Earning to Learn: Working While Enrolled in Tennessee Colleges and Universities
Open accessAbstract
Although some students choose to work while enrolled in college, others may have no choice but to work, even if work may be detrimental to their chances of succeeding in college. Leveraging 17 years of statewide student-level records from Tennessee, the authors examine the relationship between working while enrolled and degree completion, time to degree, credit accumulation, and grade point average. The authors aim to increase understanding of how the timing and intensity of work relate to student outcomes and to explore how these relationships differ by college sector, industry of employment, and student characteristics. The authors find consistent negative associations between work and academic success, especially at higher levels of work intensity. Working students attempt and earn fewer credits and are 4 to 7 percentage points less likely to complete college. Among completers, working students take longer to graduate, even though they earn similar grade point averages and complete their attempted credits at similar rates to nonworking students.
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Cited by
Still being checked.
- Authors
- Ecton, W. G., Heinrich, C. J., & Carruthers, C. K.
- Affiliations
- Florida State University (US)
- Vanderbilt University (US)
- University of Tennessee at Knoxville (US)
- Corresponding author
- Ecton, Walter G.
- Venue
- AERA Open
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2023-01
- Volume
- 9
- ISSN
- 2332-8584 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W4313678788
- Semantic Scholar
- 5006d44fe9792761f4c253d8cd60bd867392c825
- Cited by
- 19
- References
- 25
- Citations by year
- 2026: 2 · 2025: 4 · 2024: 9 · 2023: 4
- FWCI
- 14.14
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- AERA Open (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- Funders
- anonymous nonprofit foundation
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Education › Higher Education Research Studies
- Social Sciences › Education › Educational Outcomes and Influences
- Social Sciences › Education › Higher Education and Employability
- Keywords
- university students, graduation, time to degree completion, credit accumulation, grade point average, work intensity, academic performance, industry of employment
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