Lower income students and the ‘double deficit’ of part-time work: undergraduate experiences of finance, studying and employability

ABSTRACT

This paper explores how the various pressures of finance, employability and part-time work are experienced by undergraduates studying in an English Red Brick University. Drawing on the results of a 3-year qualitative study that followed 40 students throughout their 3 years of studies (n₁ = 40, n₂ = 40, n₃ = 38, n_total = 118), the paper details three dimensions by which students understood their part-time employment experiences: the characteristics of employment types; motivations for employment and the challenges of shaping their employment experiences around their studies. It is argued that the current shortfalls in the student budget and the pressures of the employability agenda may actually serve to further disadvantage the lower income groups in the form of a ‘double deficit’. Not only are discrepancies between income and expenditure likely to mean that additional monies are necessary to study for a degree, the resulting need for part-time employment is also likely to constrain both degree outcome and capacity to enhance skills necessary for ‘employability’.

KEYWORDS:

• Employability
• part-time work
• student finance
• student debt

Acknowledgements

The authors are grateful to the University of Sheffield and especially Julian Crockford and the Widening Participation Research and Evaluation Unit, who host the ‘Sheffield Student 2013ʹ longitudinal tracking project this paper is based on. Special thanks to Catherine McKeown and the Financial Support team for their support and help.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. Further, most institutions operate some form of hardship fund students can draw on in cases of financial emergency.

2. Civic universities that were set up at the turn of the 18th–19th century in several industrial cities of the UK, now operating as research intensive institutions (Morgan 2015).

3. One interviewee declined to be interviewed during their final year, with another failing to respond to requests for an interview.

4. Although Khaled did not receive a fee waiver, he had the highest possible bursary from the University, meaning that his family is low income.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Rita Hordósy

Rita obtained an MA in Sociology at the Eötvös Loránd University in Budapest and conducted her doctoral research in education at the University of Birmingham. Her research at the University of Sheffield follows a generation of undergraduate students throughout their university years to get a better understanding of their experiences.

Tom Clark

Tom obtained his BA in Psychology, an MA and PhD in Sociological Research at the University of Sheffield. He is currently a Lecturer in Research Methods. His main research interests are in the broad areas of research methodology, novel applications of social theory and sport.

Dan Vickers

Dan obtained his PhD in Geography at University of Leeds. He is a Lecturer in Social and Spatial Inequalities at the University of Sheffield. Dan’s research interests are centred on social and spatial divisions within society. This includes: social and spatial inequalities, residential segregation and methods and techniques for measuring these differences.