As roommates and friends gather in a nearby room in my apartment on a Saturday night to hang before Fringe Festival events, I am overcome with that all too familiar feeling of the endless amounts of time studying that one can spend as a student. We took a Finance midterm today from 1pm to 4pm and as soon as I got home, I cracked open the laptop to work on a paper due for Management Communication by 5:00pm on Sunday (yes, SUNDAY).
I remember upon entering the workforce how nice it felt to switch to the infamous 9-to-5 schedule. Sure, waking up early was an adjustment from college, but in my experience, more often than not, the workday ended at 5pm. When I left the office, I ideally wasn’t thinking about work until 9am the next day – how refreshing! Now, back in the academic world, we often start class at 8:30, study during the day, have another class, and then hit the books preparing for the next day. As our Finance Professor, Bill Reese, says, “You should be spending four hours studying outside of the classroom for every hour that you spend in the classroom.” By Professor Reese’s estimate, we should spend 64 hours a week studying for our 16 hours a week in the classroom schedule. Grand Total = 80 hours a week! At first this number seemed preposterous, but in reality, I’ve found it to be quite accurate.
While I work on a paper on a Saturday night in New Orleans, this situation seems like a pretty raw deal – but really when you think about it: our “job” for the next two years is to learn for 80 hours a week. Not too shabby…
-Sarah, sgaddis@tulane.edu