Work vs. Education

I grew up in a family which encouraged the pursuit of a higher education in order to obtain higher paying professional jobs after graduation. For my family, education was always the highest priority and I was always taught that education should be my focus and not working. I was fortunate enough to have a family that could support me financially through my academic years so that I would not have to work during the school year and only work during the summer months. However, for most of my friends and peers this was not the case. With the price of university rising and the high cost of living many of the people I go to school with have to work during the academic year. I would like to argue that not only does this affect their education but it also affects the students in their classes.

          I am not trying to say in any sense that having a part time job is a bad thing. In today's society it is often very much a requirement. Here is an article I found looking at students that work part time. The amount that students work, however, is increasing as prices of tuition and rent go up. The time that is now spent at a part time job is taking away from the time that students could otherwise be spending on their education. This lack of time to concentrate on school affects what the student get out of their education and can limit what they can accomplish in their secondary education. More obviously, having a part time job makes deadlines for papers and projects harder to meet.

            This time spent on work rather than school also affects the students' peers. For instance, it is my experience that the first part of the education to be looked over when students have distractions are the daily readings. Students find that readings can easily be made up at any time and that others in the class who have done the reading an answer any questions that the professor may pose. However, for those that have done the reading, coming to a class in which very few others have completed the reading can lead to a class that is not a rich as it could have been. Without the class participation and view of others in the class, the class discussion cannot go far. Without this class discussion there can be no room for collaboration or the sharing of new ideas and concepts which is an important part of the learning process [take a look at this article!].

            Another aspect of education that is affected by students' having part time jobs is group work. The education system seems to becoming more and more focused on group activities. Often these group projects require students to meet outside of class. For students with part time jobs it is difficult to find time in their schedules to meet up with a group. If one or more members of the group have part time jobs it becomes even more difficult to make everyone schedules to work together. This often leads to students missing out of certain parts of the group work, or the correspondence being through email. This kind of correspondence is not as effective as meeting directly when it comes to collaborating with group members. Also, these scheduling issues can often lead to the group divvying up the project or assignment which ruins the whole point of doing a group project.

            As pointed out above, all of these examples show how part time jobs are affecting our education. It is almost necessary to have a part time job in today's society with all of the rising costs but the time that it takes away from schooling affects both the students with part time jobs and the students without.