<p>My food (100 bucks a week, covers groceries and gas), tuition, and housing is paid for. If I go out to eat, drive anywhere other than school, buy toiletries, etc I pay for it myself. I’ve been working since I was 14 and have saved up money over that period of time. </p>
<p>If you have time to go out and spend money then you have time to get an extra job for one day a week or something.</p>
<p>My parents gave me an emergency debit card with $200 loaded on it. I’ve used it once, and it probably saved my life.</p>
<p>Other than that I work for personal expenses. IMO, even with the most intense schedule, working 8 hours a week isn’t a big deal and should pay for most nonessential expenses college students incur, so long as they’re not, say living in the middle of Manhattan.</p>
<p>I didn’t get a job freshman year and I didn’t have work-study so my parents would deposit money into my account for my cell phone bill and other things I wanted to buy, like snacks or school supplies.</p>
<p>I think they overdid it at first because I am the first one in my whole entire family to go away to college so they were unsure of how much I was going to need to spend. I think they gave me around $250 or maybe $300 for the first month and a half and would deposit $50 or $100 every few weeks in my account. I don’t really remember but it was more than enough since I had a full meal plan. </p>
<p>I always had enough of money and always managed to eat out occasionally or go to the movies. </p>
<p>So, it depends. You won’t need a lot if you don’t work or don’t have a car. I now work at school and my parents buy my books and some of my tuition/housing and I buy whatever I need/want, like my cell or other things.</p>
<p>I’m curious. It seems that a number of posters are saying they have there own cell phone bill. We have a family plan so DS doesn’t have his own bill. Is there some advantage to students having their own phone bill… Like it’s cheaper or are you using it to build credit?</p>
<p>I definitely don’t have my own cell phone bill. I’d like to keep my phone so I’ll stay on the family plan. :p</p>
<p>@MichiganGeorgia: The family plan is often much better (in terms of cost and service). I have friends who got their own plan either because their parents wanted them to or because they felt that they should pay for their own phone. Whatever the reason, it was often more expensive comparatively with a worse plan. One of my friends did it for about a year before going back on her family’s plan. It’s more cost effective to pay a portion of the family plan (if you’d like your child to contribute) than to have them get their own plan. There’s no other benefit that I know of to having their own phone plan–other than being responsible for their own bills.</p>
<p>My kids pay for their own books and spending money (and have known for years that they will have to, so have saved some going into college). I do pay for their phones because I like it when they call and text me. 
And it is so much cheaper overall for them to be on the family plan.</p>
<p>I don’t get any allowance - I pay for my own books (which is between $100-$300 per term) and everything else I need. I pay part of my tuition, but my parents do pay for room, board, and food. Outside of that I maybe spend $100-$200 per term on toiletries, food (if I ever go out to eat) and alcohol. If you’re not planning on eating out often, and especially if you don’t drink, you should be fine. To be honest, before I turned 21, I probably spent less than $100 per term, which is easily covered by my work study.</p>
<p>I understand that you’re nervous and you’re the first in your family to go to college - relax. I’ve been able to work 10-15 hours per week, play a sport, and keep up my grades for three years of college and I haven’t had any problem paying for anything additional that I’ve needed. You’ll be fine. :)</p>
<p>@Michigan- it’s much cheaper to stay on the family plan. I just pay my portion of it.</p>
<p>I have a pre-paid, cheap phone that I bought in October of my freshman year. My mom and brother each have pre-paid phones too and it’ll probably be cheaper that way but we all got our phones at different times so it didn’t make sense at the time. I hardly use my phone anyway.</p>
<p>In my first semester of college, my mom gave me $100 a month to start out. After that I started working ($6!) and no more allowance. Eventually I made more than enough money to enjoy myself.</p>
<p>interesting thread… thanks for posting</p>
<p>Most college jobs can fit around your class or test schedule- and are easy. My kids pay a lump sum for their phones from summer earnings. We don’t send a regular allowance, but since they get paid 4x in the academic year (unusual for nearly all college jobs; theirs are a bit different,) we will sometimes float them $50-100 before their next checks. Or if there is a special expense. We give them $100 budget for toiletries/personal/whatever (a WalMart run) at the beginning of each semester and they plan/manage the rest. It works. In our case, with one kid, any interference with academics hasn’t ever been because of the job, but other choices. The other never had issues.</p>
<p>I got an allowance… lol and it made my freshman year better (it’s spoiled sounding, i know 
) but i liked to eat out and go shopping. honestly, if you can be frugal & not go out to eat, then you can definitely do fine with just an oncampus job haha</p>
<p>You can definitely go out and eat, go shopping, etc with an on campus job.</p>
<p>Your tuition and housing is already paid for? And your having a job on top of that?</p>
<p>Then you need zero “allowance”. Whenever I needed money freshman year (or any time actually), I called my parents and told them an amount. It was only maybe at most $300-400 in a semester and that’s all my parents ever gave me. They didn’t give me a set amount either.</p>
<p>In reality, most freshmen don’t need more than a few bucks a week in spending money. Pretty much everything you need is available on-campus and meals are usually paid for. You don’t have to pay for transportation.</p>
<p>Honestly, a lot of you don’t know how good you have it. My parents don’t pay for my schooling. I pay for my own books. Up until this summer, I had a scholarship that covered all of my tuition and a part of my living expenses, and my grandparents had a savings account that covered the rest. My parents pay for my car insurance, health insurance, and phone bill. Anything else that I need is on me. Groceries, fun, and gas is all on me. Starting in the fall, tuition and room and board is something that I’ll need to figure out how to afford. So I work about 12-15 hours/week for a decent wage at one of the dining halls. </p>
<p>Getting a job for 8hours/week shouldn’t be difficult. There are TONS of places on campus that need student workers, and small amounts of hours like that are easy to work into your schedule depending on where you work.</p>