What happened to my work-study hours?

By: Dustin Looney
Features Editor

Many upperclassmen who have been involved with Monmouth College’s work-study program will have to find a new source of money. This school year, Monmouth College was not able to provide jobs for many juniors and seniors who have been employed in the past.

The reason behind the predicament is plain and simple: Monmouth College simply does not have the funds to pay all the students who applied for jobs, said Jayne Whiteside, director of financial aid.

“I am very aware of the voiced concerns on campus from students, their parents, faculty and staff concerning the federal work-study program,” Whiteside said. “When students are interested in and motivated to work, it is frustrating for me to have to limit them in any way from obtaining a position on campus.”

Here’s how the process works: Monmouth receives money from the government (under the Federal Work-Study Program) and the funds are earmarked specifically for the school’s work-study program. The college is required to add a certain percentage to the government money, and that sum is what pays for the students to work.

Last year, the government gave Monmouth $177,000 and the college added another $125,000, making a total amount available for work-study of $302,000.

Although this sounds like a tidy sum, the problem comes in the fact that the college is growing in enrollment, with more than 400 freshmen this year alone. Unfortunately for students relying on work-study, the government is not increasing the money they give to Monmouth to match the increased amount of students.

In fact, the college is actually receiving less money from the Federal government now than it did last year. 

So much for the “education precedent.” In 2000-01, before the current administration took office, Monmouth College received over $200,000 from the government. All these statistics combined with the fact that minimum wage has increased over the years puts Monmouth between a rock and a hard place.

This causes Monmouth College to be more selective as to whom they pick for work-study jobs. It also puts the upperclassmen (juniors and seniors) at a disadvantage, because they are most eligible for loans, so the underclassmen get priorities for jobs.

The proof is in the pudding, as the breakdown of students in each class who have jobs through work-study this year goes this way: freshmen have 166, sophomores have 115, juniors have 35 and seniors have just 32. That is more than four times more underclassmen who have jobs than upperclassmen.

Whiteside said this is a problem which has been building up for several years.

This year’s problem is the most apparent, and many upperclassmen are unhappy with how they have been treated by the school. Many students were not aware that their jobs were eliminated until they arrived at school this semseter.

The work-study dilemma has negatively affected many students at Monmouth, including junior Heather Prater from St. Charles.

“I count on that money every single year, especially this year because I had a job in New York City at the ‘Today Show’ and it was an unpaid internship,” Prater said. “When I came back to school, I was really expecting to have that money supply, and now it’s taken away. I have to find other means to make my ends meet.”

Prater, who is a member of the cheerleading squad, Pi Beta Phi and the head of MC-TV, received 10 hours a week of work-study for her first two years at Monmouth. She was expecting to receive a job again this year, but Monmouth told her they did not have enough hours for everybody, and she was not going to get any hours at all.

Prater did not know that her job would be revoked until she got to Monmouth to start the school year, and she was relying on her job as a source of finances.

Whiteside pointed out that students could always try to get an off-campus job, but that is easier said than done in Monmouth. In case you did not notice, Monmouth does not exactly have a booming economy. Even the Western Pottery outlet store closed last spring.

“For everyone that doesn’t get work study, we have to go out to Monmouth,” Prater said. “It’s such a small community and it’s hard to get a job here.”