Working one's way through college and university; a guide to paths and opportunities to earn an education at American colleges and universities

Front matter

Copyright]^?.

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WORKING ONE'S WAY THROUGH COLLEGE AND UNIVERSITY

Foreword

THE aim of this book is to speak informingly and sympathetically to the many thousands of young men and young women, boys and girls, whose heart's desire is to gain college and university training, but who do not see their way to that goal. Thousands wish for such education but are scarcely aware that it can be attained by their own efforts, or that it has been done and is being done by many who have no financial backing. To such students I trust these pages may afford light.

February 7, 1912.

C. D. W.

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Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I The Outlook . 13

II Is It Possible to Support Oneself

Chapter I The Outlook

Ten thousand capable boys and girls graduate each year from our High Schools and Academies, who, though in character and ability entitled to every advantage of higher education, are compelled by lack of funds to forego a college course. This is not only a loss to them as individuals but a distinct loss to the country in the lessened opportunities and diminished efficiency of some of its most promising young citizens. When we consider the vast sums donated each year to our colleges and universities, — amounting in 1907 to $17,716,605, — and when we consider further the sums squandered in sending to college unappreciative sons and daughters of the wealthier class, the failure of these ten thousand young men and women seems like a national calamity. It is a national calamity. — Dr. Edward J. Wheeler.

THE colleges are open to energy and talents. They are not close corporations welcoming only well-lined pockets. Their sesame is not a bank account. Their doors swing wide for brains, courage, and character to enter. Such youths as have financial backing have neither a patent on, nor a monopoly of, educational opportunities. There are no warders at the gates to shut out any or to ask about their property or heraldry. The colleges have been established and builded up with democratic aims, with intent to include in their hospitality all alike. To-day, more than ever before, one of the chief symbols of the college student's life might be a youth with a book in his right hand, while his left hand grasps a tool with which to work his way.

It is encouraging to note how numerous and how widespread are the higher educational institutions in our land, among which one may choose. One does not have to leave his State, scarcely his own neighborhood, in the search. There are five hundred and seventy-three recognized colleges of all kinds. These include one hundred and forty-three for men only, three hundred and twenty-one for both sexes, and one hundred and nine for women only. In addition there are very many private schools, preparatory schools, academies proper, and privately managed military schools, of high grade; these in general are not endowed and do not grant degrees, and so are not included in the first list; but nevertheless they provide training for intellect and character, and they serve as steps toward the higher institutions. In a large proportion of those that have been referred to there are more or less favorable opportunities for earning education, in whole or in part by one's own efforts.

It is encouraging to consider the hosts of young people now in the colleges, academic and professional, and to remember that a large percentage of both men and women among these students are winning their own way. There are more than one hundred and fifty thousand of these students. This number does not include those in the lesser schools above the public High Schools, though all these may be kept in mind as possibilities on the upward path of education. Of the students, more than one hundred and six thousand are men. The women's colleges are divided into grades A and B; of the A grade there are just sixteen. There are more than forty-three thousand women and girl students in the A grade and in the co-educational colleges, while there are many women in still other colleges.

But far greater than the hosts now in the colleges are the numbers of young people in the land who aspire to rise through like training to the ranks of the educated. Many of these are now

Working One's Way Through rv

girding themselves for the struggle toward t* end by their own efforts. Multitudes more are ready to have smouldering ambitions fired by knowledge that their dreams can become realities.

Many others have never heard that educations earned by the students are actualities, never met and talked with a man or a woman who has fought this battle to successful issue, never learned that a College Employment Bureau exists. Many others have but vague notions that a few here and there, in unknown ways and by special good fortune, have found it possible to win education by personal effort; but these rumors have been without detail, mere floating hearsay, and so have made no definite impression as having a bearing upon their own future.

In shops and stores, on farms, in out-of-the-way districts, are hundreds of thousands of young people, vigorous, aspiring, courageous, talented, to whom information as to the possibility of their college education may come as good news from a far country. Still others are aware, in a limited way, of the opportunities, and are beginning to fumble for a start, but have no general survey of the field.

Unto you, O young men and young women, we write. We aim to bring to your hosts light, that jrtyng One's Way Through College a. ..way may be opened, that you may gain . courage, take stock of yourselves, formulate plans,

and begin and carry on to the end the battle for

earning your own education.

We do not intend to depict the pathway to which

you are invited as one of roses, and so allure with

vain hopes the vacillating and the lovers of ease.

But we hope to help those whose ambitions are gPQ^erful enough to carry them past obstacles and

difficulties, and to make these seem as little things

compared with the goal to be won.

Chapter II Is It Possible To Support Oneself And Gain A College Education?

The experience of many students shows that if a man has health, energy, cheerfulness, a good preparation for college work, he need not hesitate to enter. — Charles W. Eliot, ex-President of Harvard.

THESE vital questions are upon many earnest youthful lips : " Can I by work and thrift earn my support and gain a college education? Can I select a college, enter it as a student, sit at the feet of its teachers, be a part of the student life, gain intellectual discipline and knowledge, and at the same time pay my way by extra efforts? Can I do this and preserve health, get the good of school life, keep self-respect and standing among my comrades? Is there anything I must lose in this way? Is there anything I may gain beyond those whose expenses are provided by others ? "

It is a cheerful fact that the youth of to-day who asks such questions can be answered optimistically. The replies are based not on theory but on experience. In many hundreds of instances young people have earned their own way to education. It is being done by many at this hour. If one has health, pluck, determination, adaptability, one can do the same.

These questions find suggestive reply in the fact that a very considerable proportion of the colleges have within themselves organizations for the finding of remunerative work for students, and for assisting them to adapt themselves to suitable employments while at school. These are known as Employment Bureaus or Self-Help Committees. In still other institutions this aid is in the hands of the local Young Men's and Young Women's Christian Associations, and these undertake and carry on successfully this service.

These Bureaus and Committees are carefully organized and operate systematically, keeping in touch with employers of labor of various kinds in their cities or towns, having lists of student applicants for work, either special or general, and in multitudes of instances bring employers and employees together. .

More than this, after the students get under way, they grow in initiative, seek jobs, put to varied uses such experience and skill as they possess, and find and make ways to earn expenses. The youth of to-day who aspires in this direction is not a pioneer, though he may often need to be his own pathfinder as to special ways and means. He may start with the assurance of the practicability of his undertaking, backed by the experience of many. He can hearten himself by the knowledge that grit and skill have accomplished the same, and he can cry out to himself, " What man has done, man can do again."

We may also turn directly to the colleges and ask them our questions and find their replies encouraging, though wisely qualified by reference to the personal equation, which must enter into success or failure in this as in any undertaking. The Secretary of Harvard states :

" Whether one will be successful or not depends chiefly on his own ability and energy. . . . It is possible to work one's way through Harvard, for there are always self-supporting students in college; and the experience of many students shows that if a man has health, energy, cheerfulness, a good preparation for college, and enough money for the necessary expenses of the first year, the chances are he will never turn back. The ways of self-support at Harvard are as various as the men using them, and in the main every man must find his own way."

Yale has a Bureau of Appointments with the object of assisting needy students and developing in every way their opportunities for self-help. This Bureau requests all who have work which students can do to let it be known at the office. It issues a small pamphlet on " Self -Help at Yale," and in reply to the question " Can it be done? " it says : " A sufficient answer is that for several years an average of about twenty-five men in each class of the Academical Department and perhaps as many more in the rest of the University, in all say about two hundred men, have been paying their own way entirely, and about four hundred more have been earning more or less of their own expenses."

Yale, in 1908, asked by circular of the students who were earning their way wholly or in part at that institution, how much money or its equivalent they had made, and in what kinds of work. Five hundred and sixty- four replies were received ; the whole amount actually earned, in term-time and in vacation, was about $214,449. The Graduate School men earned the largest amount, and the Academical School the next. The Sheffield Scientific Seniors came next, followed in order by the Academical Freshmen and the Sheffield Scientific Freshmen. The men longest on the ground, who have proved themselves capable and reliable, get more of the remunerative work.

Columbia has a Committee on Employment for Students. The total earnings for 1907-1908, both with and without the Committee's assistance, were $95,855. The business depression led to a decrease in student incomes to a certain extent. In 1908, there were three hundred and eightyeight requests from employers. There was a total of 722 students registered; they applied in many cases for a particular kind of work.

At Cornell there are many who support themselves in whole or in part by outside labor. Cornell does not undertake to secure employment for its students, owing to their large numbers, so that in finding jobs the individual is obliged to depend largely upon his own efforts. But the University Christian Association, through its Students' Employment Bureau, is always ready to serve such as are in search of work. The Association during the University year ending June, 1909, had helped about two hundred and fifty students to work, aggregating in value nearly fourteen thousand dollars.

The situation of the University of Chicago affords opportunity for the employment of many of its students. There both men and women are able to earn a part of their expenses, if they have energy and ability. The University has an Employment Agency associated with its Bureau of Information, conducted without charge. This Bureau keeps a register of students seeking work, and a list of positions. By letters addressed to employers stating the opportunity which the Bureau affords them to obtain capable help, and by personal interviews and applications, the Manager of the Bureau seeks to maintain and increase the number of positions which are open to University pupils.

Many students at Armour Institute of Technology are paying their way by doing various kinds of work such as may be found in a city like Chicago. At Dartmouth, five or six hundred pupils make part of their college money during term-time, and a few hundreds more earn money during the vacations. At Drake University, an enterprising student can make his own way. Baker University, Baldwin, Kansas, is the scene of successful efforts on the part of many students who aid themselves materially by their labor while carrying on their studies. The people of the city of Baldwin have done much in the way of providing work for students ; in fact, during the past several years there have been at certain seasons more calls for workers than the committee could supply. An Employment Bureau is maintained by the Young Men's and Young Women's Christian Associations.

The College of Liberal Arts of Northwestern University issues an encouraging pamphlet on this very subject. It gives lists of jobs, — Regular Employment, Positions Requiring Experienced Men, and Odd Jobs. " No student can be guaranteed employment. Nevertheless, the experience of many men at Northwestern justifies the assertion that no industrious young man, equipped with health and energy, need hesitate to make his own way." Evanston Academy of Northwestern University has a Committee on Employment. The College Young Men's Christian Association also is of great assistance. From the first days of the Academy till now many of its students have earned a part or all of their expenses, so that the spirit of the school has taken a characteristic color. The Registrar of Leland Stanford Jr. University says : " Quite a number of students here are almost entirely self-supporting."

These are but glimpses of the situation which, while not universal, is general at the higher institutions of learning in America to-day. These are cited now that we may at the beginning base ourselves firmly on the fact that from Ocean to Ocean and from Lakes to Gulf are numerous colleges in which young men and young women are making their way in whole or in part by their own efforts. Never before in the history of education have so many students been able to do this as to-day. Never before have the opportunities to this end been so numerous and the conditions so favorable. Never before have there existed so many well organized committees and methods within the schools for aiding the pupils to help themselves.

It may be well at this point to indicate that favorable conditions exist for Indians and for colored people as well, for all without regard to race or creed. In some of the greatest universities there is no color line, so that what is said in regard to opportunities in these applies to all alike. While other colleges do draw the color line, there are special schools for colored people and for Indians. It is therefore possible for members of all races that live in this land to make their way to education in some good schools.

Chapter III Ways In Which Young Men Earn Money While In College

No ambitious young man need go without a college training if he is determined to have it. A longer period may be required for the course; pleasant aspects of college life may have to be given up; self-denial and toil must be constant. But if there is willingness there need be no hindrance. — S. B. McCormick, Western University of Pennsylvania.

THERE seems to be a general impression that the possibilities of making money while at school are confined to a few employments. The students who wait on table at summer resorts have been exploited as representative of college labor, whereas in fact the jobs and occupations of the students, both men and women, have a very wide range. It may be said indeed that whatever talent or skill a young man or young woman has, whatever has been learned of work of hand or brain, may be made to come into play as helping toward paying school expenses, either during term-time or vacations.

There is, so far as I am informed, but one line which the student himself draws against any kind of employment, and that is the duties of a valet. He refuses to serve the person of another in such duties as may be properly included under the term valet. Many, both men and women, however, act as nurses, companions to invalids, readers for the aged, but these, of course, differ from the valet's kind of service.

The farm lad, the clerk, the apprentice to a trade, the factory worker, the youth at almost any kind of labor, may be pleased to learn that the very things he knows how to do are the ones for which place may often be found at a college or in its vicinity. There is nothing he knows about planting and harvesting, care of animals or gardens, food production and distribution, building or tearing down, handling of machinery small or great, but may be made to serve his turn. The girl who can sew and mend, make candies or knit, who is a judge of knickknacks, who knows foods, can turn the knowledge to account. Some things are better than others ; some are less exhausting; but tutoring, waiting on table, or managing eating-clubs are only a few of the ways of helping to swell college pocket-books. One may quickly come to appreciate that certain of the duties he may have been forced against his pleasure to do at home, and which promised the least outlook, may be his best aids toward support at college.

Whatever one knows may serve him in his course. I knew an Italian, skilled in several languages, who while at school in Pittsburgh gave private lessons to a number of young ladies. He was recommended as a teacher by one of the professors, who had a large social acquaintance and who thus obtained for him engagements with daughters of several rich men, who paid him well. He also lectured in small churches and halls in the vicinity, accepting whatever sums were contributed in the collections. He often returned to school with a heavy package of what he called " chicken feed," mostly pennies, nickels, and dimes, that, however, helped considerably toward his self-support. He also understood telegraphy and occasionally undertook this kind of work for brief terms.

I knew well four young men who were at Princeton together. Two were sons of a minister, and were cousins of the others. The oldest of the group, one of the minister's sons, was a large, powerful, fine-looking youth. His father paid his railway fare to Princeton and gave him a little other help at the start. He speedily got on his feet there, coached in athletics, tutored, and did odd jobs besides. As soon as he felt confident he could manage the situation he sent for his brother and cousins. His brother, a smaller man but strong and active, became an expert in indoor athletics. One of the group became a crack short-distance runner, and the fourth the leading pole vaulter at that time in the school. Between athletics, tutoring, managing dining-clubs and occasional other occupations, the four men easily paid their way. All stood well as students. Two were sent to Athens to the first Olympic games some years ago. Three were distinctly among the most popular men at Princeton at the time. These were, to be sure, particularly fortunate in their personalities ; two were giants ; a third was a greyhound, graceful and handsome. They had no difficulty in making their way, and, being personally popular and abundantly strong for double work, took it all as a pleasant diversion rather than a disagreeable struggle.

A few years ago a group of three youths, whose homes were in Ohio, were studying at Ann Arbor, and in the summer vacation went together through parts of Michigan selling in country places stereopticons and views. We gathered from reports that they were in high spirits during that time, enjoyed the tramping, the sleeping out, the scenery, and the people, and were exceedingly successful in selling their wares. Their earnings during the season were so considerable that they had to make but little further effort during the following year at school.

To fulfil the intentions of this book, it will be essential to give the prospective college man and woman numerous indications of the actual lines of endeavor which have been discovered and utilized by many who have already fought the battle for self-earned education. These lists of jobs will open vistas for others by presenting concrete instances of their own possibilities. While Homer was unable to make a catalogue of ships which readers would be unwilling to skip, we cannot at this point do more than record outlines of work which the searcher after ways and means of self-help may glance over, and then return to from time to time for guidance and suggestion. The names of the Grecian ships are of no moment to us, but the particular ways by which college finances are strengthened may be of vital importance.

It may suggest itself to the reader that one needs to have acquaintances and friends at a given school in order to win his way. But while this may be a means of simplifying a situation, it is by no means essential. One student at Harvard, whose home was distant, and who had no friends in Cambridge or Boston from whom to expect assistance, earned in three years and a half eight hundred and seventy-five dollars by clerical work and tutoring, besides winning scholarships.

Another distributed literature, washed windows, tended furnaces, beat rugs and carpets, shovelled snow, shifted scenes, until he became a university guide and had, in addition, the care of a library during certain hours.

Two others, a few months after they entered, found employment as janitors of the Old South Meeting House, Boston. They worked together about two hours every morning, getting the building ready to open. In addition to the janitor work, one of them had to be in the building from 2 :30 p. m. every day to 9 :30 a. m. the next. They had a well furnished room in the building. Their income from this was sufficient to meet necessary expenses.

Harvard affords many temporary jobs. These are duplicated to some extent in some other institutions, and the list may serve to indicate the varied avenues of employment.

Some find openings as

Advertising agents

Gymnasts

Athletic coaches

Hotel helpers

Attendants

House painters

Bell boys at clubs

Janitors

Boatmen

Laboratory assistants

Bookkeepers

Lecturers

Canvassers

34,.

Legal assistants

Caretakers

Letterers

Carpenters

Library workers

Chair-movers

Literary workers

Chauffeurs

Messengers

Chemists

Metre readers

Clerks

Monitors

Collectors

Museum workers

Companions

Musicians and mu-

Computers sical directors

Councillors in sum-

Directors

Night-school teachers

Draughtsmen

Outing-class teach-

Elevator men ers

Engineers

Physicians

Farmers on outskirts

Playground keepers of city

Printers

Furnace men

Proctors

Gardeners

Proof-readers

General men on sum-

Railroad employees mer places

Readers

Guards

Scene-shifters

Guides

Secretaries

55. Snow shovellers 62. Surveyors

56. Solicitors 63. Ticket-takers

57. Statisticians 64. Time-keepers

58. Stenographers 65. Tutors

59. Summer-school 66. Typists

teachers 67. Ushers

60. Sunday-school teach- 68. Watch repairers

ers 69. Watchmen

61. Supervisors .ofi 70. Weighers

studies

One man at Harvard earned during term-time in four years $1,331 : by clerking $50 ; insurance soliciting one term $200; insurance soliciting the following term $350 ; singing in chapel $50 ; gas insurance $150 ; teaching Sunday school one season $68 ; Sunday school another season $88 ; teaching evening school $100 ; tutoring $275. During a single vacation one earned $225 above expenses.

The employments at Yale that yield returns to students are given here in the order of the number employed and the proportion of rewards. These are:

1. Teaching 5. Serving as dining-

2. Private tutoring hall " checkers "

3. Service of eating- 6. Clerical work

clubs 7. Canvassing

4. Management of eat- 8. Editorial and news-

ing-clubs paper work

9. Caring for furnaces 11. Street railway work and lawns 12. Music

10. Typewriting and stenography

Under miscellaneous jobs at Yale, we note only such as differ from the Harvard list, many being of the same kinds. Additional to these are:

1. Civil engineering 14. Employment in lum-

3. Work in boys' clubs 15. Service as Pullman

4. Surveying conductor

5. Mason work 16. Sleight of hand en-

6. Selling violets tertainments

7. College guides 17. Collecting geological

8. Operating stereopti- specimens

9. Meat-cutting as advertisements

10. Fencing instruction 19. Wheeling invalid

11. Publishing pro- chairs

grammes 20. Addressing envelopes

12. Interpreting 21. Selling spring water

tory

At Columbia, many have been occupied in tutoring, and the range of subjects is large. This pays from $1 to $3 per hour. The position of summer companion earns $50 to $125 per month. Summer hotel clerks have been paid from $25 to $40 a month. Summer bank clerks received from

$25 to $50 per month. Boys' club managers were paid $250 for the college year. Statistical work is paid $2 a day. Summer farm work earns $25 a month and expenses.

Draughtsmen obtained from $30 to $50 a month. A proctor for examinations got $2 to $5 a day. A bookkeeper was paid from $10 to $15 a week. A watcher at the polls earned $5 and canvassers from $2 to $15 per day. The average earnings per student were in term-time about $200, and in vacations $175.

The most usual work to which students at Cornell resort is waiting on table. Owing to absence of dormitories for the men students there, a large number of boarding-houses have sprung up in the vicinity of the campus, and in practically all of these student waiters are employed. So numerous are such positions that it is seldom, if ever, that an energetic young man who is really able and willing to work cannot find an opening of this kind. The time required for such occupation is on an average about three and a half hours per day* and the usual compensation is one's board; but in rare cases individuals have been known to get their room rent as well.

Another means of self-support there is tending furnaces for professors and townspeople; the compensation is generally one's room, or if paid in cash five or six dollars per month, according to the amount of labor involved. Considerable tutoring also, at seventy-five cents or more per hour, especially in such subjects as mathematics and physics, is to be had at certain seasons of the year by members of the upper classes who have distinguished themselves in scholarship ; and occasionally such students, in their senior years, are appointed to assistantships in the various laboratories with appropriate compensations. A few students are able to earn their way by corresponding for out-of-town papers or by reporting for the local press.

Among other kinds of work resorted to at Cornell may be mentioned:

1. Copying or office 5. Reading proof on the

work for profes- University or local

sors papers

2. Copying in the li- 6. Collecting bills

brary 7. Running laundry

3. Arranging collections agencies

in the museums 8. Farm labor on the

4. Typewriting theses University farm

In the University of Chicago, the jobs that are additional to those already spoken of are :

1. Working for express 2. Work in railway stacompanies tions

3. Carrying newspapers 9. Operating soda foun-

4. Canvassing for City tains

Directory 10. Posting advertise-

5. Canvassing for City ments

6. Operating night tel- books

ephone switch- 13. Pen copying- work board 14. Decorating halls for

7. Night clerking in entertainments

hotels 15. Assisting photogra-

8. Packing books and phers

furniture

Persons with special training in certain lines are generally said to have advantages over others in self-help at school, but experience at the University of Chicago has proved that students of ability and perseverance may succeed even without initial skill in any one line.

In order to guard against incompetent tutoring, the Board of Recommendations keeps on file a list of official tutors who have been indorsed by the heads of departments in which they offer instruction. Those who desire pupils should register with the board.

The University Service employs many students for a limited number of hours as clerks or messengers in the various offices in the institution, paying from twenty to thirty cents per hour, compensating them with a voucher covering the whole or part of their tuition. Members of the University Choir are granted remissions of tuition to the amount of $1,200, each person receiving a portion or all of his tuition fees, according to his ability. Members of the University Band receive help in a similar way, the appropriation for tuition for members amounting to more than $2,500. Another source of income is waiting on table in the Men's Commons, the compensation being furnished in board.

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Chapter IV More Ways For Young Men To Earn At College

I advise every one who can possibly devote his time to a college course to do so. If he must work in order to get money, I agree that he should, because it is a good thing to get a college education even if one does not get out of it all the possibilities. — Thomas Arkle Clark, University of Illinois.