<p>I put down 20+ hours a week as a grill cook at a burger joint.
Put down about 40+ hours during breaks.
I’ve been working since Junior year
Saved up 4 grand last year and bought my own car.
In reality, the experiences you get from a job outweigh anything high school can teach you.
It’s real life; you deal with real people and their crap, you pay income taxes, you come home at 11 Pm with four hours worth of homework ahead of you. But all of that makes you grow up, you truly learn something about yourself and the world. You also become stronger on the inside and outside, way stronger than those kids who just focus on school.</p>
<p>^ I’m with LoA. I have a 3.875 unweighted GPA, doing about 8 hours of volunteering per week, EC’s are all crammed up on Monday after school (literally until 9 pm), and I still find work the most eye opening thing in the world. I don’t work a lot, 10 hours a week, but I started since 16, and though my job was decent, the company was a disaster, so I learned how to NOT run a company.</p>
<p>I’ve always held a job over the past 4 summers but my mom always makes me quit when school starts because she doesn’t think I can handle it (she’s probably right).</p>
<p>I desperately need to find a job right now though. Since I’ll officially be a 2nd semester senior after tomorrow ends, I’m thinking of filling out some applications and seeing what happens.</p>
<p>I’ve worked since I was 12 (plumber’s apprentice 12-15, umpiring 14-present, various theater jobs 15-present, photography 17-present, ushering 17-present, teacher’s aid- since last September). Managed to balance clubs (president/co-founder of two), theater (which as any techie knows means anywhere from 10-50 hours a week), and social life.</p>
<p>Also run a non-profit basketball league which took well over 40 hours of my time during the winter.</p>
<p>Last semester I took 18 credits, worked well over 20 hours per week (ranged from 18-40 depending on the week, worked 5 days a week), still managed to participate in some clubs and have a social life. </p>
<p>Trust me, the money and experience are so worth it. And in the real world you need to be able to juggle a job and other responsibilities.</p>
<p>I’ve been working since this past summer. I work 15+ hours a week and sometimes get called in to work more. I have all AP classes, and do two sports in the fall and one in the spring. I am the Logistics Officer of my JROTC battalion and therefore must plan and coordinate all the events, which takes outside of school planning and organization and coordination. I made straight A’s last semester.</p>
<p>I have a very serious boyfriend for over two years and a few very close friends even through all of that stuff. I also volunteer tutoring services at my church on Wednesday afternoons (unless I have to work) and Sunday nights (unless I have to work).</p>
<p>With JROTC, I usually have to do most of the gruntwork of organizing fundraising and service projects. And the three sports take up a lot of after school time and weekend time.</p>
<p>It really does make you grow up. Without the experience, you’re just taking all that your parents give you for granted. I had to work to pay for my own car, and now I must pay insurance and gas on it. I don’t really have any extra spending money, but I honestly don’t do that much that costs money (my friends are as broke as I am. We love movie nights at someone’s house. lol).</p>
<p>It’s annoying that when you work fast food, people treat you like dirt. I’d like to see those people make straight A’s in their AP classes, work, and keep up with all of my EC’s like I do. Downtime is important, and you should definitely try and factor that in to your week, but responsibility far outweighs downtime.</p>
<p>Do you guys that currently work do varsity sports (3-4 hour practice 4-5 times a week and 1-2 games/meets that practically take up half the day/12 hours)? What’s your course load like? Do you do any extracurricular activities like DECA or Forensics (that take up a long time)?</p>
<p>Starstuck, I am in varsity track, and we meet for two hours after school Mondays through Fridays. The meets tend to last 5-6 hours, and even longer depending on how long we have to travel for the meets. I also have all AP classes, and have the second highest position in my school’s JROTC battalion. I also have officer positions in Mu Alpha Theta, NHS, and SNHS (Spanish). </p>
<p>My work week tends to be 12-15 hours, but many times more because I get called in a lot. It’s certainly doable. It’s all about time management.</p>
<p>TRying to get a job. but no luck.</p>
<p>I really want a job, for both the experience and the money, but I just don’t have the time. I feel that getting a job would be a trade-off for my academic performance. I’m not willing to settle for B’s just because I have a job.</p>
<p>If I could find a job that allowed me to work on Friday nights and weekends only, then I’d consider it. But during the week - I just don’t see how it’s possible.</p>
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<p>Learn to balance school and work. You’ll have to do it in college and in life (on a broader scale). Best to get used to it now. If you work hard you won’t have to “settle for B’s” just because you have a job. Most hs students work around 8-15 hours a week. It’s not a lot, at all.</p>
<p>yes I work at my dad’s shop, mainly during the summers since 10th grade. it’s pretty boring, but money is money.</p>
<p>Starstuck, I played varsity football in the fall and currently playing varsity basketball. i will be doing varsity track in the spring as well. practices range from 2-3 hours a day and a shorter practice before games. during football season we sometimes had morning workouts as well. My courseload consists of ap calc bc, ap physics, ap english lit, ap gov, french lit honors and latin. i am co-president of two clubs this year, but it’s not that time consuming at all, we usually meet during extra help times or lunch during the day so it doesn’t interfere with anything.</p>
<p>I personally don’t think work taught me anything too great; only that a dollar is hard to come by, even though I kind of had that idea before. I worked mostly only because I wanted to, and now that I don’t want to anymore, I’ve quit…</p>
<p>During the year, I played badminton and swam, participated in my 5 usual clubs/teams, did a bunch of volunteering, 6 APs, etc… work really didn’t interfere with much.</p>
<p>Yeah, I work two jobs. One is kind of seasonal, but I still do some stuff in the winter. </p>
<p>Summer kind of sucks for me. Sometimes I could work 30+ hours in one week because of the two jobs. The money is nice, but I’d like some more down time…I am a kid still.</p>
<p>I WILL get a job as soon as I can drive, I really want one but my mom is too lazy to be picking me up or dropping me off.</p>