Everyone knows college students are supposed to be broke, but to still be broke when working more than 20 hours at multiple jobs?
America’s college students control more money than the national debt of some small countries, as reported on bankrate.com from a study done in 2001, which adds up to more than 19 billion dollars that we spend collectively in a given year.
Two out of three students require loans to attend college, and while in the early 1970s the average in loans was $2,000, today it is over $12,000 in federal student loans, according to Nellie Mae, a provider of higher education loans.
These expenses have students scrambling to keep up.
“We have a handful of [workstudy] students that work over 20 hours,” said Diana Devellis, associate director of financial aid. “We don’t track every time card that comes in, but at least 10 percent [work over 20 hours], mostly upperclassmen.”
She said that students are definitely having trouble, and students not having enough money to pay for school has been a big problem all over the country.
“It’s pretty much a crisis,” said Devellis. “There is a trend. I worked 40 hours a week to help pay for school, and do I think students are doing it now? Definitely.”
Alicia Castelot ’07, works over 30 hours per week at two different jobs to help pay for books, car costs and all her bills.
“It’s good to work so I’m not doing nothing, and between my two jobs I can cover my expenses,” she said.
She says that the tough schedule actually makes her work harder at school, as opposed to causing problems, because she knows she only has a certain amount of time for her school work, so she has to get it done.
However, she said her social life does suffer a bit.
“I can’t go out as much because I’m working a lot, but I wouldn’t change anything about my schedule,” she said.
Emily Lowery ’06, also works long hours at multiple jobs every week. In addition, she has to put in 12 hours of clinical work every week because she’s a nursing major.
“I’ll have about $20,000 to $25,000 in loans to pay after school, and I pay for car insurance,” she said.
She said sometimes it’s hard balancing work and school, but giving up is out of the question.
“It’s tough when I have papers to write and tests to study for, and I can’t do that,” said Lowery. “But I wouldn’t consider stopping [work]; it’s a great source of income.”
Credit card debt is one way many college students find themselves deep in debt.
College undergrads have an average credit card debt of $2,748, according to Nellie Mae, which is up from $1,879 in 1998.
Jenn Feagan ’06, said it’s so easy to get into debt when you’re using a credit card.
“You lose track of what you spend. The most credit card debt I’ve ever been in was $1,000, and now I’m in about $200 to $300 worth,” said Feagan, “I don’t always have time to work too many hours, but I always hope my parents will bail me out once in a while. It’s almost impossible to do it all on our own.”
Leave a Reply