When school is out, we all have this idea of a fun-filled summer; however, many of us work during the summer. It's always nice to make a little bit of extra money to put towards books, Qdoba, and any activities you want to do. A little extra money comes in handy when you're feeling down and decide to follow Tom Haverford's advice to "treat yo' self." A summer job isn't just about the money. Even though it never hurts to have some money, a summer job teaches you things you can't learn anywhere else.
A job teaches you the value of the dollar. When you're earning your own money and that's the money you're spending, you're more careful with it. You know you had to work lots of hours to earn that money, do you really want to just blow it or waste it on something you don't need or won't use? If it's your own, hard-earned money, you'll think twice before making an outrageous purchase because you know exactly what you had to do to earn that money.
A job teaches you responsibility. You can't just scrape by or not do your job; you won't get to keep your job. Maybe with your schoolwork, you can put in the bare minimum effort and still get by. Maybe you can skip classes and still do well. However, with a job, you can't just wake up one day and decide you don't want to go and stay in bed watching Netflix instead. You have to be there every day that you're scheduled and do what's expected of you.
A job teaches you time management skills. Whatever you do, you have to prioritize. Without prioritizing, you realize you have so much to get done today, but are too overwhelmed and disorganized to get anything done. At work, you have specific tasks you must do and challenges you must handle each day. If you aren't on top of things, they often get away from you. Before you know it, tasks start to build up, and it's hard to come back from that.
A job teaches you people skills. Whether you work with the general public all day or just a handful of co-workers, you have to be friendly, or at least tolerate people. Even if you can't stand a customer, or have a headache and don't want to be around people, you get yourself together, deal with it, and carry on with your day. A simple smile and "Good morning, how are you?" goes a long way. You don't have to be BFFs with everyone you meet, but you at least need to get along with people at work.
Working is the last thing that we really wanted to do this summer, but when you think about it, it isn't so bad. With enough searching, you can find a summer job that is actually pretty fun, or something related to your major. Whether it's just a job for the summer or you keep working there throughout the school year, you still can learn the same things from it. You may think that your job is insignificant and your contribution doesn't matter, but every job has a purpose and someone is very grateful for all you do.
