How can a Full-Time Student Make Money?

When it comes to the questions, “how can a full-time student make money?” it’s all about time and time management.

As a full-time student, you’re taking 12+ credit hours. This may not seem like much, as 12 hours is only about 7% of your week.

You already know 12 credit hours means far more than 12 hours of time every week. Plus, most full-time college students take 15 or even 18 credit hours.

According to the University of Michigan-Flint, every credit hour equals 2 to 3 hours of additional work outside the classroom.

Your 12 credit hours just turned into 12 classroom hours per week plus an additional 24 to 36 hours of work outside the classroom. Full-time students don’t have a ton of time left to make money, but it’s not impossible.

Breaking Down your 168 hours

We all get 168 hours every single week. How you use these hours will determine your answer to the question, “How can a full-time student make money?”

If you manage your time well, you will have many options available to you when it comes to making money. Let’s look at what you have left after classes, homework, sleep, and a few extras.

For the example below, we will assume you are taking 15 credit hours over 5 total classes you will attend for 3 hours each per week. If you’re taking less or more, just make the necessary adjustments.

In addition, I am using 2 hours of extra work outside the classroom as, in my experience; most students don’t spend 3 hours per credit hour working outside the classroom.

The only students I have ever known to spend three or more hours per credit hour on work outside the classroom were in medical, law, or architecture programs. Of course, you know better than I do about your situation, so make adjustments, as needed.

Here’s the basic break down:

• 15 hours in classrooms
• 5 hours to get to and from class
• 30 hours homework outside classroom
• 49 hours of sleep (assuming 7 hours per night)
• 19 hours of extra-curricular activities
• 15 hours for meals
• 35 hours anything you want

If you plan correctly and use your time wisely, you will easily have 30+ hours to do make money. The key is time management.

How to Manage Your Time as a Full-time Student Trying to Make Money

I am not going to go into great detail, here, but I will give you a few tips that make an enormous difference for me.

Time management is a skill, not a personality trait or something you’re born with. If you can figure that out, you’ll be ahead of those thinking you’re either good at it or not.

Tracking

One of the keys to my success as a blogger and freelance writer is tracking. I track my time so I can see how I am spending it.

I went through Dave Ramsey’s budgeting class called Financial Peace University (I highly recommend it for ALL STUDENTS) and it made a world of difference for me. Yes, I understand money and finances better, but it also taught me how to budget my time, even though that’s not what it was meant for.

This class showed me how to track every dime I spend and I turned it into a time management budget for myself, as well. Tracking every single moment you spend doing anything will give you an accurate picture of where you’re spending your time.

Maybe you’re spending too much time sleeping or watching TV.

You might be the type of person that gets caught up in unnecessary conversations regularly.

It’s possible; you’re spending too much time getting from one place to another.

Tracking your time will show you where it’s going. This is step #1 when it comes to time management as it will show you where you spend your time, which is the key to figuring out how to find time to make money as a full-time student.

Adjusting your Time

After you track your time for a couple of weeks, you can start making adjustments. You might discover you sleep 10+ hours and you really only need 7. (Sleep is another subject and I am not trying to tell you how much sleep you need. Everybody is different.)

You might discover you spend too much time watching TV or with another meaningless task. If you want to make money as a full-time student, you probably cannot afford to waste time on meaningless things.

Tally up your time after tracking for two weeks and make your adjustments. Keep tracking your time and forgive yourself when you have a bad day or slip back into an old habit.

Habits take time to form and can be difficult to break. Be kind to yourself and don’t give up due to a bad day or two.

Read the full post, “How can a Full-Time Student Make Money?” from the original source, BenjaminEhinger.com