The Student Worker Perspective
Fatima Bibi is a current ARU Medical student who regularly works through ARU Temps. We asked Fatima for her perspective on temp work and what it means for her student experience...

Being a student is great, but at times it can be costly. Sometimes Student Finance isn’t quite enough to cover all the expenses. This is where student employment is a great opportunity. ARU, like many universities, offer on-campus jobs for students to boost our income and give us a bit of extra cash for things we want. Here is my perspective as a part-time student worker and the benefits of having a student job.

I am a current year 2 medical student and a postgrad; therefore, I pay my student fees without SFE loans. This means before joining ARU I already had a spreadsheet set-up and calculated how many hours I would need to work each week. I applied to many roles ranging from KFC to Primark- anything I could find. However, I realised that most of these jobs were not very flexible. As someone who studies most of the week and goes to placement- the hours were just not achievable. That is when I learnt about ARU Temps. Not only are the job hours flexible, with lots of training opportunities and internships, but the pay is in line with the real living wage rather than minimum wage.

Having a student job provides many benefits to students. It can help alleviate the financial burden of being a student. Instead of relying solely on SFE, students can earn money to help pay for the various course expenses as well as extra things they may enjoy. Furthermore, student jobs provide valuable work experience which is beneficial when applying for jobs post-graduation. The soft and core skillset you gain from various roles provide a great set of transferable skills that can be applied in your future career. You can also build networks and relationships with different faculties and staff; this is useful for references and discovering new opportunities.

This isn’t to say there aren’t any challenges when working part-time during your studies. One of the biggest challenges for student workers is balancing work and university. It can be difficult to manage a job and maintain grades. However, as mentioned, universities are understanding of this and many of the roles offer flexible work schedules to accommodate. I have also felt comfortable speaking with the team about my availability and whenever I have important assignments/exams, I reduce my hours to something more manageable. Again, this helps with time-management and organisational skills, I have found that I am much better at following a revision schedule and keeping up to speed with my course thanks to honing these skills.

Overall, having a student job has been very beneficial for myself. It helps relieve financial stress, provide me with interesting work experience, and allows for networking opportunities.

Fatima Bibi