Survey finds more women work to finance college.

With a flailing economy and rising tuition, more students worry about paying for college. According to its 2002 survey just released by the Higher Education Research Institute at the UCLA, women students in particular plan to have a job while they are in college.

"When we examine the long-term trends on this item, it becomes clear that this shift toward employment during college is accounted for entirely by changes among women students," the survey reports.

The 37th annual survey polled 282,549 students from 437 four-year colleges and universities from across the country. Students answered questions during orientation or within the first week of college classes.

A majority had some or major concerns about funding their college education. A disparaging 70.9% of women reported concerns about having enough funds to complete college, compared with only 58.3% of men.

The percentage of female first-year students who expected to get a job to help pay for college rose almost 10% over the last five years: 52.9% of women planned to work and 40% of men.

A record high 6.2% of students expected to have full-time jobs while in school, 6.7% of first-year women and 5.5% of men, a gender reversal from when the question was first asked in 1982.

Not only do students plan to work in college, but most have already experienced dividing time between school and work. In their last year of high school, 58.3% reported having spent six or more hours a week working, while a record low 33.4% spent six or more hours a week studying. Despite the decline in study time, 50.1% of today's female first-year students earned "A" averages in high school and 40.4% of men.