forever.
Back in the Stone Age, I had a great work study job as a research assistant for an awesome professor (world known in my field…who also wrote my LOR for grad school). I loved that job. But you know what…when I needed extra money (which was almost all,the time), I would go to my dining hall manager and ask if they had any open shifts. Thank goodness the answer was almost always YES. I was very grateful.
Work Study was a component of my fin aid years ago. My family made its contribution – in good conscience, I couldn’t ask them for play money when my university was simply looking for an excuse to give me money if I provided 10-12 hours each week. I worked all four years – never even thought it was an option otherwise.
It’s a simple cause and effect. You want items and fun things? You work for them.
It’s a function of how I was raised and saw money. My mother was a waitress and I saw how hard she had to work for a $2 tip.
I did not get a work study job until several weeks into my first semester. I had applied at the last minute, and had to keep after the financial aid office to approve me for a WS job.
I floundered those first few weeks with too much free time. Once I got a job, my study times were shorter but better defined.
The training I received in my office job on campus was life-changing. I learned word processing on a computer, which was brand new technology for me. And most important, I did not feel lost on campus anymore. I had a group of people who knew me and cared about me.
I encourage you to take the job on campus. It helps to have some employees on your side who are willing to guide and help you if you run into academic or administrative trouble.
You’ll be surprised at how much more efficient at time management people can be once they have a job. Working for money will force you to divide up your time. I really think it will help your grades in the long-run.
The work study jobs at many schools are well paid and good stuff for the resume. Food service is not a typical job. Lots of research stuff, office work, minor tech support for the many computer clusters around campus, and even volunteer style jobs. The best jobs on the list at my son’s school are all WS and the vast majority have super flexible hours so they aren’t in the way of other activities.
And even if food service IS the typical job- my spouse did food service WS all through college. He is an excellent cook, can clean a kitchen like nobody’s business, and regularly rotates the canned goods/staples in our pantry to minimize waste. He was in a supervisory role by senior year where the job was less about slinging hash and more about managing purchases and deliveries.
I took Home Ec way back when and don’t have his kitchen management skills. Nothing wrong with food service.
Def take the work study. My D took it her freshman year (dining services is required for first year students, she worked at a Starbucks café because she had some restaurant experience) and was able to go out for pizza, buy her own toiletries, take the train to NYC. She also picked up a tutoring job in the chem department. Last semester she decided she wouldn’t take the work study but instead would grade papers just a few hours a week, she thought probably 5 hours. Big mistake. She was broke all semester and didn’t have the normal summer savings because she had stayed at school to do research for 10 weeks. The professor only needed her about 10 hours/month and that didn’t go far. She has signed back up for 7 hours this spring and can hardly wait to start making some $$ again.
@thumper1@twoinanddone I thought it would be obvious that the only reason I was questioning doing work-study was fear of how it would affect my academic performace. As I have limited knowledge on work-study and don’t know anyone who is currently doing it, I was unsure whether doing work-study would put a considerable dent in the time I had to study for my classes. That was the sole concern.