Pay Me Dammit!
By Joshua Tremblay
Opinions Editor

Pomona College's financial structure favors the rich. Pomona College's Office of Financial Aid does an incredible job of making it possible for almost anyone to afford the extravagance of Pomona. One of the most important aspects of the office's packages are work-study jobs. These jobs theoretically provide students with opportunities for earning income for personal use, be it for books or just going out to dinner with friends. This lowers the pressure on the student's parents to forward even more money to the College, be it to a student or to the administration. However, these jobs are less effective because of the Business Office's pay structure and schedule.

All student jobs are paid on a two-week cycle. Therefore, a student must work for two weeks before even turning in a timesheet for pay. Then the student must wait two weeks to receive these paychecks. Even if the semester begins in the middle of the pay cycle, it is a minimum of three weeks before any pay is received. This is assuming the student's job begins immediately upon returning to campus. This is unlikely; it often takes at least a week, if not two, to even begin working.

This puts the arrival of the student's first paycheck, full or not, about five or six weeks into the semester. Some of the most expensive costs of a semester occur at the beginning: books, living in a new room, and the travel expenses of returning from break. Then, the student must function payless for five to six weeks at the college. While I think most students who depend on their work-study jobs never dream of living or spending at the level of the "average" Pomona College student, even maintaining a decent social life is incredibly difficult without pay.

Second semester exacerbates these problems. A dependent student is forced to exist for almost a month and a half on the money he or she has saved. Having a month and a half of income saved after spending a usually unemployed month at home is very unlikely. Just when the first regular paycheck is in the mailbox of students, students go on Spring Break. The average student probably tends to overspend on Spring Break. These students return, maybe in debt, to a paycheck halved by taking a week off of school and therefore work, whether they can afford it or not.

The pay structure of organizations also discriminates against students with lesser means. Almost all purchasing of goods for organizations, from pencils to potato chips, is conducted on the system of reimbursement. The system is simple: the student buys whatever is needed and receives a check later for it. These checks take anywhere from five to ten days to arrive. This assumes not only that a student has the money to front for the purchase, but it also that the student can go without this money for however long the check may take to arrive.

The solutions to these problems are simple: accelerate the turnaround with paychecks and reimbursements. Reimbursements would not be such a problem if students didn't spend almost half of the semester without reliable income. Weekly pay schedules are common all across America, and have become more and more popular in the last decade. For work-study to function properly, students must be able to depend on their paychecks. A majority of Pomona College students are incredibly fortunate; a quick glimpse at any given closet or parking lot will tell you that.

Thankfully, both the Federal Government and the Office of Financial Aid give students the opportinity to earn money for themselves. This helps parents and develops good life skills like budgeting, planning, and how to survive well below the poverty line while your friends talk about going to another continent for Spring Break. Pomona College should take the step of changing its pay structure to further help students who have less enjoy their time here at Pomona.