YouNiversity of Miami: My Miami

It’s one of the worst feelings a college student can experience. The phone feels so heavy in your hand, you dredge through slowly typing the numbers in, listening to the dreadful dial tone… “Mom? Yeah, I’m… I’m… I’m broker than MC Hammer.”  Calling your parents for money is demeaning and something that most of us would like to keep to a minimum.

In my opinion, its easier to address the problem at the source; the need for funding. Whether that funding goes to textbooks and pencils, or (root) beer and (not) drugs, is your decision, not mine. What I want to address is how you go about making those extra dollars.

The most obvious way to have a steady dependable income is to find a job with regular hours. Unfortunately, in this recession heavy era, jobs don’t always fall from the sky like they used to. Luckily, there are avenues to take to skip that whole pesky actually-looking-for-work phase. We have the Office of Student Employment right on campus, with listings for every type of job possible, on campus and off, paying and volunteer. Websites like Monster and CareerBuilder are designed for you to put in exactly what you’re looking for, and they’ll give you a nice clean list of places that fit your needs. Or you can do what I did, and find an easy job writing article about whatever comes off the top of your head for the school paper!

The second option, which I personally endorse, is following the American capitalist dream, and becoming your own success story. I know of students on campus that have started a laundry company, charging fellow dormmates a small fee to pick up bags of dirty laundry, wash dry and fold the items, and then return it to the customers door. A freshman named Cameron Bloom partnered with an upperclassman and started MyMiami, a business that caters to the needs and wishes of UMiami students. Simply texting ‘Miami’ to 66337 adds you to a once-a-day texting list, that will send you huge deals to local businesses at no cost to you. Cameron has even been business-savvy enough to start a Facebook page to let students interact with him and request businesses and restaurants that they’d like to receive discounts to. This is, in my mind, exactly the motivation and creativity that Miami embodies, and I personally recommend joining the texting list. More personalized than Groupon with better deals… what’s not to love?

There are a huge number of unfilled positions at companies and businesses around Miami, and all it takes is a little effort to get hired. On even a grander scale, there are an infinite amount of great business ideas that haven’t even crossed the mind of anybody yet, and all it takes is one bright individual. The man who created the internet, who developed the combustion engine, who first thought of stirring chocolate in with his milk (GENIUS!), had at one point been completely oblivious to his effect on the course of history. So how do you know what you’re capable of until you try?

Evan Peskin is a junior majoring in pre-med psychology. He may be contacted at epeskin@themiamihurricane.com.