Balancing School and Full-Time Work: How Do Other Students Do It?

[erok81]

Are there any fellow PF'ers that work full time while attending school?

I am curious what sort of credit hours you take and how you balance your schedule.

My first two years were no problem I could do 40 hours of work and 13-15 credit hours and maintain A's. But that I am entering my junior year I find 40 hours of work I find 10 credit hours tough.

I used to be able to just study all day after work at random times, but now I have to set schedules to get everything done.

Of course I still set aside a few hours a week for my favorite TV shows.

Anyway...what are you guys doing?

 

[raam86]

I do not know anyone that is able to do that.

 

[Pengwuino]

I'm a graduate student and the convenience of a part time job (20h) as a TA on campus still makes it difficult to keep up with everything.

 

[erok81]

Hmm...It's not really that hard. I would think more people would be doing this. However, maybe they are all too busy working to post on forums.

I hope if I can make it to graduate school I will stop working then. But for now, I don't have much of a choice.

 

[AwesomeSN]

I did this my first couple of years, albeit I was a part-time student. I'm going full-time now and close to my junior year, I'll find it hard enough to just even keep a part-time job. :/

 

[turbo]

I worked part-time all through engineering school (buying and selling amps and guitars and repairing them, and playing music for frat parties, etc). Summers were full-time+ in wood-products mills, taking all the overtime I was offered.

I don't think I could possibly have put in 40 hours per week in addition to the course-work. I would have collapsed. Good for you if you can pull it off, but that plan is a recipe for burn-out, IMO, unless your academic load is light.

 

[QuarkCharmer]

I worked full time through all my general-ed and remedial math stuff (I was out of school for some time and forgot a great deal). I could not imagine working full time as a 3+ year student. I actually downgraded my car so I had no payment, moved closer to the university so I can walk to school in a few minutes (or take a free shuttle). I do get a living stipend from the VA to attend though, but that extra budgeting helped a great deal financially.

 

[erok81]

I am to the point that I can't really handle more than 3 classes a semester 8-10 credit hours. Then I make up a couple more classes every semester.

The only thing that sucks about is I can't really do REU's - although I might take next summer semester off so I can try one.

I don't really see how working full-time is any different than those crazy mo-fo's that to 18-20 credit hours per semester.

 

[AwesomeSN]

I am to the point that I can't really handle more than 3 classes a semester 8-10 credit hours. Then I make up a couple more classes every semester.

The only thing that sucks about is I can't really do REU's - although I might take next summer semester off so I can try one.

I don't really see how working full-time is any different than those crazy mo-fo's that to 18-20 credit hours per semester.

18-20 credit hours in what field?

I may be underestimating the Art major, but my friend is an Art major and is taking roughly 16 or so credit hours, but I feel that engineering classes are a tad bit harder than art classes. :)

 

[turbo]

18-20 credit hours in what field?

I may be underestimating the Art major, but my friend is an Art major and is taking roughly 16 or so credit hours, but I feel that engineering classes are a tad bit harder than art classes. :)

When I decided to ditch engineering, I still had some of those tough courses to clean up, in addition to taking on a double-major track in English Lit and Philosophy. I had 18 credit-hours total, when my advisor tacked on 3 more "Theory of Education" courses. He said "just show up for classes and ask a question once in a while, and use the class-time as study-periods for your tougher classes." He was right, and I aced all the Education classes with no effort. That gave me some insight into why the Education majors in my Uni were generally party animals.

The University of Maine was a pretty decent land-grant Uni with some demanding technical academic tracks, but their Education college was a joke. Got a pulse? Get a diploma.

 

[zif.]

18-20 credit hours in what field?

UBC engineers consistently take 18-20 credit hours per semester.

I did first year engineering at another university and took 21 credits in my first semester. The full load was 26.

 

[QuarkCharmer]

I started off as an Engineering student, and in the first year there were so many "fluff" classes (EGS this and EGS that) which were basically a waste of time! I can see the 18-20 hours in a semester like that, but once you begin actual degree courses... wow. If anyone is doing that while taking 3+ series courses, I commend your effort, amazing work ethic, and superior intellect.

 

[flyingpig]

I am going to be a second year next year and I am going to be a lab monitor which demands 12 hours (at most) a week. I'll probably be only taking 8 - 9 courses for the whole fall/winter semester.

 

[zif.]

I started off as an Engineering student, and in the first year there were so many "fluff" classes (EGS this and EGS that) which were basically a waste of time! I can see the 18-20 hours in a semester like that, but once you begin actual degree courses... wow.

Introduction to Structured Programming (C++)
Academic Writing (essays)
Calculus I
Physics I (mechanics)
Introduction to Engineering (one credit fluff course)
Computer-Aided Engineering Graphics (Very little actual CAD work, mostly starting to learn standards and technical drawing. Hardest course I've ever taken.)

The course I didn't take was Chemistry I, a five credit hour course.

The advantage to going through this in first year is that when I switched to physics a 15 credit course load seems light.Edit:

Here's the MechEng curriculum at ubc:

http://mech.ubc.ca/undergraduate-students/curriculum/

 

[ych22]

In my junior year fall semester, I took 15 credit hours of engineering classes while serving as a TA for freshmen engineering classes 10 hours a week.

It killed me totally! I had barely any time for social activities.

 

[mal4mac]

The Open University is geared towards people in full time work, you might want to check out how they do it:

http://www3.open.ac.uk/study/explained/part-time-or-full-time-study.shtml

 

[Geezer]

Are there any fellow PF'ers that work full time while attending school?

I am curious what sort of credit hours you take and how you balance your schedule.

My first two years were no problem I could do 40 hours of work and 13-15 credit hours and maintain A's. But that I am entering my junior year I find 40 hours of work I find 10 credit hours tough.

I used to be able to just study all day after work at random times, but now I have to set schedules to get everything done.

Of course I still set aside a few hours a week for my favorite TV shows.

Anyway...what are you guys doing?

I worked as a substitute teacher during the first couple years of my Physics undergrad program, but by the time I got to junior year, there was no flexibility in the school schedule--E&M I was offered just one time during the academic year, so I had no choice but to sign up for it at that time--so I couldn't continue with subbing. I tutored and TAed, graded homework and tests, and even worked as a research assistant for money. Not a lot of money, but it helped.

 

[Yesimivan]

I took 18 hours and worked 40-65 hours a week this past year.

I did this only because I applied to University late and had to pay for everything out of pocket in just a few months in addition to 5k in debt. Needless to say, I was financially burdened.

Don't ever attempt it. I had zero social life, was constantly exhausted, and frequently sick; however, I persisted. :) Now I can reduce my workload by quite a bit.

Also, I took traditional Freshman classes. Nothing too intense.

 

[QuarkCharmer]

Also, I took traditional Freshman classes. Nothing too intense.

Those are the courses that took the most time for me. I can sit through math/phys/chem and like it, learn the info, but it could take me hours to remember some stupid list of humanities definitions or to write a paper on some other such asinine topic. At least, to keep a good grade. I find year 3+ easier.

 

[Jack21222]

I'm taking 14 credits and working 40 hours a week. I've been doing this for 3 years now, and it's getting to be too much. I've been able to maintain a 3.88 GPA so far, but this semester (and to a lesser extent, last semester) have been really rough. I intend to jettison my full-time job for my last 2 semesters to maintain my sanity.

 

[Angry Citizen]

You people frighten me... I had enough trouble just maintaining a courseload of calc III, calc-based physics II, and chem II... (eleven credits), with no job.

 

[mege]

I am currently working full time at night in a job that gives me the opportunity to do school work while at work. (server maintaince work - so it's a lot of watching progress bars)

Luckily I could schedule my classes all in the morning so I still have a consistent sleep schedule.

My days are generally work 11p-7a, eat large breakfast, class 8a-noon (depending on day varys a bit), sleep until ~6p, eat dinner/see wife, maybe do some homework at home if I know I'll be time crunched at work, then go to work.

This is working out perfectly right now - but if I have to take classes across the entire day, I will have to reevaluate my job.

 

[Geezer]

My days are generally work 11p-7a, eat large breakfast, class 8a-noon (depending on day varys a bit), sleep until ~6p, eat dinner/see wife, maybe do some homework at home if I know I'll be time crunched at work, then go to work.

The first time I attended college, I worked graveyard shifts (10pm-6am) five nights a week; I'd go home, shower, take the tiniest of naps--one or two hours, tops--then head to class (I was a full-time student).

I somehow managed to do it. I was 17, 18, 19 years old at the time; I had youth on my side. However, now that I'm in my 30s, there's no way I could pull it off.