The Job Placement Center (JPC) has notified some departments on campus that their funds to pay student workers are running out.

As a result of the notices, many students are now worried about receiving their paychecks throughout the semester.

Many students at GCC work on campus to pay for school and to get job experience. “It’s a combination,” said Mirta Lorenzo, manager of Student Employment Services. “The student starts here, gets a job here and experience here, then goes out to find a better job in the future.”

Many jobs in the real world do not want students without experience, Lorenzo said, so campus jobs help toward preparing a resume.

Yet the question of whether or not hundreds of students will be out of a job due to dwindling funds remains unanswered.

The memo sent out to some divisions on campus reads:

“Your account balance for Student Assistants is less than $200. All students must stop work immediately. Please contact the Job Placement Center to find out if your account may be augmented for the balance of the semester.”

According to Lorenzo these types of memos are sent out all the time. It is not uncommon for student assistant accounts to be nearly empty.

“A division head may tell me they need more money for fall semester than spring or vice versa,” she said. “The money that is not used from one account can be used to help out another one. It is not a big problem.”

Regardless of the cause for the deflated accounts, the divisions have to respond to JPC with haste in order to solve the problem.

“The departments normally respond to these memos soon enough and the situation is handled. The departments that wait to respond receive whatever is left over.”

Lorenzo is certain that no students will feel an impact from this situation.

Oxana Davydova, an international student at GCC, said that the low account balances have had an effect on international students.

“There are no funds left for international students,” she said. “I wanted to find another on-campus job to increase my experience, but because there are no funds left for international students, I couldn’t.”

Davydova is currently working with Admissions and Records because of her close relationship between boss Kathryn Ligon and supervisor Pamela Rosas.

“They understand my situation and worked something out,” she said.

About 540 international students may be affected by the shortage of funds.

Lorenzo, on the other hand, says that this is not a problem that cannot be handled.