The Sandspur

Issue date: 4/14/06 Section: Life & Times

Media Credit: Ryan Walls BARNIES: Rollins student hard at work off-campus.

"People are poor only because they are lazy," one sophomore expressed, wishing to identify herself only as a conservative student concerned with the level of productivity at Rollins College. The girl, a former prep school student whose father now pays for her pricey arts and sciences program tuition at the college, reports that students who do not have the same resources available to them as she does are "obviously people who have made bad decisions."

This individualistic level of poverty is untypical of students at a liberal arts institution, according to Jessica Estes, 20, who explains, "Poverty is a structural problem, not individualistic. The professors here make sure we are aware of how poverty comes as a result of public policies, and not simply because someone is a slacker."

According to education researcher, Tracey King, poor students are not slackers. In fact, "74 percent of full-time college students have jobs," and at least half of these are working because they would otherwise be unable to afford to attend college. The question is, how does this impact students lives?

"I work between 30-35 hours a week as a butcher at Publix and it's a juggling act," Paul Leonard, 20, a sophomore at University of Florida revealed. "I don't have the luxury of not working. I work because I have to."

Like Mr. Leonard, Ms. King explains, "Most students work while enrolled in college, and nearly half of all full-time working students work 25 hours or more per week." Unfortunately, "while many students are working at levels that are likely to negatively impact their academic achievement and the quality of their education, they often cannot afford to cut back on their work hours."

Jennifer Browning, Assistant Director at the Office of Career Services in Rollins College, does not necessarily agree with Ms. King that working is such a negative experience. While "there are certain events you can't make it to because you have to go to work," she concedes, "I think that there are definitely many more pros in terms of getting real-world experience while still in school. It helps students figure out what they like to do…so, it's real beneficial in terms of helping them establish goals."

Indeed, many students do take advantage of this opportunity to gain "real-world experience," as a recent poll of Rollins College student's shows that a full 35 percent of students work at off-campus jobs. Of this, 75 percent report that their parents pay almost all of their bills. While the figure for students with jobs is significantly lower than at other institutions, Rollins is notorious for drawing in more affluent students and so it correlates well with Ms. King's research showing how students from higher-income families tend to work less.

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