Thursday, February 13, 2014

Student Jobs and Monthly Expenses in Germany

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Student Jobs in Germany

Student Research Assistantship / HiWi / werkstudent

Most students are interested in knowing about are student jobs. These are called  Hilfswissenschaftler (HiWi) here which literally means Assistant Scientist  but is commonly used for part-time working students as student assistants or research assistants.
Students are allowed to work up to 20 hrs/week in Germany. Also, there is a condition on the number of  days you may work during an year. This is limited to 120 full days or 240 half days.
Almost all student jobs available in Germany are related to programming. So if you intend to work here  to  bear   your  expenses, you  should  be  good  in  atleast   one  programming  language  like  C/C++,   Java,  Python etc. There are some jobs for VHDL as well (Verilog is not used here).
You  may  work  either   a  university  institute  or  at   a  company.   Both  have  some  pros   and  cons.   At   a  company, you get paid higher but the working hours are strict.
At university institutes, the pay rates are  slightly lower but the advantages are great: flexible
working hours, can work from home (which you  may also do on weekends), easy to stop working
before exams (university supervisors will never say no  if  you  need  time  for  studies  before  exams).  One  other  great   advantage  is  that   the  work  you  do  at   a  university institute
does not deduct your 120 full (240 half) days allowed per year.

University notice boards usually host student job postings. Almost all notices are in German. But this is  not that big an issue even if you don't know German. With a little bit help from the internet, you can  understand them. Note the requirements and email addresses of the contact person(s) and send them  your  CV  by  email.   Try  to  keep  the  length  of  the  CV  restricted  to  one  page.   Include  only  relevant  information.
Student job advertisements are also there on university institutes' websites. You may also contact people  by email before arriving to Germany and meet them when you are here so that you may have a job as
quickly as possible (although this is not possible in all cases). If you intend to start your job as soon as  possible, you should apply for residence permit as soon as you can since this is one of the requirements  for student jobs.

Finding  a  student  job  may  take  some  time.   It  also  depends  on  their  availability  on  the  German  city  where you are coming for studies.
In some cities, students find jobs quickly within the first few months  while  in  others,   it   might   take  more  than  one  semester.   Availability  of  student  jobs  is  one  factor  to  consider when choosing a university if you cannot fulfill your expenses without them.

 Odd jobs/Outside University

Such kind of jobs are not related to technical/academic work. It may be in a hotel as dish washer or in a factory for packing material. There may be no regular activity in such jobs, there may be more work in summer and less in winter or any other situation. So in this case there is no continuity.
Average earning is 10€ per hour.
Such kind of jobs mostly depend on the city in which are living, if you live in big city you have more chances to find a work as compared to small cities.
In this case sometimes you have to do work during night or may be you need to travel also.


For both the cases students are allowed to work 120 full days/240 half days per year (one day means 8 hours).
It is not easy to find a job just after landing here, you have to wait for some time (2-3 months) and after you start settling, you will be able to explore opportunities.

If you earn more than 400€ per month then you have to pay pension, which is 9-10% of your earning and it is compulsory for every student who earns more than 400€.
*I am not sure about people who do odd jobs, if wrong make it correct ( I think it is same for all).

Guys you have to manage your study also, so never think that working along with study is an easy job. Atleast you have sacrifice something to get something. So keep this thing in mind.
If you think you want to study well with good grades and you regularly want to earn money also, then it is hard.

Estimate of Monthly Expenses

Monthly  expenses   vary  from  city  to  city.   Large  cities   like  Berlin,  Hamburg,  Munich  etc  are   more  expensive than smaller cities. The major expense is of accommodation.
In big cities, the cost for a room  starts  generally  above  €250.  The  other   major  expense  is  health  insurance  which  costs  about  €77  a  month. Transport is expensive in bigger cities
(about €40 ­ 50) whereas in smaller cities, it might be  included in the fees and does not
cost anything extra. Food and other items cost less than a €100. To  sum it up, monthly
expenses may range from €400 – 450 for smaller cities and €500 – 600 for larger  cities.
I would like to mention that this is an estimate and the actual expenses might be lesser or higher  according to your living style but some expenses are fixed and you cannot cut
down on those.

Collected from Study & Life In Germany

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