College is a Full-Time Job
This was my absolute favorite activity to discuss when I worked in higher education. When students would come into my office ambivalent about getting help, yet admitting they did need to change something, I would capitalize on blowing their mind with one tip. I talked about treating college like a full-time job to better help them understand what they needing to be doing to ensure they “didn’t get fired.” Let’s break this down.
Full-time jobs are often far more than 40 hours/week nowadays, but for the sake of this exercise, we’re saying a full-time job is 40 hours.
If the student is taking 15 college credits in the semester, that means they are typically in class (physically) for 15 hours; whether online or in-person. We all know that college classes require coursework outside of the classroom. There are equations out there getting to the number of hours of outside coursework required, but I think my example is the most simplistic.
40 – 15 = 25
That means that a student needs to plan in their weekly schedule to have 25 hours outside of their actual in-class time to be reading, studying, doing projects ahead of time, etc. Most of the college students I worked when I showed them this would immediately lose the color in their faces. I’d ask them to talk to me about how many hours outside of the class they were dedicating to studying. Most of them would say between 5-10 hours (at most!). Brace yourself for the question I would follow-up in asking these students.
“So, if you’re in college to earn a degree to then get a full-time job in your field, you want to treat school like it’s your current employer. You’re telling me that between in-class time and the time you spend doing work outside of class is only a total of 20 to 25 hours/week. If the university if your employer and they hired you to work 40 hours but you’re only working 20-25, what do you think your employer will do?”
Every single student had a lightbulb go off. “They’re going to fire me.” Read this as “they will put me on academic probation and then I’ll be kicked out.” The instantaneous comprehension of what the student needs to do to not “get fired,” clicks. There is no way they can forget to do the work needed or forget the amount of time they need to be putting in to treat school like a full-time job. Once they here this number, you just can’t forget it.
If a student ends up on academic probation even after having this information, then there needs to be a different conversation altogether. Specifically about whether or not being in college makes sense if they aren’t taking it seriously or aren’t putting in the effort needed to be successful (academically). This tip is helpful for all college students, no matter the semester.
For questions or comments contact Joanna.
