Working Lives Research Institute
An international research team led by WLRI has won funding from the European Commission to look into the paid work done by university students during their studies. The Commission are funding a series of projects looking into precarious work in the EU, and ways of improving the social rights of the workers involved.
The study will be conducted across 7 member states (Czech Republic, France, Italy, Spain, Poland, Latvia and UK), and will include an online survey conducted amongst university students. This will ask about the types of work carried out by students during and between terms – examining issues such as occupation, industry, hours of work (and variability), hourly pay, taxation & social security, documentation (such as contracts and wage slips), and work-related problems encountered. The survey will be supplemented by face to face interviews with students working in “precarious” jobs, and key respondents such as student and trade unions, employers and university administrations.
Around half of the 19 million tertiary students in Europe are thought to work, with industries such as retail, hospitality and call centres featuring prominently. Some studies have found high incidence of informal employment and temporary contracts, but this is thought to be the first study specifically aimed at examining students’ employment relationships and experiences in Europe. The project commenced in December and is due to report to an international conference to be held in Brussels at the end of 2012.
The team is composed of researchers from: