Thornton Academy Postscripts Alumni Magazine Fall 2012 | Page 7

with school depending on how close
she lives.

Jameson Faunce ’13 has been
standing in the same spot at the
Subway counter for three hours.
Just when he reaches the last
customer, more walk through the
door. Exhaustion starts to get to him.
He has a headache from the heat of
standing in front of the 450 degree
bread oven. It seems like it won’t
end. Finally the line ends and more
orders are barked at him. “Jamie
go start on dishes. Wait, first fill the
chip rack and add ice to the soda
machine,” says the manager. Before
these tasks are finished, more
customers flood the lobby. It just
won’t end he thinks, but being busy
does have its positives. When he
next has time to glance at the clock,
his shift is over. Most high school
students are starting to think of their
futures, careers, and college. The
legal working age in Maine is 16, so
students as young as sophomores
are getting jobs at places such as
McDonalds, Subway, and Dunkin’
Donuts. It can be stressful for teens
with their first jobs to learn how to
juggle working and going to school.
Faunce said, “I don’t really feel
much stress between work and
school, I’m just a lot more exhausted
than I used to be. It was definitely
much easier when I was working
this summer just on weekends.” He
currently works on average 15 to
17 hours a week during the school
year.

Danielle Dupuis’ 12 works at the
Dunkin’ Donuts a few doors down.
“I’m a lot more organized now that I
have a job in order to get my school
work done on time. I haven’t been
working very long, just since this
past October, but I think it’s worth
it if you have a good reason for
getting a job and you can handle
it while also keeping up with your
school work.”“It can be stressful at
times but you just have to stay on
top of things,” she said.
The labor laws in Maine state that,
students under the age of 18, may
not work at jobs more than six
hours on a school day and eight
on the last day of the school week.
During weekends, holidays and
vacations minors may work up to
ten hours a day. Students can work
a total of 24 hours on a school
week with three or more scheduled
school days, and up to 50 during
summers and vacations, or school
weeks with three or less scheduled
school days. “Labor laws are helpful
in my opinion because if we, as
teenagers, were able to legally work
more we wouldn’t be able to keep
up with school work and that’s when
it would get stressful. I wouldn’t
be able to handle more work than
I already do,” said Dupuis. She
definitely plans on going to college
after she graduates this spring. She
may, or may not keep the job to help

Both Faunce and Dupuis feel it has
been a good experience to have
jobs. But according to an article
by Annie Lowrey posted July 5th,
2011, fewer and fewer American
teenagers are having such early
working experiences. “From the
1950s through the 1990s, between
45 and 60 percent of teenagers
had summer jobs, with the numbers
ebbing and flowing with the
business cycle. Today, just one in
four American teens has a summer
job. Indeed, over the past decade,
summer employment among people
ages 16 to 19 has plummeted to the
lowest level since the government
started keeping tabs after World
War II.”

C r eat ive Pr o cess

Guest Column: Juggling Work and Being a Student

According to experts, the decrease
in younger workers is the result of
many factors. “A number of factors
suggest that teenagers are facing
greater academic demands and
pressures than in the past, which,
together with the desire to achieve,
may incline them toward placing
greater emphasis on academics
than on working,” economist Teresa
Morisi of the Bureau of Labor
Statistics explains.
Lowrey goes on to explain that,
“Secondary education has become
so expensive that few kids feel it is
worth it to save up for it.” Many just
plan on taking out loans. Despite the
trend towards less working teens,
Faunce and Dupuis are happy they
took the plunge into the working
world. They feel that whether teens
are working to make gas money or
saving up for that new Xbox game
getting a job isn’t all that bad or
scary, and it’s a great way to get a
taste of real world responsibilities.
Story by Chelcey Vachon ’13
Story first run in Carpe Dien, Thornton
Academy’s student magazine.

Postscripts

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