Why do college freshmen need money?

Student Lounge College Life
101

Will echo the value of work thing. Both of my kids (one will be sophomore in HS, one a freshman in college) are three-sport athletes (cross country in the fall, indoor track in the winter, outdoor track in the spring), and they haven’t really had time to have jobs and achieve in the classroom and with the running as they want if they had a job. This is the one area for both of them that I wish they had some experience with. I still wouldn’t change what we have arranged for them in HS, but it is important to know you can do a job that earns money. I look forward to my daughter eventually getting a campus job and then moving on from that. Will feel the same way with my son when it is his turn in college.

To the point of the thread though, depending on the school you go to, you can definitely do just fine as a college freshman without a job. Limits you though, or course. Any dating might take some money.

102

Here’s a different perspective: peer acceptance. Everyone else is working crap jobs and you want to fit in socially.

Also self respect for not having to ask your parents for stuff

103

@math112233441 have you asked your mother why she would like you to get a summer job?

104

Good luck getting a good job when you graduate after not working at all for 3+ years.

105

Yes, jobs are important and a valuable experience in kids/ teenagers lives, but we are only a kid once and we have the rest of our lives to work. People put way to much pressure on kids to “succeed.” They place their own values in front of what the child desires. I have one year left to spend it with my close friends, and I will wait to get a job until I need one. Remember money can not buy you time. You have the rest of your life to work, and you will need too, but enjoy your time as a child for you will never get it back.

106

OP, still here? Depends on how rich and generous your parents are, but the fact they want you to get a job is significant. Suspect from my experience that you will not want from sufficient money to do whatever you want at college, but they and many others are telling you that regular work experience in a minimum wage job will make you a better person. Most spoiled brats who have never lacked for anything benefit from the opportunity to see how the majority of the world gets by. Look at it as a cultural experience just as useful as a gap year spent doing community service, with the added benefit of enjoying how little a minimum wage job provides for the less economically blessed.

107

What if we already we devote ourselves to about 200+ community service hours a year?

If you have enough savings, how will the minimum wage job feel the same if you’re not doing the job just to make your needs?

As an engineer, I do not study too hard / practice much, rather I get the feel of how to do the problems and figure a lot of it out during the test. I’m makeshift and I probably understand how it feels to work without having to do too much of it-- it can’t be that complicated can it?

Engineers I know without work experience find jobs within the first 6 months of graduating, sometimes related to their senior projects anyways.

And there’s people that get jobs without ever having to do a single interview.

108

Absolutely, though I’ve never met one. And there are people who win LOTTO after buying a single ticket.

Any employer I’ve ever worked with, or that my kids or my siblings or their kids have ever worked with, wants to know who he/she is hiring. There’s more than enough competition for any job out there that employers aren’t going to trust the working of their organization to someone sight unseen.

Getting a job without a single interview sounds like relying on mommy and daddy to pull strings.

At some point that gets really stale. Mommy and daddy-- the ones who want the OP to work-- want their babies to become adults, and make their own way in the world. That’s our job-- to raise our kids to become responsible self-reliant adults.

But for the vast majority of people, a resume devoid of any work experience (or any beyond a single summer, as the OP has illustrated) is a flag that something is wrong with the applicant’s work ethic.

The OP hasn’t mentioned “200+ community service hours a year.” He has said that his parents want him to get a job, he did it once and didn’t like it, and that he doesn’t see the value in a “soul sucking” minimum wage job.

The overwhelming number of adults on this thread disagree, strongly.

And once that $1000 is spent, what’s the plan for getting money for next year? Minimum wage will be every bit as “soul sucking” as it is now, but the OP will be a year older with still next to no work experience and no good explanation for the void.

109

Because if you came in for an interview at my office and it was between you (who had only worked one summer) and candidate B who had a solid work history and proven ability to take correction, follow-through and show initiative? I would choose Candidate B. Hands down. I don’t care about your 4.0. I don’t care about where you went to school. Show me you have some real life skills.

110

@math112233441 - I will be blunt. You come across as a narcissistic rich kid who sense of entitlement makes you want to be better that everybody else (“Since I’m in the honors program I want to walk in on day 1 knowing more than everyone else. I’ve already taught myself calculus for my calc class, and I’m about to start learning the chem terms, and review physics. I demand a near 4.0 and I feel this is essential to up my chances.”)

You also said “I come from a wealthy family, and I just don’t see the point of a min wage job. I don’t want to act spoiled, but as much as my mom acts like I need a job… I just don’t see the point.”

Welcome to the real world son. I have never not worked to have money for college or fun, whether it was unloading watermelons from an 18 wheeler, cleaning out a tanker full of waterproofing tar, slinging burgers at McDonald’s, or stocking shelves at K-Mart. It made me value my education more because I had skin in the game (and my parents did not have a lot of money).

Your mother is wise as she sees what a self-absorbed person you seem to be from your posts. You need to learn humility and gratitude. If I were your father I would tell say to you: “I am not giving you any money for spending, laundry, etc. You were supposed to earn that through a job, so find a way.”

SMH at you. Please never, ever try to date one of my D’s. They have much higher standards.

111

I would like to point out that many adults work 40 hours a week and still have time to study! I work 40 hours a week and self-studied statistics this summer. Many adults with families, children, and other commitments work full-time and go to school part-time. It all comes down to how driven you are and how badly you want it.

112

I strongly agree with the above. This summer I am working around 28 hours per week while going to school full time (7 credits). I even have time to go to taekwondo class every day, play on a softball team, and go to the lake every weekend for canoe practice. Even better, I have time every week to hang out with my friends! Not to mention the fact that I have friends at work, in school, at taekwondo, on my softball team, and on the canoe team. I spend virtually all of my waking hours with my friends to be honest.

It is far from impossible to balance work and school and social life. I’m having the best summer I’ve had in my entire life. Don’t make your social life or schoolwork an excuse for not working and relying on others for money.

113

If you only made $1,500 last summer you shoukd have gotten most of the taxes back.

I don’t know why you worked last summer and why you chose that particular job, but you must have spent some of the money since then because you said you now have $1,000. So if you spent $500 while your parents pay for pretty much everything, then you can see that you might need some money to spend freshman year of college.

I hope you don’t carry that attitude of a job beneath you to med school. What shifts do you think you will get? Whenever they need you, wherever they need you, whatever they need you to do…

114

@math112233441 Asking why college students need money is a dumb question. College is not free, whether you are “covered” or not. There are always expenses and I agree with @bjkmom your post does scream entitlement. Your post after you graduate college will probably be “Why do Adults need Jobs?”

115

Places like New York City are impossible for the middle class. Junior had to get a loan to cover his social life. There is lot to be said for remote schools. Guys who own bars adjacent to colleges should be encouraged to endow a chair. S#2 went to a college in a dry town and found ways to have a modest amout of fun. S#1 is still re-paying his restaurant/bar tab. I think an modestly active kid needs a minimum of $1,000 per semester. A wall street bound lad will need much more to keep up with the joneses.

116

^ The median household income for NYC is 50k. It’s statistically identical to the median income for the whole of the US. Somehow, most NYers manage to make it work on a “middle class” income (though, admittedly, they’re probably not running up tabs at restaurants and bars). It depends on your priorities :slight_smile:

Fwiw, the OP has not logged on since July 5.

117

I didn’t look through the posts so I don’t know if this has been mentioned but there are a lot of little things that add up in college, freshman or not.

  1. Do you plan on solely living off of cafeteria food? What about when they close and you're in the library all night (because it happens to all of us) how will you eat? You need snacks and, if you want to be healthy you shouldn't be able to buy in bulk at the beginning of the year because these things are usually chips, cookies, crackers etc. A big chunk of my money went towards food because yes I wanted to go out, but I also bought yogurt and a lot of fruit and cases of water (I go through at least 2 a month.)
  2. What about when you need to buy clothes? There will be times where you'll have to go on an interview or better yet, if you ever wanted to go to a job fair, or apply to an internship. You need if not a suit, khakis, dress shirts, nice shoes and a nice jacket.
  3. You say you aren't a night life partying person, neither was I but sometimes you want to go out. Do you really want to give up all of your chances for going out?

I’ve had a job nonstop since I was 15. One of which I’m still at now, and that has opened many, many doors for me. I’m an education student and I’ve gone on observations where I’m allowed to step in, I’ve done evaluations at schools and other things where presentation is not only important, it’s vital.

If I didn’t learn how to manage my time and have my own money there are a lot of things I wouldn’t have been able to do. If not for money, I at least urge you to think about resume opportunities.

I also saw you talk about not being able to do anything with your job. Unfortunately that’s one part of growing up. I CONSISTENTLY work 40+ hours, 5-6x a week at minimum wage (8.25) and I am on my feet for 8-10 hours daily on top of being thrown up. pooped on/ having food thrown at me, changing diapers etc. It sucks yeah, but I suck it up because not only do I love it, I know that as a future teacher I will be on my feet a huge amount of the day.

118

Again posting not necessarily for OP but for anyone reading this…

I just finished my freshman year and many professors tried to teach us with their specific methods/from scratch, so self-studying could prove to be a total waste. It is completely possible to get a 4.0 without knowing all the subject material. There is a lot to be said for learning specific software/skills; i.e, business majors could learn Excel, journalism major could learn a language, CS major could learn a programming language or two… but just teaching yourself course material, only to relearn it, seems silly. Even if you went this route, it shouldn’t be taking you 40 hours/week.

Second, the resume is big. I assume you want to land the big prestige internships/jobs next year. If I’m looking at your resume, I’m going to ask why you have work experience two summers ago but not last summer. Were you a poor employee and not invited back? Did you simply say “meh, I’d rather sit at home”? Answering with “I was studying for my classes” would signal me as an employer that you are very inefficient, very antisocial, or both. Even if you can pull off an acceptable answer, will you get a good reference from that employer? Imagine the employer calling up your old boss, only to have them say “OP? Hm, OP, OP… oh, yeah! Well, I guess we didn’t fire him, so he was probably fine.”

As for spending money, it pops up everywhere. I had two groups of friends this year… one that liked to spend money, and one that didn’t. I spent significantly more time with the latter because I couldn’t always afford to keep up with the former. Brunch, going out (alcohol, clothes, taxis/Ubers), late night pizza, concerts, sightseeing/weekend travel, going out to eat for someone’s birthday, Spotify/Netflix, extra phone chargers, lost ID cards, a fake ID, when the Girl Scouts post up on campus during finals week and exploit the hell out of us… all things my friends and I spent money on. It is okay to say no to some things for frugality, but as mentioned earlier… if you say no too many times, they will stop asking. And while you obviously don’t need to buy friends, you will want to make friends in the early weeks and if it costs $15 to go to Chipotle or $30 to buy a handle/mixers, it’s probably worth it. Also, any and all things you might not want to ask parents money for… STD testing, birth control, anything illegal, even presents for their birthdays (it stops being cute to buy Mom’s birthday present with dad’s credit card when you’re like, 8).

One last thing, for OP…
Drop the “I’m much smarter and mature than most of the other kids my age act”. You may be smart, but you sound incredibly naive and not self-aware in the slightest. You can of course think you’re smarter, but don’t talk about your peers like they’re peons for not having a 4.0 or being in the Honors program. It’s not cute.

119

-eating off campus
-car problems
-joining greek system
-basic things like shampoo and clothes
-football/sports tickets
-money for dates

these are just some basic things people need money for in college!

120

My first semester at school, I didn’t think I’d need much spending money because I knew I would be home often enough to get supplies/ do laundry etc. I may not have needed much, but I still did wind up spending for late-night snacks from the vending machine, coffee for those long afternoons in the library and small activities. So yes, people do need spending money for school, but if you play your cards right you won’t need a lot to get you through.