Introduction

The community I’m focusing on is the community of college students who are part time workers. I am an insider to this community because I am a part time worker who attends college at the same time. I work as a doorman/ porter at a building in the Upper East Side on 80th street. Since I don’t work full time I am known as the “relieve guy” since I work when someone is either on vacation, taking a sick day, or any other reason. My dad, who has been working for the building as a porter for many years, was the one who got me the job and I have been working there since the summer before my first year at CCNY. This experience of working while attending school is what meaningfully connect me to this community. Now that I have been working there for a while I have been able to gain insights for my research on how working can affect a student in different ways. 

Being an insider gives me the privilege of knowing more about my topic which gives me the opportunity to share a lot of my experiences and how I handle it. This will also help with being able to relate to the people I plan on interviewing since they are also going to be students who are part time workers. We will be able to easily talk to one another because we would already have an established connection because of the community we share. However, being an insider would also be a challenge for me as I do this work. It is going to be a challenge to put myself in the outsider position when I have been an insider for a while. When interviewing I am going to have to be more of an audience than a fellow member of the community. This will help me gain more knowledge since I will be looking at this from another perspective, since I am so used to my own. Since the interviewees and I are going to be in their environment I am sure it is going to be easier to get their true perspectives. 

Field Notes

One of the sites I visited that relates to my subculture was the Gateway Academic Center in the NAC building at CCNY. I decided to come here because I know multiple students work here since I used to come here for my math tutoring. Although I am familiar with the setting and environment I have never truly observed it closely. However, now I will be able to. 

It was a Tuesday afternoon and I had just finished my second class of the day and I had a three hour gap before my next class. I thought to myself this would be the perfect time to go observe my site since I have time and also this when tutoring in the Gateway Academic Center starts. I was walking down the escalators to go, and yes I said walking down the escalators since they somehow never work at CCNY even though they are always “fixing” it or maybe that’s what they want us to think. As I entered the first thing I noticed about the room was how bright everything was. The walls were painted white and baby blue. They also had paintings on them of bright colored flowers. The couches that were in the room were a bright red color and when I sat down they were also very comfortable. 

It was a nice setting to walk into because the room with it’s bright colors made it feel so welcoming. The two people at the front desk were fellow CCNY students. One was an African American girl and the other was a hispanic guy. This showed to me how diverse it is at this particular site that relates to my subculture. Anyone is welcome to work here. It also shows how diverse it is in terms of race which tells me that the problems that challenge my subculture, student part time workers, are not aimed at any one particular race. Another thing I noticed how many students were coming here at this time. I assumed that since tutoring starts at 12 and most students don’t have class during this time then they took advantage to go to tutoring. Something I noticed was how diverse the students that were coming in were. This made me think about my first initial thoughts off the room of how welcoming I felt it because of its bright colors of the room giving me a good vibe. The workers here also resembled this because of how nice they were. Once the room cleared up the girl politely asked me if I needed anything since I was just there sitting down looking around. Since I didn’t want to say “No, I’m just observing,” I nervously asked if there was math tutoring going on. She said yes and asked me to sign in this binder they had at the desk. When I went to sign I noticed how both of them were doing their homework because I saw their notebooks and worksheets. While I was signing I was listening to their conversation. I overheard the girl saying she couldn’t go out with him and some other friends since she had to study for a test and finish a lab report. She said she hasn’t had the time to be able to start on either and she really needed to. The guy responded by saying “damn, why teacher be beasting during this time.” I chuckled after hearing this and the girl too while saying “this guy knows what we’re talking about.” 

Peer Reviewed Source

After leaving I kept thinking about what the girl said. I was thinking about how she has no time to study or do any school related work or even time for herself to go out with friends. This shows how working part time can affect a student. In Geerlink and Conrad’s research on “What effects do student jobs have on the study performance, competency and career development of hospitality management students,” (Geerlink, Lashley, 2018) they discuss how students “who work more than 15 hours a week have poor academic performances and are more likely to quit their studies” (Geerlink, Lashley, 2018). With school and work, they both take up a majority of a student’s time to study and do their homework or any other other assignments. As a result of this students tend to fail tests, turn in incomplete assignments, or not turn in assignments at all. This doesn’t mean that they’re bad students, it means that they are struggling with working and going to school at the same time.

Interview

This reminded me of one of my interviews with my friend, Shazida, who works at a Key Food Supermarket as a cashier when she is not at Hunter where she attends school. She too had told me that “Having a part time job makes it difficult for me to make time for myself and my loved ones.” She explained how some students go to school four to five times a week and how they usually get to enjoy their free time after school or on the weekends but she, like many others, do not have this privilege. Most importantly, she talks about how working “takes away time for doing hw and studying” and by the time she gets home she feels tired because her energy was already wasted by being at work standing for seven hours. 

Conclusion

Ultimately, I enjoyed visiting this site and observing how these student workers try to balance their life of work and school. Even though it is clear that they can struggle with this at times, as I have seen with the girl that worked in the Gateway Academic Center, they don’t let it affect their work performance. They are still kind, welcoming, and very helpful instead of being in a bad mood since they can’t go out with their friends or because they can’t do any school related work. I felt bad since I know how that can feel since I too am a student worker and I can get frustrated and stressed when I feel like I have no time for anything. This is why I hope that there is something done to address this problem so that students can stop going through this. It is known that it can have an affect on their academic performance and if they can fix this problem it would go well for both sides. Students will improve their academic performances and the school will get an even better reputation

Works Cited

• Geerlink, A., & Lashley, C. (2018). What effects do student jobs have on the study performance, competency and career development of hospitality management students1. Research in Hospitality Management, 7(2), 121-126.