I don’t know anyone at Chicago to ask this, and it looks like people here are fairly knowledge about Chicago’s workload and time commitment. I am currently a high school senior, recently admitted to Chicago. I would like to accept, but before I can I am wondering about the workload for students at Chicago and if it is possible to be a working student? I am currently in a situation such that I’m estimating I’ll need to work roughly 30 hours per week for the entire time I am at the university. Assuming this, would it even be possible to “handle” Chicago - how much work is really required assuming I take 3 courses per quarter? My planned major is mathematics, if that helps. Also, this is not a financial aid issue (the school is going to cover my costs), so don’t just recommend not working!
I am confident I could handle working with two classes per quarter, but I know reduced work load is restricted. I contacted the school to see if I was eligible for accommodation, but my answer was very unhelpful and more or less amounted to accepting at Chicago and then petitioning the school. But I don’t really want to do that and get screwed later. Maybe I should contact again and try to talk to someone more understanding …
I would really advise against this. Working and taking a full load at college is extremely difficult but working almost full time and taking Classes at UChicago is academic suicide.
I went to a mediocre state public school and worked because that’s how I paid my bills- not much financial aid back then but also the cost at a public was extremely reasonable. At one point, I was going to classes, working and completing my internship in a different city so I had to commute. I almost killed myself. Really. I lost so much weight that people got concerned about me and I drove exhausted back and forth on the highway. A couple of times I fell asleep. Please, take their offer and work on campus but just part time. You only get to do this once. I never had any fun while I was a college student (first generation) so if you can, be a college student.
It would be really really hard. The average workload per class at UChicago is around 6 hours per week, not including time in classes. To graduate, you need to take enough classes such that you have 3 classes half the time and 4 classes half the time. You spend about 2.6 hours in school per class per week. So add all of our pocket math together and you’re looking at between 55.8 and 64.4 hours working on things that is just school and your job. That comes out to between 8 and 9 hours a day every day including weekends. That is crazy, and that’s only looking at average work. Math classes also tend to be a few more hours per week.
People start getting super stressed around midterm seasons when your p-sets and papers and labs and midterms start to add up, I can’t imagine trying to deal with that with 30 hours a week out of your schedule.
Is it too probing to ask why you have to work 30 hours a week? There may be some other way.
I am a math + CS major at Chicago and work 20 hours a week in two research assistant jobs. It is hard, but not as bad as some people are making it out to be. I have a few friends that were commuting to work part time in downtown Chicago during the year (and one of them also played a sport). 30 hours a week might be pushing it, but if you aimed for doing one major and taking 3 classes every other quarter, it would be achievable.
Edit: You should also note that if you are working for a professor, they are usually lenient with the amount of work you have to do. So if you have one of those pressure point weeks (midterms, finals, etc.) you can do less work then, and make up for it later.
As I mentioned in another thread, one of my kids regularly worked 20+ hours/week for pay, plus some significant extracurriculars. At one point, she had three different part-time university jobs and was working over 25 hours/week until they figured out that she was going to qualify as a full-time employee, and they cut her off.
That said: She didn’t do it as a first-year. She didn’t start working for pay at all until spring quarter first year (and she had worked for pay since 10th grade in high school), and she didn’t really hit her stride working until third year. Also, she accepted that she wasn’t going to get top grades in all of her courses. She graduated with general honors and honors in her major, but her GPA was a lot closer to the median than it was to PBK. Doing what she did is inconsistent with maximizing your academic record.
One other thing. Although she liked the money, she was never working just to make money. All of her jobs had some significant academic, career, or social component. They were part of her education.