Monday, 28 January 2008
There are limits to student work
I've never been terribly impressed by the annual whinge about students taking part-time jobs to supplement their interest-free student loans while pursuing their undergraduate courses. It is commonplace in many countries; the right job is good on the CV; and the best universities, like Warwick, integrate it into their undergraduate offer. But there are limits.
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2 comments:
Two points: firstly, at Oxford and Cambridge it is nigh on impossible to balance a job with studies. So if you have to work to afford to go there, your studies are going to suffer.
Secondly, there is a massive difference between science and arts courses. Science courses are much more time intensive - e.g. medicine. Same is true of law. If all we want our children to do is English then sure, let things continue as they are. Having jobs has a massive impact on students from less well-off backgrounds.
I was one of them and the only reason I was able to cope was the frankly shoddy nature of Arts education in this country.
Studies show fairly clearly that work of longer than around 4 hours a week impacts on the academic achievement of students. Of course that figure will go down for more weighty subjects and up for more lofty ones, but I never like to stand by as I hear people try and downplay the perils of working while studying.
But indeed, one lucky lad, must be gutted that people found out about his income stream.
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