Student Jobs Affect Academics

By Kristyna Mauch
14 September 2009

ATHENS, Ga. — University students are scrambling to find jobs in order to support themselves during these hard economic times. Students have to work harder to maintain grades and still be able to pay for school or have extra spending money.

According to a study by the American Council on Education (ACE), 23 percent of full time students work 35 hours a week or more. With a full class load and working full time, students have to work twice as hard to be successful in both. Unfortunately, the time spent away from studies causes’ student’s grades to drop.

Lauren Key, a senior art major, works about 30 hours a week.

“College is not affordable if you don’t work,” Key said. “It would be easier to just go to school. I would definitely get better grades.”

Students work in order to pay for school and support themselves. Students do not have much leisure time while they juggle both work and school. Any extra free time is used to study, but is not adequate time to spend on academics.

“Working diminishes my quality of schoolwork,” Key said.

U.S. Department data collections have consistently found that working more than 15 to 20 hours a week has a negative impact on persistence and degree completion, according to the study by ACE.

Students have to manage their time wisely. A social life is difficult to pull off when you have to work and finish a full class load of homework.

“I have no social life,” said Key. “I am so tired at the end of the day that I do what little work I can before I have to go to bed.”

According to ACE, when the number of hours working increases, the average GPA declines.
Charlie Burgamy, a senior, criminal justice major from Cusseta, Ga., claims that working 25 hours a week has negatively influenced his school work.

“It’s killed it,” Burgamy said. “But I need the money to pay bills and living expenses.”

Students work in order to support themselves financially. Justin Heath, a management major from Adairsville, Ga., works 40 hours a week and goes to school full time.

Heath needs the money to pay for his own education and thinks that it interferes with his class work because there is less time to focus on studies he said.

He does not complain about having to work and go to school to support himself.

“It’s the way it should be because you learn to manage time and life,” Heath said.

Although a majority of students work, what about the students who don’t work?
Students who do not have to work feel like they have an advantage over working students.

“I feel sorry for people who have to work,” said James Atkinson a Pre-business major from Athens, GA.

“I spend five hours studying and I still have time for a social life,” he said.

Josh Kruhm, a senior risk management and finance major from Acworth, Ga, is a full time student who does not have to work and loves his extra time.

There is more time available and you do not have to worrying about time management, Kruhm said.

“I have more of a social life than some of my friends who work,” he said.

The advantages of students who do not work are evident in both student’s responses and the study done by ACE. ACE suggests a solution by recommending that the government gives additional grant aid. This aid would limit the amount of time that low-income and academically disadvantaged students must spend time away from their studies.

Students would not have to work as much and would be able to spend adequate time on their academics, assuming that this extra time would allow students to get better grades.