If you had a nickel for every time you heard a friend complain about their lack of money you’d be rich. Unfortunately, that’s never going to happen and the only way you can shed the guilt you feel every time you squeeze out more cash from your parents is if you face the facts: you can balance a job and school.
The hours between 3 PM and 6 PM are the most wasted hours of the day in a college student’s life. It’s that awkward time when you’re done with class, it’s too early to eat and way too early to start that reading assignment. The solution to becoming more productive, having more money for doing the things you love and learning time management skills is having a job. When you have a schedule and that free-time that you are so accustomed to isn’t at your disposal daily you begin to take full advantage of life. If those typically wasted hours are filled with a money-earning job you’re other days will become more productive because you know you have to be.
CU offers many campus jobs, which are ideal for coordinating with a busy class schedule and often allow you to do homework while working when it’s slow. Boulder is a bustling community of consumers and there are many restaurants and shops that need part-time employees. Whether you’re looking for a job on campus, in sales or at a restaurant, going through the process of interviewing always teaches students and continues to prepare them for more serious interviews later on in life.
Once you find the job be upfront with your boss and identify the hours you can work from the start. Take your job seriously because in one way or another it will benefit you in the big scheme of things. Many times people learn about themselves through their jobs and meet new close friends that you never would have met otherwise. Every employer wants to see you are a hard-working college student and even if the job seems unbeneficial to your future career it will demonstrate your ability to be a hard-worker, a quality everyone looks for.