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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Good luck!![/quote]

Thank you, i will update once i hear back :-) [/quote]

What kinds of programs did you apply for? LMFT? MSW?[/quote]

I applied to the MSW, it requires 16h of practicum a week, which means i have to quit my job. If anyone has any tips on what kind of jobs i could get part-time to support me while in school ( background finance, banking) , im open to ideas [/quote]

I'm about to finish a MSW program, and I have not had to quit my job. I did one of my internship days on Saturday and the other on a weekday and went to an 80% schedule at work. Is that possible for you?[/quote]

What do you mean by 80% schedule at work? Could you please share what that looks like i-e was it 3 days/week or 7-3am daily? Did they allow you to do it because you were working in social work already? Im working in Finamce, so not sure how my company will take it if im going to school for a degree not relevant to my job. Also, everything im reading online states that you cant work full time and do your MSW, as you wont have time to do all the readings, homework ect plus the school i applied to stated that practicums would be during business hours. How did you manage ? And what type of practicum did you find that was on weekends? TIA[/quote]

PP here. So I'm in the Catholic University program that is part time and online. I have a lot of things to say about the program specifically, and if that's where you applied, I'm happy to chat. The specifics are not super germane to the rest of the conversation, though, so just let me know.

For my first internship, I just dropped one weekday - so I worked 4 days a week instead of 5 at my office. Originally, I was going to switch a 7a-3p schedule because my internship agency does have a night shift of 4p-midnight that was possible, but for various reasons, I decided that was not going to work well for me. The agency is here in DC and it operates 7 days a week, so I suppose that technically, I _could_ have done all my internship hours on the weekend without reducing my schedule at my office (which is not social work oriented at all - just very flexible). That said, that was for my first internship. The second one is more intensive, and the agencies I'm looking for do not have those flexible hours, so I am currently trying to figure out what the next part looks like. My point is that depending on how your program is structured, you may be able to put off quitting your job for some time. I started the program in early 2015 and finish next spring. I worked 4 days a week for most of last year, and now I'm back to full time.

As for time for class, I do most of my reading during my commute (which is 20-40 minutes on the bus), in bed at night, and over my lunch hour. I won't say that I have completely read every single thing that has been assigned, but because my program is structured to be 8-week blocks of one class at a time, I have not felt overwhelmed by the amount of work. There have definitely been times when I have deadlines at work AND at school and things have been stressful, but I would say that's happened maybe 2-3x over the course of the program, and all of those times, I was able to just take a personal day from work to focus on finishing school stuff.[/quote]

You say you don't work in social work, was your undergrad in something similar? mine was in finance so Im guessing i will need more time to study as everything will be new to me. How are you managing papers and work? I head these programs are very paper/research intensive. The program I am looking at requires 16h/fieldwork a week the first year and 22h/week the 2nd year, not sure what job in Finance will allow me that flexibility sadly. Also, we are relocating to the NY/NJ area so I applied to schools there. My guess was to find a new job once we move, but my expertise is in Finance, so I doubt i can find a job in social work without any experience/degree right when we move that would afford me the flexibility to work the schedules you described. Plus, with it being a new job, I don't think they will be that flexible unless i am really lucky. The only way I see it working is if I quit working, which I don't really wanna do. It is very stressful![/quote]

My undergrad is in political science, so there are some overlaps when talking about the history of oppression the US, but not really.

I agree that it's stressful, and also agree with the MSW field instructor below. It really requires a commitment, and if you can stop working, that is really the only way that it will work. My situation works because my program is flexible and my day job is flexible and I've been here for long enough that they know that I can manage both at the same time. They were concerned at first, but because I'd been there long enough, they were willing to give it a shot. That wouldn't happen in a new job. I was actually considering accepting a new job earlier this year (in SW field), but I need the flexibility to finish my last bit of school, so I turned it down.

Good luck with whatever you decide![/quote]

Thank you PP. From all the feedback im getting, it seems the only reasonable way to give this a shot is to quit my job for 2 years and fully concentrate on this. It will be a strain on our finances for sure, which scares me i-e paying for school, family surviving on 1 income and potentially years of low salaries after graduation til im able to set a Pp ughh[/quote]

I would have some long, long talks with my spouse about it if I were you, OP. One thing I will tell you is that no matter whether you can figure out a way to work part time in your field for a while during school or whether you quit all together, if your spouse is not enthusiastically on board and happy to pick up any slack that is created by your school plans, you will all be miserable. When I was working 6 days a week last year (10 hour days, usually, at least), my spouse, who has never been the primary caregiver, had to be the primary caregiver AND the primary breadwinner. It was really hard for both of us, but he was the one who was in charge of like 90% of kid activities on the weekend and the household logistics. We figured out some ways to make that easier, but if your spouse is not as committed as you are to this change, I would think twice about doing it.[/quote]

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