Hi there,
Glad to see a positive update and hope you get the grades you desire.
Oh my, if I added up the hours correctly, you are planning to work 30 hours per week (that's almost full-time work!)
Not sure what your University recommends, but UoM tells us our degree should be treated like a full-time job and we should expect to spend 40 hours per week on uni (although for many of us, this time is more).
In my opinion (which ofc you are welcome to disagree) I think 30 hours might be too much, not sure what your financial situation may be, but I am currently working 20 hours per week as a tutor, and even I find that too much (I actually underloaded this semester, and did a subject)
Since I can't underload next semester (last semester b4 graduation
) I decided to reduce my hours (currently tutoring five days, planning to drop to 4). It is important to look after your mental and physical health and as well as keeping up with your uni load I think you may struggle with your current working hours (this is just me speaking from experience).
I would assume compared to tutoring, working as a waitress would be more physically demanding (I used to also work at a restaurant before tutoring full time) so I would try to see if you could potentially reduce your hour as a waitress (or possibly quit altogether) but maybe just ask to reduce your hours (to prevent having any double work days, i.e. don't work at the restaurant and tutor on the same days). This might be a good idea and may ensure you have a more manageable load (at least in my opinion).
Another possible option could be underloading if you need to work the number of hours that you work for financial reasons, however, if you can afford to reduce your hours I would recommend doing so.
Something else to consider, your current working schedule may reduce your opportunity to attend social activities in uni, as a first-year, it also important you that explore what uni has to offer socially, and ofc you could always attend an event after work.
But considering all most of your tutorials are on Wednesday, I guess you don't really have a reason to go to uni on other days of the week, but if you ever want to go out for dinner with uni mates, it hard to do so if you have to tutor every night (at least this happened to me and I had to cancel a lot of plans because I basically tutored every day, which makes socialising hard).
Just something to consider, first year is very important for both the uni content but also your interpersonal and intrapersonal development, so it is up to you, I know some people who did work similar hours and didn't burn out, but they had to sacrifice other opportunities (social events/ gatherings, university career events etc)
In the end of the day, it is totally up to you and your situation but I think 30 hours might be a bit much, but if you think you can handle then go for it, in the end every degree is different and I can only speak from my experience in biomedicine.
I hope this was helpful, please take this as a grain of salt, but I hope my insights can help shape your final decision.
Looking forward to future updates,
T&S
Spoiler
P.S I have been following your journal but never realised you got a tutoring job, not sure if you ever mentioned it but congratulations! I know how hard you worked to get a tutoring job, and you did it! Wishing you all the best