Students are workers too – and they need to know their rights

Most young people do paid work during their studies.

In our own research, we found that this work starts well before young people reach university – most have had a paid job while at school or college. Once at university, the majority of students juggle part-time jobs alongside studying for their degrees.

The rise in part-time work among HE students is well documented by studies such as ours and the Student Working Lives project, as well as by national surveys such as the HEPI and Advance HE Student Academic Experience Survey, all of which show paid work is now the norm rather than the exception for large numbers of students.

Working to live

Our research has identified the many ways student work matters to those who do it – it gives young people workplace experience, enables them to develop skills, and sometimes introduces them to new social environments. But in the context of what others have called a “cost of learning” crisis in HE, a part-time job is increasingly necessary for survival. As one HE student worker in our study put it, “right now I’m just working to live.”

Our research and that of others has also shown that student work is gendered. At any one time, women in education are about 50 per cent more likely than men at an equivalent educational stage to be working. The tensions produced by earning and learning – for educational progression, student wellbeing, and finances – are therefore disproportionately borne by female students, which means addressing them should be part of HE institutions’ public sector equality duty.

Student workers matter to the economy and to the workplaces and sectors that rely on them. Even though they make up only 4 per cent of the overall workforce, students comprise up to a fifth of the workforce in sectors such as hospitality and retail. We also found that students took on roles of responsibility, training others or providing complex services such as care work or medical dispensing.

Not always decent work

But we also know from our study and other research that the work students do isn’t always “good” or “decent.” Student workers in our study reported a range of problems including low pay, inflexible hours, harassment including sexual harassment, and a lack of voice and power in the workplace.

Most student workers aren’t aware of or members of trade unions, and don’t see their educational institutions as places they can go to for help and guidance about the problems they encounter at work.

More than proto-work

We believe a central reason for this is that student work is often ignored or dismissed as trivial “proto-work” – simply a temporary rite of passage in which young people must endure “crappy jobs” as a form of character building. Yet we found that about 40 per cent of students aged over 16 had been in their job for a year or longer, and some students spend long hours at work.

In some cases the period designated as “student work” can stretch across ten years – from age 14 to 24, for example. And as previously discussed on Wonkhe, the UK lacks the specific protections or support for student workers that are found elsewhere in Europe.

It’s perhaps obvious that students’ experiences of work matter financially – low pay, for instance, means students have to work longer hours to meet their rent. But student jobs are also where young people first learn what to expect from work and what their rights are in the workplace.

Blind to current work

Universities are currently being pushed to increase students’ work-readiness. Yet this push seems blind to the work students already do. Universities UK’s future jobs roadmap, for example, doesn’t include a requirement to support students in their current jobs, or to acknowledge the work experience accrued from them. Nor does it aim to improve the conditions of that work.

As the government’s new Employment Rights Act comes into force, wide-ranging changes to employment law will have implications for the higher education sector in general, and for student workers in particular. It’s essential that student workers know how these new rights and protections apply to them, and universities – and their careers teams – must play a role here.

Earning + Learning

Our new national campaign, Earning + Learning, builds on the evidence base of our research and is backed by the National Union of Students, the Trades Union Congress, and the Young Women’s Trust. It provides the resources needed to raise students’ awareness of their employment rights and protections, and to deliver real change for student workers.

The campaign was co-created by an expert advisory board of young people aged 17 to 23 with first-hand experience of student work, including part-time and zero-hours jobs. Their insights were used at every stage of the co-creation process and helped identify the most pressing issues working students face today. The students highlighted gaps in existing support and focused on creating a campaign that would empower their fellow working students.

The campaign website provides advice about students’ rights at work, with information on topics including the minimum wage, calling in sick, the right to rest, joining a union, and how to deal with problems at work. It’s organised in clear, bitesize chunks and includes downloadable and printable posters and postcards that students – as well as educators, careers advisers, employers, and SUs – can put up wherever there are young people who are earning and learning.

What the partners say

Work must not come at the expense of education – students should be able to earn while they learn without sacrificing their wellbeing, academic success or financial security,” says the NUS campaigns team.

TUC is involved in this project because students are workers too,” says Vic Jones, head of equality at the TUC. “For many students, paid work is not optional. It’s what helps them pay rent, cover bills and stay in education. Yet many are working in sectors such as hospitality, retail and leisure where low pay, insecure hours, cancelled shifts and poor treatment are still far too common.

Students deserve decent work, fair treatment and a real voice at work, and that is exactly why the TUC is proud to support this campaign.”

We’re really pleased to now be partnering on this campaign to reach students with this vital information,” says Kate Nightingale, director of communications, campaigns and research at Young Women’s Trust. “We hope it will help them learn their rights now – and carry this knowledge into the rest of their working lives too.”

A first step

This campaign isn’t the end. There’s much more that policymakers, HE institutions, employers, and trade unions can do to better support student workers. But given how little is currently being done, it’s an important first step.

To download resources and become part of the campaign, go to earningandlearning.co.uk.