College jobs that give real real-life experience
Party On, Wayne
Job: Party/Club Promoter
Experience in the field of: Sales/Marketing
Pay range: $2-$5 per head (club), % of sales (party)
Resume boosters: customer relations, networking, entertainment
promotion, grass roots marketing
If you're a social butterfly whose feet can't stop tapping—and
whose mouth can't stop flapping—promoting may be the college job
for you. Hook up with a local bar or club who'll pay you a bounty
for each live body you corral through the door, and boost your
status (and paycheck) by bringing in hot girls, hot names, and
hot wallets—and your friends, of course, for free. Some
corporations such as Apple are getting into the act and are
giving socially gifted college kids a cut of campus sales to
throw branded parties on campus. And your parents thought your
fraternity/sorority would never help you get ahead in life!
Upside: VIP list
Downside: VIP attitude
Playing Nice
Job: Babysitter/nanny
Experience in the field of: Childcare Management
Pay range: $10-$15/hr
Resume boosters: home management, mediation, domestic skills,
communication facilitation
Don't knock babysitting. Not only is it one of the more
flexible jobs around, but it's good preparation for the demands
of a business environment. If you think that your future
co-workers will necessarily have more mature and reasoned desires
than your five-year-old's insatiable appetite for dry-wall, you
haven't yet entered in the working world.
Upside: Naptime
Downside: Diapers
Sprays of Thunder
Job: Running a Car Detailing Business
Experience in the field of: Entrepreneurship
Pay range: $80-$100/day
Resume boosters: time management, marketing, automotive
maintenance, small business management
Ah, the sun on your back, the titillating scent of...Turtle
Wax? For outdoor and/or car enthusiasts, running your own car
detailing business can be a great college job. You get to be your
own boss, charge your own rates, and work your own hours—all
outdoors. It's a tough job, but if you do it well, referrals can
get you as much work as you could want. How many entry-level job
applicants can say they ran a small business—and got a
sweet tan?
Upside: Ferrari Testarossas
Downside: Ford Tempos
Too Cool for School
Job: Teaching SAT Prep
Experience in the field of: Teaching/Education
Pay range: $15/hr+
Resume boosters: time management, public speaking, teaching,
tutoring, customer relations
Teaching SAT prep can be the ideal college job, depending on
your location. Most classes are in the evenings or on weekends,
and the combination of preparing the curriculum, adapting on the
fly, and assuaging the concerns of anxious parents and students
will give you the confidence you need for any job that follows.
Plus, you'll be set for MCAT, LSAT, GRE, or GMAT prep.
Upside: Perspective on high school
Downside: Chalk
Making the Cut
Job: Selling knives door-to-door for CUTCO
Experience in the field of: Sales/Marketing
Pay range: $25-$250 per sale
Resume boosters: customer relations, asset management, business
management, sales, interviewing, handling rejection
The bright folks at companies like CUTCO Cutlery and Kirby
Vacuums figured out that college students make some of the best
door-to-door salespeople—young, energetic and hungry for cash. It
isn't your grandparents' "Avon lady calling!" door-to-door sales,
either; you set up appointments from referrals, so very few doors
are slammed in your face. Hours at CUTCO are flexible, and
commissions start out at 10% but can grow to 50%—a nice "cut"
from a few hundred dollars worth of knives.
Upside: Bling-bling
Downside: You're still a door-to-door salesman
Professional Potato
Job: Professional Survey-Taker
Experience in the field of: Consumer Research/Marketing
Pay range: $5-75/survey or $50-150/hr in focus groups
Resume boosters: market research, telecommuting, addressing the
needs of the client
If you're completely inert, a lifeless mass with an
intravenous reliance on your couch and television, this is the
college job for you. If you can work up enough energy to actually
have an opinion, companies will pay you to express them, and if
you can actually get yourself out of the house and over to a
focus group, they'll pay you even better there. Don't hurt
yourself.
Upside: Cartoon Network
Downside: Cartoon-like belly
The Old College Try
Job: Soliciting alumni for donations
Experience in the field of: Sales/Marketing
Pay range: $10/hr+, depending on how badly your school needs the
cash
Resume boosters: networking, customer relations, sales, outreach,
educational development
Like your college? Love your college? Or maybe just able to
pretend that you love your college? Most schools hire
current students to spend hours on the phone soliciting alumni
for money. It's work that sucks the soul and fills the wallet; on
many campuses, it's the best-paying student job out there. Look
on the bright side: at least you're not asking them if they're
satisfied with their current long-distance carrier.
Upside: Dear alma mater...
Downside: Do these alms matter?
Troll-ing the Web
Job: Freelance Website Designer
Experience in the field of: Web Design/Development
Pay range: $20-$50/hr
Resume boosters: small business administration, website design,
graphic design, search engine optimization (SEO), HTML, etc.
Many adults still haven't figured out how to turn on their
computers, much less understand HTML. Yet every business large or
small these days needs a professional web site—at a less than
professional price. That's where you come in: you're young,
cavalier, and $20/hr is a sweet deal for you. All it takes is a
computer, a book on HTML, and a little get-up-and-go.
Upside: Logging your own hours
Downside: Carpal tunnel syndrome