Unit 5      

  In a market-driven economy the splendid tradition of student poverty is becoming less fashionable. And as every student is painfully aware, scholarships have a sad tendency not to keep up with the cost of living. As a result, more and more students all over the world are facing the same problem: how to balance work and school. The passages you are going to read in this unit examine not only the down-to-earth realities of finding a job and working your way through school, but also how difficult (and sometimes humorous!) it can be to separate academic theory from the demands of the working world

     Text A

   While preparing to graduate from high school in 1987, Priscilla Vazquez waited anxiously for her letter from the University of Washington, hoping she would be the first person in her family to attend college. When the acceptance letter arrived, she was overjoyed.

   There was just one problem: The University of Washington didn't have any grant money to give Priscilla. It offered her only a small loan and expected her family to come up with the rest. “My family was making enough money to get by, but not enough to pay that much for me to go to school,” she said.   

   Priscilla called the financial-aid office for advice. They told her that prospective students seeking more financial aid are eligible only if they have lived apart from their parents for a minimum of two years. During that time, their parents cannot have claimed them as a dependent on the family's tax forms. “Hearing this, I was totally stunned,” Priscilla recalls. “I realized I was going to have to take some time off, work, become financially independent from my parents, and then reapply to school. Postponing my dream hurt, but it was the only possibility.”

  Within a month, Priscilla had found a job at a restaurant and moved into a cheap apartment in a poor neighborhood of Seattle. She also signed up for a job-training program in the city, to learn to be a secretary. It was a hard lifestyle to adjust to. “I got up at 6 a.m. for a long commute to school, finished class at 2 p.m., started work at three, got off my shift at 11 p.m., and then I came back home and collapsed.”

  Priscilla soon found that her restaurant job just didn't pay enough for her to make ends meet. “So I went to the landlord of my apartment building and asked if there was any cleaning work I could do. Since he felt sorry for me, he agreed to give me thirty hours a month.”

  The job-training program was designed to last six months. Priscilla finished it in four. “They taught me various office skills and word-processing programs. I also learned to answer the phone in an office setting, and write proper business letters,” she said. The program helped Priscilla find employment as a secretary with a small company. “It was my first decent job,” she says. “I was nineteen years old, living on my own, and making $15,000 a year.”

  Priscilla reapplied to the University of Washington and was accepted. She qualified for financial aid because she had been independent from her parents for more than two years. As of the fall of 1990, Priscilla was finally a college student ---- working full-time during the day as a secretary and going to school full-time at night.

    Balancing work and school was difficult. “I was staying up late studying, and going to work early every morning. I was having a hard time concentrating in class, and a hard time on the job because I was so tired,” she says. But she ended up with two A's in her first semester anyway.

   Priscilla decided to pursue an archaeology major, and in the summer of 1992, she got her first opportunity to really test out her interest in the subject. The archaeological field school of Washington State University was sponsoring a summer research project at a site alongside the Snake River in Washington. Priscilla threw herself into the work, and the project supervisors were impressed. At the end of the summer, one of the professors offered her a job. “He said, ‘we just got a contract for a project in North Dakota. We want to hire you if you're willing to take a semester off from school.'” The offer was a diversion from Priscilla's pursuit of her BA. “But by then I no longer doubted that I would ultimately finish school, so I felt comfortable grabbing this opportunity,” she says.

  When the North Dakota project ended, Priscilla moved to California, where she could live rent-free with one of her brothers. “I ended up working three jobs, trying to make as much money as I could,” she recalls. “I was tired of working full-time and being a full-time student. My goal was to save enough money to let me go back to school, study full-time and work only part-time.” Priscilla's brother ran a house-cleaning service, and he agreed to give her work. And she decided to enroll at a local community college where the tuition was much cheaper.

  Priscilla took some art classes (she was an amateur photographer) and helped organize a gallery exhibit of students' artwork, including her own. In the spring of 1994, she graduated from Wenatchee Valley College with a two-year Associate of Arts degree. After graduating, Priscilla applied to the University of Washington once more. She was accepted and enrolled in the fall of 1994. Not having to work so many hours allowed her to make school her priority. “This was such a luxury, I was almost sorry to graduate!” Priscilla laughs. “But I was awarded my BA in January of 1996.”

  As Priscilla looks back on her years of struggle to make her dream come true, she is cautiously encouraging toward others working their way through school. “To balance work and school, you have to know yourself,” she says. “You have to know what you can take and what you can't take. You need a lot of discipline, and you have to stay focused, even when you run into barriers and distractions and delays. But mostly you need determination. If you get put down once, just get back up there and keep fighting.”

   1987年，普丽西拉·瓦日奎兹一边为高中毕业作准备，一边急切地等待着华盛顿大学的录取通知书，希望自己成为家中读大学的第一人。当录取通知书送来时，她欣喜若狂。

   只有一个问题：华盛顿大学没有为普丽西拉提供助学金。它只为她提供了一笔数目不大的贷款，并要求她的家庭负担其余的费用。“我家挣的钱刚够全家生活，但要花那么多钱供我上学却还不够，”她说。

   普丽西拉打电话向经济资助办公室咨询。他们告诉她说，未来的大学生要寻求更多的经济资助，必须与父母分开生活至少两年才符合条件。在这期间，他们的父母不能在家庭税单上称他们为被赡养人。“听到这话，我完全惊呆了，”普丽西拉回忆道，“我意识到我必须抽出一些时间去工作，在经济上不依靠父母，然后重新申请入学。推迟实现我的梦想令人伤心，但这是唯一的选择。”

   不到一个月，普丽西拉就在一家餐馆找到了一份工作，并搬到了西雅图贫民区一套低廉的公寓房去住。她还报名参加了城里的一个职业培训班，学的是秘书专业。那是一种很难适应的生活方式。“我早上6点起床，坐很长时间的公交车去学校，下午2点下课，3点开始工作， 晚上11点下班，然后回到家就累垮了。”

   普丽西拉不久就发现她在餐馆的那份工作的收入还不够她维持生计。“于是我找到我那幢公寓楼的楼主，问有没有什么清洁工作可以让我做。他因为同情我，便同意让我每月工作30个小时。”职业培训班按计划要历时6个月。但普丽西拉只用了４个月就读完了。“他们教我各种办公技能和文字处理程序。我还学会了如何在办公室环境里接电话，以及如何撰写得体的商业函件，”她说。培训班帮普丽西拉在一家小公司找到了一份秘书工作。“这是我第一份像样的工作，”她说。“我那时19岁，独立生活，每年挣15000美元。”

   普丽西拉重新向华盛顿大学提出入学申请并被录取了。因为她在经济上不依赖于父母已超过了两年，所以她还有资格申请经济资助。自1990年秋季开始，普丽西拉终于成为一名大学生----她白天做全日制秘书，晚上做全日制学生。

     要做到工作学习两不误很困难。“我要一直熬夜学习，每天一大早又要去上班。我上课时很难集中思想，上班时也很难受，因为我实在太累了，”她说。不过她第一学期最后还是得了两个A。

   普丽西拉决定攻读考古专业， 并在1992年夏天获得了检验自己对这一学科兴趣的第一个机会。华盛顿州立大学的野外考古中心正在发起一个夏季研究项目，发掘位于华盛顿州斯内克河边的一个遗址。普丽西拉全力投入这项工作，给项目管理人留下了深刻印象。 夏季结束时， 有一个教授给她提供了一份工作。“他说，‘我们刚拿到北达科他州一个项目的合同。 如果你愿意休学一个学期，我们就聘用你。’”这份工作偏离了普丽西拉要获得学士学位的追求。“但那时我已不再怀疑我最终会完成学业，所以很坦然地抓住了这次机 会，”她说。

   在北达科他项目结束后，普丽西拉搬到加利福尼亚州与她的一个哥哥同住，这样可以不付房租。“我最后干了三份工作，想尽量多挣些钱，”她回忆说。“我厌烦了既做全职工作又做专职学生的生活。我的目标是要攒够钱，重新回到大学里，做一名全日制学生，只兼职做一些工作。”普丽西拉的哥哥开了一家房屋清洁公司，他同意让她到公司工作。她还决定到一所当地的社区学院读书，那儿的学费要便宜得多。

   普丽西拉选修了一些艺术课程(她是一名业余摄影师)，并帮助组织了一次学生艺术作品展，包括她自己的作品。1994年春，她从韦纳奇河谷学院毕业，获得了两年制的文科准学士学位。毕业后，普丽西拉又一次向华盛顿大学提出了入学申请。她被录取并于1994年秋季入学。因为她不必工作那么多小时，所以能够以学为主。“这真是一种奢侈，我几乎都不想毕业了!”普丽西拉笑着说。“不过我还是在1996年1月被授予了文学士学位。”

   当普丽西拉回顾自己几年来使自己梦想成真的奋斗历程时，她对其他靠打工挣钱完成学业的人既是鼓励又是提醒。“要平衡工作与学习的关系，你必须了解自己，”她说。“你必须知道哪些自己能承受，哪些不能承受。你需要很多的磨练，而且必须专心致志，持之以恒，即使遇到重重障碍、种种困惑也要如此。但你最需要的是坚定的决心。一旦被击倒，就要重新站起来继续奋斗下去。”