Earning while learning: is it worth it?
16th October 2015
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Jobs: good ones, bad ones - most of us have had them.
Jobs when you're a student probably weren't designed for enjoyment, for many of us - the sole purpose of earning whilst learning is to keep those little numbers in our bank account ticking over. "Working until 4am cleaning up sick, lost shoes and mopping up jaeger" probably won't be our first thought when filling in those horrible 'future aspirations' sections of the thousands of application forms that seem to head our way as a student.
Luckily, and I realise that this is not the case for many people, I am in a position where my parents can always afford to pay my rent. I never have to doubt the roof over my head - however, for many people, student jobs pay the rent. Quite literally. Being a student is expensive: books, travel, groceries and admission to clubs and societies are all things that we have to purchase. That's a massive amount of your loan gone before you even start to think about nights out, new jeans and that train ride home to see your mum, do your laundry and have a roast. A little more than £1,000 for twelve weeks, more often than not, just doesn't cut it.
Most of us work at some point during our educational careers, and I was no exception.
By the halfway point of my first year, running out of money and thinking that ten contact hours a week was a walk in the park, I got a job in my student bar. It was coming to the end of first year, my essays had been submitted and it was socials galore at the Student Union, which meant that I was more than content spending many a happy hour pouring pints and toasting paninis, and even happier an hour going back into the student bar, spending the money that they had paid me just hours before.
I enjoy working. That wasn't my first job, or even my first bar job. Supermarket work, restaurant work and bar work are all part time jobs that I have enjoyed... well, the paychecks, certainly. However, there's a photo that regularly makes the rounds on social media, more often than not, being shared by A Level students. It reads: 'social life, successful at work, enough sleep - pick two'. Like most people, I giggled and shared this when I was 17, with absolutely no idea how real it would become in my second year.
Personally, I found that working for cash was just one pressure too many. With essays and novels coming out of my ears, and career experience opportunities that I felt like I just couldn't miss alongside a shift pattern that meant I was regularly working beyond 3am, something was going to give. Unfortunately for me, it was the wrong thing.

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