Dive Brief:
- A new study from the Community College Research Center at Columbia University’s Teacher College has found a mix of benefits of the federal work study program, but evidence that the federal aid disproportionately flows to private schools.
- Work-study students have higher retention and post-graduation job placement rates than their peers, and they likely benefit from the less demanding campus work more commonly funded by the program.
- A surprise finding was that work-study students generally have more debt than their peers with similar characteristics, perhaps because colleges package work-study with other student loans.
Dive Insight:
The federal work study program provides an important source of income to many college students. The Columbia study found that students average 11 hours of work per week, and the jobs are mostly on campus, giving students more time to focus on their schoolwork than students who took outside jobs, averaged 18 hours per week, and generally had to commute for their shifts. About 25% of students enrolled in private four-year colleges in 2012 got work-study as part of their financial aid deals. That’s compared to 6% of students in four-year publics. Perhaps a retention strategy for certain schools should be advocating for a change in the federal funding formula.