With less than a month left before I go off to college, maybe reality is starting to sink in. When I say reality here, I’m referring to my own financial reality. I realized, I’m going to need a job. If you’re like me and looking at need-based financial aid, “federal work study” is a phrase you’re probably going to hear a lot, and it may or may not be offered by your college as a way to pay for school. In my case, Harvard wants me to earn $1500/semester through a campus job. How it works is the school subsidizes affiliated employers to hire me. Any money I earn through the job goes straight to my pocket, but I’ll have to pay the school at the end of the year, or at the end of the semester.
Now, in looking for a job, Harvard (and I’m sure other schools do this too) has provided its students with a great tool called the online Jobs Database. I simply type in what kinds of jobs I’m interested in — research, administrative, tutoring, community service, etc. — and I get a whole list of job openings that match what I’ve input. The site then gives specifics on what kind of worker the employer is looking for, how much is being paid by the hour, what the job entails, all of that. It makes finding a job really easy. Though securing one of these jobs, I’ve learned, is a whole different issue.
So here I am, perusing the job database when I find what seems to be the perfect position. It’s a paid internship at a laboratory experimenting with 3D printing to make human tissue, and looking at how the printed biomaterials interact with stem cells in the body. They’re looking for Harvard College students (meaning undergrads), with weekly hours ranging from five to twenty hours. At this point, all sorts of excitement are shooting through me. This would be an amazing lab to work in: I’d get experience in research relating to my field, I’d learn topics that would be helpful looking ahead to med school, *and* I’d get paid. Jackpot.
So I contact the name listed as a reference as well as the professor in the lab, letting them know of my interest. A few days later, I get this in my inbox.
Thank you so much for your email and interest in the projects I will be involved in during my Radcliffe Fellowship tenure. As my time at Harvard will be relatively short in experiments terms, I would like to hire a student who has previous lab experience in skeletal biology.
A very polite, but clearly-stated rejection. Let me say that I’m used to this kind of disappointment when trying to get into labs — I went through ten of them when I was trying to find one to work in while in high school. However, I expected that, being a college undergrad at Harvard, I’d have a little more luck in this department. Unfortunately, it seems as though the problem is still the same. Professors want someone with more experience. In high school, when people asked me about how I got into the labs I did, my response was to keep trying. Email the professors. Be persistent. You’re going to get ‘no’s’, you just have to keep asking until someone says yes. I think I have to apply that advice to myself now as I get over my first rejection at Harvard. You might not always get the first thing you ask for, but maybe it’s for a reason. Who knows, maybe a better job opportunity will come along?
For now though, it looks like I’m still looking for a way to make $3000 this school year. Without knowing my class schedule or rooming situation yet though, it’s not like this job is the only thing up in the air.
The Ivies And Me 