By: Cassidy Pate

A high school student having a job is expected. Lots of people have jobs, it’s normal. The difference in the employee is whether they actually wanted to get a job in high school or not. The people who actually want jobs in high school probably want the job to make their own money and to get some sort of real-world experience. The people who don’t want a job in high school but get one anyway are usually told to get a job by their parents because their parents think they need something to do. 

Jobs are actually really good for teenagers. You learn real life skills that will become useful in the future like how to treat customers, since most teenagers work in some sort of customer service position. I mean yes, sometimes you do get yelled at by customers even though you did nothing wrong, which doesn’t really make sense, but other than that, it’s usually a good environment for a teenager. 

The only real problem with getting a job in high school whether you wanted one or not is that employers don’t always understand that you need certain hours or that you can’t work full time. There’s also the fact that teenagers don’t always have the best time-management skills, so they don’t always do that well in school. Their grades usually go down at first, but then they start to figure out how to multi-task and then their grades end up going back up. 

I know from personal experience what not getting the correct amount of hours is like and how it can affect everything else in your life, especially when it comes to school. I’m in high school, and I have a job. When I first got my job, I was given an insane amount of hours per week that just wasn’t working out considering the fact that I’m still in school. I was working anywhere from 30 to 40 hours a week, which is way too much for a high school student to be working during school. I asked my manager for less hours because I was falling behind in school, and I ended up getting more hours than I was already working. I ended up asking a manager at the store, who was higher up than the other one, for less hours and explained the situation. I ended up finally getting less hours. When I was working crazy hours, my coworkers kept telling me I was working way too much because they saw me there every single time I was working and asked how long I was working that day. These coworkers were the ones who made me finally realize that working that much, even though I was getting paid a lot, was only hurting me as opposed to helping me. 

In highschool, you should be able to have a job and be able to manage school along with it. The job you have shouldn’t cause more stress, and your priority should be school. If you’re working more than you should be, tell your manager that you need less hours and make sure they know that school is a priority. 

Having a job and going to school won’t help your social life at all. Your friends will ask you to hangout and you’ll check your work schedule and realize that you can’t hangout with them because you have work. At first it’s not fun at all, but then you just have to make an extra effort to figure out when you can hangout with friends. 

Having a job is beneficial, but, when you’re in high school, you have to make sure you have your priorities in the right order. The first thing on that list of priorities should be school and that’s that. If you don’t have good grades, then your gpa will go down, and you might not be able to do everything you wanted to do before you had the job. The most important thing about having a job in high school is to make sure that you graduate and don’t get stuck working there your entire life. Getting stuck in one place your entire life can be draining and irritating. 

Jobs are great and all, but keep your priorities straight and make sure you’re not working more than needed. Even if where you work is understaffed, make sure that you’re not the one who has to work more than wanted. So pretty much, if you have a job, make sure you’re doing well in school and taking care of everything you need to take care of outside of work before you go to work. And most importantly, do everything you can to make sure you never feel like you’re drowning.