IMRaD

Andrew Oyler

English 102

4/12/15

Working In College

Abstract

Many full-time students find it hard to maintain a job, a full course load, and keep their grades to an acceptable level therefore the general conception that college students are poor comes to play. Research was conducted by creating a survey that was sent out to students at the University of Louisville, and by interviewing two students on the topic. 50% of students that are employed who completed the survey said their academics were negatively affected by their job.  36.36% of the students that are not employed said they do not have a job because they did not have time or needed to focus on school; and 91.6% of the students that are not employed said they feel their academics would be affected if they were to add a job in their daily schedule.

Introduction

            College students tend to be generalized as poor and struggling due to the lack of students with jobs or students that have to spend their money on their education.  The reasons why students do not have jobs while attending school can be unclear. Depending on some student’s financial status’s they must work to pay for their education and possible all the essentials to live, or in some extreme cases to help out their own families. Students who do not work may feel they do not have the time to incorporate a job into their schedule or that it will take away focus from their schoolwork. This research can help explain the motives behind student’s reasons to work or not work while in college, and whether their academics are affected by this decision.

Methods

Participants: Students at the University of Louisville

Procedures: A survey was made to gather information on students who attend the University of Louisville and their employment status and motives behind these. The survey was sent out through an email to an English class at the university and posted to Facebook to collect results. Two students were interviewed, one male and one female, to gain a more in depth response of their personal motives behind their employment status and if their academics have been affected by this.

Data Analysis: The data was broken down into two groups, students that have jobs and students that don’t, their opinions on their academic performance due to their employment decision was then taken into consideration. Whether or not a student needed the job for financial reasons or for their own pleasure was then noted.

Results

All of the participants in this survey are full-time students (12+ hours), 65% of them male, 35% females. If you refer to table 1, the table shows that majority of participants that do not have jobs do not, because they feel they do not have time for a job, or they feel they need to focus on schoolwork. Adding these two figures together, this is 36.36% of the participants, a little over one third.

Table 1:

(Describes the motives behind a persons employment decision)

Do you have a job? If yes, why? If not, why?
Yes, I need to pay for school.	4
Yes, I need to help my family.	0
Yes, I need money for my own pleasure	8
No, I don't have time.	4
No, I don't need the money.	2
No, I need to focus on school	4

Around half of the students that are employed feel that their job affects their academic performance in a negative way, according to figure 1. 12.5% of participants that are employment strongly agree that their academics are affected negatively, and 37.5% agree, which totals to 50% of students.

Figure 1:

           

            (Chart shows students agreeableness with their academics being affected by a job)

            Figure 2 shows that almost all of the participants who are not currently employed feel that their academic performance would be affected negatively if they added in a job in their weekly schedule.  Of the 10 students that are not employed, 9 of them answered yes to feeling as if their academics would be affected if a job were taken on.

Figure 2:(Chart shows how students without a job feel about their academics if a job was added into their schedule)

            The male student that was interviewed on the subject did not have a job because he felt he did not have enough time for one. “Working on top of going to class everyday, homework, and leisure time is too much for me and something I do not want to have to deal with.” He said. According to him, taking on a job would take away from the time he has to study, and wouldn’t allow him adequate time to relieve stress or do things he actually enjoyed.

            The female student that was interviewed was employed because she needs to pay for her education. She stated that she did not want to have a large amount of debt when she graduates and that her parents did not have the money to pay for her education. When asked if she felt as if her academics were negatively affected by her job she answered, “Yes, it is hard to find the time to study, go to class, and work, but it is doable. If I did not need to work as much as I do I would have a lot more time to spend on studying and getting better grades.”

Discussion

            These results suggest that many students academic performance is affected by their jobs or that they feel that a job would affect their academic performance, helping to explain some of the reasons why some college students choose not to work. This research was not given to vary many students, and majority of the participants were also males, so there was not much diversity. This research can help explain why college students are generalized as being poor by showing why students choose not to work and how a job can affect a student. In the future, an experiment could be done to help find more information. Student’s academics can be observed in two different semesters, one where the student is employed, and one when the student is not. This can help show how a student is affected by their job and in what ways.

Research Question

Are you a full-time student?

Do you have a job?

If not, why?

If not, do you feel your academic performance would be affected if you added in a job to your weekly schedule?

If yes, why?

If yes, do you feel it affects your academic performance in a negative way?

If yes, how many hours do you work a week?

Male or Female?

Research Question Plan

The research question I will use is do college students have time for a job and does it affect their academic performance?
To get results I will create a survey for students at UofL, with various questions about jobs and their experience with them. I will analyze the data into two groups first, those who have jobs and those who do not, and then go from there, such as why the ones with jobs don't have them and why the ones with jobs do, e.g. paying for school, just want money, helping family, etc.

IMRaD vs Research Argument

One major difference between these two assignments is that the research argument paper was biased and was used to argue a point, the IMRaD assignment is not biased and is just presenting research. Another difference between the two is the type of research that is done, for the research assignment we had to use other scholarly source for our research, in the IMRaD assignment we will be conducting our own surveys. The two assignments also have a different format. The research assignment was like a normal essay you would write with an introduction, body, and conclusion. The IMRaD has separate sub heading for each section and its more of a scientific research paper.