Though lines of students weren’t spilling out the doors of Vance Hall this year, more students received work-study awards than in recent years.
Work-study jobs awarded increased by an estimated 10 percent from last year, with 5,500 students receiving the option for this kind of financial aid, associate provost and director of student aid Shirley Ort said.
Of those students, 2,100 accepted and found jobs, Ort said.
Last year’s long lines of students hoping to receive work-study jobs compelled the Office of Scholarships and Student Aid to create a more efficient application process.
“To us, those long lines signaled greater interest from the students and also concern about the availability of jobs and getting them quickly,” Ort said.
The new automated work-study process emails job assignment forms to students, who take the forms directly to supervisors.
“This has improved the logistics and is easier for both the students and the supervisors,” Ort said. “It has also helped us provide better service.”
Victoria Kennedy, a sophomore transfer student from New York, said finding work-study jobs was easy with the new process.
“Once you have that resume and cover letter down, it’s just a matter of sending emails, which makes it really simple,” Kennedy said.
In the past, students who were awarded funds went to the Office of Scholarships and Student Aid to pick up job referrals for different offices.
