The last job I had was at a large corporation’s visitor center as a Work Study Student. This was a two-year commitment to work full-time and maintain full-time schooling at our local community college. The way I came across the program was quite quick and informal, as one of my old managers was ordering his coffee and told me about it. I got the impression that the program was new and they were still working out some aspects of it. However, I jumped on the opportunity to apply because I had worked there before and they were paying for the first two years of education. As I was familiar with all of the departments I would be rotating through, I was not too concerned with the job description.
Above is the only discussion of a job description I received in my offer letter. As mentioned, there should have been an attached one, but I do not remember ever reviewing one. Throughout the program, most of my daily tasks were consistent with what I remembered from my previous experiences, such as running food in the cafe, scooping ice cream, stocking shelves, etc. However, there were a lot of responsibilities that were placed on the work-study students that were not previously stated. In particular, part of the job was completing a capstone project, which we were aware of, but while also doing regular employee activities. This meant that we had to advocate to our managers that we needed time to work on our capstone projects or attend meetings. Typically, this became difficult during the busy season. Overall, there just tended to be new rules or standards we had to meet suddenly being made. In which, the offer letter specifically stated that the job description is subject to change, but it was how the changes were implemented that made the job challenging. Despite these challenges, I gained great experience.
