Dive Brief:
- A new report from Georgetown University finds 70%-80% of college students in the workforce, and while work experience is valuable to employers, few of them work in their fields.
- Inside Higher Ed reports the Georgetown Center on Education and the Workforce report calls on colleges and businesses to create more opportunities to link student work and academics, integrating the two and maximizing the value of a student's need to work.
- The research argues colleges must do a better job of helping students find meaningful, paid internships or work-study opportunities and businesses must be willing to pay for their labor.
Dive Insight:
Students used to be able to focus exclusively on academics during the school year and then work over the summer to pay the costs of tuition and fees. Now, working over the summer can hardly get students anywhere. And those trying to work enough during the school year to stave off debt are more likely to take longer to graduate or not graduate at all.
About 40% of undergrads work at least 30 hours per week and the portion of graduate students doing the same is just more than three-quarters. As employers seek more job-ready skills from entry-level employees, finding more meaningful, paid work experiences for students while they're studying could be a key to improving student outcomes on multiple metrics.