Time And Money Management For College Student’s

Both time and money management while in college contribute a lot to the students success in life. In this aspect, better management of these two assets guarantees the student more time to dedicate to their study and the finance facilitates an easier transition while in the learning facility in terms of security, and personal maintenance.  For college students, most of the issues related to time directly link with finance. An example is that one of the major reasons for students dropping out of college is that they have to work so much that they do not have time for school or that they cannot pay for their education, which includes paying not only for the educational process itself, but for different students' tools and supplies. This aspect stresses on the importance of not only learning to effectively manage time, but money. Many college students make mistakes on their budgeting and spending while at the institutions and let their peers and environment dictate their time and financial management. This often leads to overspending to support the lavish lifestyles, which leads to borrowing from other students having raised credit and interest rates on their credit cards and overspending on their initial budgets. To solve the problem, students have to work in more part-time jobs and this affects their grades since they have to resort to tuitions and crush courses to catch up on their classes.

Arguments arise about how most of the above stated factors like credit cards can affect the student’s time and financial management. The main reason to this is that mostly students resort to use credit cards to pay for essays and most college expenses. They focus mostly on the benefits of the card and tend to forget that the card also has its disadvantages. This type of spending is equivalent to borrowing which is expensive and hard to pay back. It is conveniently easy to pay using the credit card but forgetting that the credit card companies benefit mostly from the transactions. An example is if a student owes accumulative interest of 3,000 dollars using the credit card, which is paid with a rate of 18 percent interest at monthly basis of 60 dollars minimum; it will take him/her approximately thirty years and 10 months to clear the debt. This makes credit card risky for the college students, as they will be incurring unnecessary charges. It is highly advisable to have the card handy but used only in emergencies. By not having a good attitude towards money management the students tend to ignore the basics of maintaining a budget and in the end spend more than expected on items that should be given secondary importance like clothes, entertainment, and luxuries that they can do without . These leaks on their budgets are a hindrance on to their saving and achievement of long time goals. These two examples are examples to support the above stated issue.

Realization that poor money management greatly affects time management in all aspects of their life, students can start operating using a budget that will help in controlling the finances, avoidance of overspending, unnecessary borrowing and enhance a culture of saving. Poor management skills make it difficult for students to keep to their originally set goals. Another hindrance is the over reliance on the use of credit  cards, without knowing that these credit institutions interest rates accumulate over time and it becomes more harder to pay back . The use of cash for most of the purchase is not only safer but it also goes in hand with set budgets and having the fixed cash will help in avoiding spendthrift behavior and indirectly benefiting of the credit card companies. In addition, friends and society influence on the personal decisions are a hindrance on the individual’s stability of both time and money while in college. Since they will influence all the decisions that the student will make and this is mostly on the negative aspect like waste of time on entertainment, image, and neglect on the more relevant things that would have contributed more on their education.

Using an established budget or plan not only makes college life less stressful, but also helps a lot in the financial/time management. This helps students plan effectively for study time. Creating a realistic budget that is easy to follow and has the projected expenses and sources of income of the student helps a lot in creating a log on the daily spending. The plan will help in establishing a pattern in the time/money management through this the option of either increasing time spent at work or cut expenses arise. In addition, students can save money through comparison-shopping for the banking requirements like the charges and fees for the banking services, use cash when possible, using local credit unions, checking regularly on the account balance or instead use online banking to know exactly how much money the account still has. Avoiding lending money to friends who are known for overstaying with debts or do not pay back should be done because this will derail the pre-planned budget and force a restructuring on the time to cover the cost. Learning to say no and avoiding peer pressure from friends to spend excess money on unnecessary items is appropriate. Engaging in comparison-shopping or window-shopping before actually buying the products gives more insight on the price range and allows better budgeting.

Most of these decisions are personal and the individual does not need a third party’s consent to make these choices. Money/ time management affect the individual not only at the current time but also later in life since the basics are also used in other areas of life be it at the work places or at the family level. In cases that the student gets monetary support from the family, the decision will rely mostly on them since they are the main source of income for the student. They can dictate how much they can use on their monthly budget and the credit card provider to use.

The most important thing for a student to do to manage time/money is to spend it on what they consider most important. By properly managing their time, students indirectly manage themselves. With time /money management, it is not necessary to always respect and abide by the budget or schedule. A better approach is by being aware of their values, knowing what is important to life by having a clear mental picture of what they consider important and with their related goals and values in mind, they can begin to manage effectively both their money and time. With these clear values, they can set goals in life and can differentiate between what needs priority and things that are less important. In addition, students can make right decisions on how they should invest their time/money. Through the understanding that money and time management is not all about control and restriction but about making proper decisions on what is important in their life, knowing what they value, and the destination they have in mind, students can effectively say no to expenditures and activities that are less important and go contrary to their plans.