How many hours to work at university?

I’m sure I’ll need to work during university when I start this September.

As I’ve never had a job and never been to uni I have no idea of the time commitments I would have to either.
So I was wondering how many hours would work if I wanted to get a good grade (maybe even a first) during my first year.

I was thinking 20hours since this would pay for my accommodation plus a little extra to add on to my maintenance loan.
But I could push that down to 10 if it was really difficult to work, stay social, go to societies and study hard.

And if it’s completely impossible maybe I’d just work holidays like Christmas and Easter for like 30hr a day to get lots of money. This is my least favourite option as it would mean I would get to go home less. And my mother is planning a holiday on Easter which I could miss but I don’t really want to.

Any help from someone’s that’s experienced this. The university website said that there schedules are very flexible to meet students needs so maybe that means a lot of people do work and study well.

Reply 1

cheesecakelove

20

Original post by Rhodesian

I’m sure I’ll need to work during university when I start this September.

As I’ve never had a job and never been to uni I have no idea of the time commitments I would have to either.
So I was wondering how many hours would work if I wanted to get a good grade (maybe even a first) during my first year.

I was thinking 20hours since this would pay for my accommodation plus a little extra to add on to my maintenance loan.
But I could push that down to 10 if it was really difficult to work, stay social, go to societies and study hard.

And if it’s completely impossible maybe I’d just work holidays like Christmas and Easter for like 30hr a day to get lots of money. This is my least favourite option as it would mean I would get to go home less. And my mother is planning a holiday on Easter which I could miss but I don’t really want to.

Any help from someone’s that’s experienced this. The university website said that there schedules are very flexible to meet students needs so maybe that means a lot of people do work and study well.

Each person is different - 20 hours may be a lot depending on your subject and contact hours (as well as independent learning hours). If you can balance your work alongside your studies, it can be manageable but you have to make sure you are extremely organised. Your studies should always take priority over your work and it may not always be possible to change your uni schedule for all classes, so it is something to take into consideration. If you are looking to work part time, you could start off with a few hours work a week and see how you get on. If you find it fairly manageable, you can try to increase your hours.

Reply 2

DrawTheLine

22

Original post by Rhodesian

I’m sure I’ll need to work during university when I start this September.

As I’ve never had a job and never been to uni I have no idea of the time commitments I would have to either.
So I was wondering how many hours would work if I wanted to get a good grade (maybe even a first) during my first year.

I was thinking 20hours since this would pay for my accommodation plus a little extra to add on to my maintenance loan.
But I could push that down to 10 if it was really difficult to work, stay social, go to societies and study hard.

And if it’s completely impossible maybe I’d just work holidays like Christmas and Easter for like 30hr a day to get lots of money. This is my least favourite option as it would mean I would get to go home less. And my mother is planning a holiday on Easter which I could miss but I don’t really want to.

Any help from someone’s that’s experienced this. The university website said that there schedules are very flexible to meet students needs so maybe that means a lot of people do work and study well.

20 hours seems a bit much. I'd say 16 is the upper limit for most people. In first year I had around 12 contact hours, but obviously this depends on your course.

I'm assuming you mean 30 hours a week, not 30 hours a day? :tongue:

Also, do you have exams at the end of the academic year? If so, then going on holiday over the Easter break is not the smartest thing to do.

Reply 3

diztrezzed

10

I think around the 12 hour mark is good, at least that's what I plan to do when I start uni in a couple of weeks. That's approximately one weekend day and an evening, which leaves plenty of time for socialising and revising. I work for marks and Spencer which give me £8.75 an hour so that's just about 100 quid a week, which should be more than enough on top of maintenance loan

How many hours to work at university?

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