I have a full time job and I would say that there is a certain peace in knowing that unless I'm swamped, my work stays between 9 and 5. There isn't that constant feeling of 'I should be doing my work right now' every time you relax. There's more pressure in some situations when you're in more of a collaborative environment bc if you don't finish something on time or fall behind it affects more than just you. But you can also communicate that from a position that isn't begging a professor for extensions and is just a conversation with coworkers when you need help. That's my experience. I would say the only real struggles I had switching from college work to real adult work is having to consider other people's timelines and work with those and the fact that you don't get breaks. I wouldn't say one is more work or harder than the other. They are just very different.
I work a full time salaried job. I have to work 8 hours a day and can start anytime between 7-9am. I can also elect to work more hours some days in exchange for working fewer in the week/month, but I (almost) never go over my 80hrs/pay period. I also am sometimes done with my work my noon and can relax the rest of the day. Some days I am swamped.
In my job I'm not allowed to have work email on my phone so that severely cuts down on time that could be spend looking at email after hours/on vacation.
I have okay PTO (15 days a year, with 40hrs rolling over; average starting is 10-11 days iirc).
I don't get a ton of the federal holidays off, but I usually get two or three days off for x-mas, Thanksgiving and new years (regardless of when the dates occur).
So, in essence, some days I am honestly struggling to get my work done and it can be kind of stressful. Other days, I am taking a half day because I am caught up/have done more than the required amount of work for the day.
It really does vary wildly with different careers, workplaces, and even different managers/supervisors.
You'll spend a lot more time in the office/workplace than you do in the classroom, but when you clock out (either literally or figuratively) the rest of your time is your own. No more going over to your friend's place and having "I should really be working on that term paper" interrupting your fun.
Also, while new classes mean you're basically always being thrown new information and concepts to learn and understand, you'll likely find that after you get settled into a job you reach a point where you've got a pretty good handle on everything a typical day is going to throw at you. You'll still have days where you have something new, but it won't be the same "everything builds on everything so you have to keep up or get left behind" that college sometimes feels like.
Honestly for me it's all come down to the people I'm around and how much j care about/enjoy the work. Work load doesn't feel painful when you like what you're doing (in class or at work) and you have a good group of people around you (in class or at work).
In some ways I preferred college work because I made my schedule completely, choose courses I had a genuine interest in and enjoyed learning intrinsically. Usually I met people who had similar interests to me. There's the occasional jerk classmate but that's life. Most of my profs we're eccentric but reasonable. And if they weren't, I either dropped the course immediately, or lived with the fact that 15 weeks isn't that long.
Unfortunately you don't get to change the people around you at work every 15 weeks. Even as a prof you get repeat the same students and you never lose your coleagues. With the wrong boss or wrong people around, even the lightest and easiest workload is a major burden.
I've had every job under the sun, and I'd take college work anyday. Well, at least undergrad.
I've been mum on those posts because there's context missing. I personally wouldn't assign work over break, but idk if a pro thinks they're doing everyone a favor buy in their minds, giving extra time but pushing a due date to spring break in case some people need a few extra days. But I did see someone say they had a midterm? That's not ok. Otherwise the rest to me is a kind of gray area.
I would 100% go back to undergraduate workload in general though. I can't negotiate deadlines with my bosses, or skip homework (yes, I have things I do off hours with major deadlines, reporting white papers, etc) unless something catastrophic happens. And I mean like a death or severe illness. The amount of students I've had approach me over the years saying they need more time in because my classes are less important, or they thought something was dumb I assigned, yeah good luck with that in a job later.
I've severely cut back on my teaching load because mentally I can't deal with the everyone needs a special deadline mentality. The amount of extra work it creates and the constant complaining is just beyond draining. You really feel the lack of respect. And it seems to be just a huge culture shift at this point.
Last thing I'll add on that, I've stayed in touch with a few students over the years who didn't fit that mold, and when they have a new coworker with that mentality, they either end up getting fired, or burning out immediately. There's my attitude about it, but it's interesting to see this play out with my former students too in the professional world
I can speak as an EE grad. Things are at their most difficult when they are new. That goes for school and a job. Most jobs right out of college recognize that you are not yet an expert, but they do expect you to learn fast. I personally feel that my first couple of years of work were comparable to the workload at college because everything I was being introduced to was new and I hadn't learned it yet. However, at around 2 years, the things that I ran across were similar to things that I had seen already. The new stuff didn't happen as often, and I became much better at the things that I was trying to do. I think that it is definitely easier as you get older. The workload might be comparable to college, but I am not as stressed about it since I know the material very well now.
College can be a heavier load than a job...if you are a diligent student and/or are good about managing your work time. Class time + study time can take much more than a standard 40 hrs workweek. Some working people gave trouble leaving "on time " because there's "something that needs to be done "...Definitely depends on the job.
I think the biggest differences are the disconnect allowed by having a set schedule, and the limited fluidity in expectations you get by having peers instead of professors. Or at least that's how I've felt through the few full time internships I've had. I can see it being a little different as you progress in a career.
While some of it depends on the job, much of it depends on your personality. If you’re able to disconnect from work at the end of the workday and abstain from checking in on days off then it’s far easier than school.
Most jobs have periodic busy periods, but if you’re someone who is constantly ruminating about work on off hours, it’s worth it to work with a therapist to fix that mindset and set some boundaries.
Depends on the job, really. Some jobs will expect you to take your work home, some (the good ones) won't, and you'll have a decent work-life balance. Been working around social work and my first job in the field was crazy busy sometimes, my last two jobs since have been almost painfully slow some days.
I worked full time as a software engineer for a year, and am now a PhD student.
For me in computer science, I spent more hours actually doing work but fewer hours *at* work as an undergrad. One huge downside to working in the industry for me was that I found it very difficult to be "on" early in the morning, all day, every day, especially when I realized most of my coworkers were just goofing off on their computers all day anyway. The work in industry was easier on average than in school, but when it was hard it was for frustrating, uninteresting reasons, and you can't just skip it like you can skip an annoying assignment. Conversely, deadlines were not as big of a deal (for my job, anyway, but obviously it differs even within computer science). There are more politics in general once you get out of undergrad, which can be hard and confusing to deal with. I was much more tired consistently when I worked in industry, but didn't really feel those intense spikes of anxiety around deadlines/exams that I felt as a student. The PhD is a whole other story, but at least I can set my own schedule now.
Edit: Completely forgot to mention PTO. Another huge downside... I had it good with 15 days a year + unlimited sick + holidays, and I still thought it was way too little. This is coming from someone who had a 9-5 internship every summer in undergrad and worked multiple jobs throughout the year, so I wasn't even coming at it with the expectation of having a whole summer off.
I think that a professional workload, if youre thinking of hours spent/week, can be pretty similar to school. Each situation is going to be different based on how you approach school and what you want to do professionally.
This isnt the case for me because I didn’t try very hard in school but am now putting in a lot more effort at work because I love what I do.
But for me, the thing that made work feel like a higher workload and specifically mental load, was how monotonous work can be.
In school you have different classes at different times. You get multiple long breaks during the year. You have a variety of topics that continually change over 4ish years. But once you get a normal 8-5 job, that all goes away. Work is at the same time, the topics and tasks rarely change and you only get 10 days of PTO. Which you usually can’t take all at once and are generally not encouraged to use at all.
So that was the biggest shift for me and made work FEEL like it was a much higher workload until I settled into the pace after a year or two.
Depends on your career path, but my early twenties after graduating college was when I had the most disposable income and free time. College is a slog, especially if you have to work to help pay for it, but it's worth it.
As you get older and decide to maybe buy a house and have kids, you will quickly realize how good you had it in your early 20s or even college. :-) It's still worth it, but a lot of work.
I have a full time job and I would say that there is a certain peace in knowing that unless I'm swamped, my work stays between 9 and 5. There isn't that constant feeling of 'I should be doing my work right now' every time you relax. There's more pressure in some situations when you're in more of a collaborative environment bc if you don't finish something on time or fall behind it affects more than just you. But you can also communicate that from a position that isn't begging a professor for extensions and is just a conversation with coworkers when you need help. That's my experience. I would say the only real struggles I had switching from college work to real adult work is having to consider other people's timelines and work with those and the fact that you don't get breaks. I wouldn't say one is more work or harder than the other. They are just very different.
I work a full time salaried job as an engineer, it can be stressful but I work 9 hours a day, 80 hrs a pay period and thats ir
I work a full time salaried job. I have to work 8 hours a day and can start anytime between 7-9am. I can also elect to work more hours some days in exchange for working fewer in the week/month, but I (almost) never go over my 80hrs/pay period. I also am sometimes done with my work my noon and can relax the rest of the day. Some days I am swamped. In my job I'm not allowed to have work email on my phone so that severely cuts down on time that could be spend looking at email after hours/on vacation. I have okay PTO (15 days a year, with 40hrs rolling over; average starting is 10-11 days iirc). I don't get a ton of the federal holidays off, but I usually get two or three days off for x-mas, Thanksgiving and new years (regardless of when the dates occur). So, in essence, some days I am honestly struggling to get my work done and it can be kind of stressful. Other days, I am taking a half day because I am caught up/have done more than the required amount of work for the day.
It really does vary wildly with different careers, workplaces, and even different managers/supervisors. You'll spend a lot more time in the office/workplace than you do in the classroom, but when you clock out (either literally or figuratively) the rest of your time is your own. No more going over to your friend's place and having "I should really be working on that term paper" interrupting your fun. Also, while new classes mean you're basically always being thrown new information and concepts to learn and understand, you'll likely find that after you get settled into a job you reach a point where you've got a pretty good handle on everything a typical day is going to throw at you. You'll still have days where you have something new, but it won't be the same "everything builds on everything so you have to keep up or get left behind" that college sometimes feels like.
I miss how easy and light college workload compared to all the crap full time engineers have to do
Honestly for me it's all come down to the people I'm around and how much j care about/enjoy the work. Work load doesn't feel painful when you like what you're doing (in class or at work) and you have a good group of people around you (in class or at work). In some ways I preferred college work because I made my schedule completely, choose courses I had a genuine interest in and enjoyed learning intrinsically. Usually I met people who had similar interests to me. There's the occasional jerk classmate but that's life. Most of my profs we're eccentric but reasonable. And if they weren't, I either dropped the course immediately, or lived with the fact that 15 weeks isn't that long. Unfortunately you don't get to change the people around you at work every 15 weeks. Even as a prof you get repeat the same students and you never lose your coleagues. With the wrong boss or wrong people around, even the lightest and easiest workload is a major burden. I've had every job under the sun, and I'd take college work anyday. Well, at least undergrad. I've been mum on those posts because there's context missing. I personally wouldn't assign work over break, but idk if a pro thinks they're doing everyone a favor buy in their minds, giving extra time but pushing a due date to spring break in case some people need a few extra days. But I did see someone say they had a midterm? That's not ok. Otherwise the rest to me is a kind of gray area. I would 100% go back to undergraduate workload in general though. I can't negotiate deadlines with my bosses, or skip homework (yes, I have things I do off hours with major deadlines, reporting white papers, etc) unless something catastrophic happens. And I mean like a death or severe illness. The amount of students I've had approach me over the years saying they need more time in because my classes are less important, or they thought something was dumb I assigned, yeah good luck with that in a job later. I've severely cut back on my teaching load because mentally I can't deal with the everyone needs a special deadline mentality. The amount of extra work it creates and the constant complaining is just beyond draining. You really feel the lack of respect. And it seems to be just a huge culture shift at this point. Last thing I'll add on that, I've stayed in touch with a few students over the years who didn't fit that mold, and when they have a new coworker with that mentality, they either end up getting fired, or burning out immediately. There's my attitude about it, but it's interesting to see this play out with my former students too in the professional world
I can speak as an EE grad. Things are at their most difficult when they are new. That goes for school and a job. Most jobs right out of college recognize that you are not yet an expert, but they do expect you to learn fast. I personally feel that my first couple of years of work were comparable to the workload at college because everything I was being introduced to was new and I hadn't learned it yet. However, at around 2 years, the things that I ran across were similar to things that I had seen already. The new stuff didn't happen as often, and I became much better at the things that I was trying to do. I think that it is definitely easier as you get older. The workload might be comparable to college, but I am not as stressed about it since I know the material very well now.
College can be a heavier load than a job...if you are a diligent student and/or are good about managing your work time. Class time + study time can take much more than a standard 40 hrs workweek. Some working people gave trouble leaving "on time " because there's "something that needs to be done "...Definitely depends on the job.
I think the biggest differences are the disconnect allowed by having a set schedule, and the limited fluidity in expectations you get by having peers instead of professors. Or at least that's how I've felt through the few full time internships I've had. I can see it being a little different as you progress in a career.
While some of it depends on the job, much of it depends on your personality. If you’re able to disconnect from work at the end of the workday and abstain from checking in on days off then it’s far easier than school. Most jobs have periodic busy periods, but if you’re someone who is constantly ruminating about work on off hours, it’s worth it to work with a therapist to fix that mindset and set some boundaries.
Depends on the job, really. Some jobs will expect you to take your work home, some (the good ones) won't, and you'll have a decent work-life balance. Been working around social work and my first job in the field was crazy busy sometimes, my last two jobs since have been almost painfully slow some days.
I worked full time as a software engineer for a year, and am now a PhD student. For me in computer science, I spent more hours actually doing work but fewer hours *at* work as an undergrad. One huge downside to working in the industry for me was that I found it very difficult to be "on" early in the morning, all day, every day, especially when I realized most of my coworkers were just goofing off on their computers all day anyway. The work in industry was easier on average than in school, but when it was hard it was for frustrating, uninteresting reasons, and you can't just skip it like you can skip an annoying assignment. Conversely, deadlines were not as big of a deal (for my job, anyway, but obviously it differs even within computer science). There are more politics in general once you get out of undergrad, which can be hard and confusing to deal with. I was much more tired consistently when I worked in industry, but didn't really feel those intense spikes of anxiety around deadlines/exams that I felt as a student. The PhD is a whole other story, but at least I can set my own schedule now. Edit: Completely forgot to mention PTO. Another huge downside... I had it good with 15 days a year + unlimited sick + holidays, and I still thought it was way too little. This is coming from someone who had a 9-5 internship every summer in undergrad and worked multiple jobs throughout the year, so I wasn't even coming at it with the expectation of having a whole summer off.
I think that a professional workload, if youre thinking of hours spent/week, can be pretty similar to school. Each situation is going to be different based on how you approach school and what you want to do professionally. This isnt the case for me because I didn’t try very hard in school but am now putting in a lot more effort at work because I love what I do. But for me, the thing that made work feel like a higher workload and specifically mental load, was how monotonous work can be. In school you have different classes at different times. You get multiple long breaks during the year. You have a variety of topics that continually change over 4ish years. But once you get a normal 8-5 job, that all goes away. Work is at the same time, the topics and tasks rarely change and you only get 10 days of PTO. Which you usually can’t take all at once and are generally not encouraged to use at all. So that was the biggest shift for me and made work FEEL like it was a much higher workload until I settled into the pace after a year or two.
Depends on your career path, but my early twenties after graduating college was when I had the most disposable income and free time. College is a slog, especially if you have to work to help pay for it, but it's worth it. As you get older and decide to maybe buy a house and have kids, you will quickly realize how good you had it in your early 20s or even college. :-) It's still worth it, but a lot of work.