There’s a small part in all of us that wishes we could afford a Netflix and a Disney+ subscription. But, as university students, managing a job and our studies (especially full-time) can be a difficult feat. With the total applications through Student Job Search (SJS) increasing by 23% over the last six months, and vacancies dropping by 27%, the struggle is being felt all across the motu. However, SJS reckons Otago students have better luck with that capitalist grind.
Student Job Search, founded in 1982 (the same year as Micheal Jackson's hit album, Thriller) has the sole purpose of “[alleviating] student poverty.” Louise Saviker, the Chief Executive of SJS, provided Critic Te Ārohi with some very sexy statistics about your chances of being employed in the Otago region (provided there’s no footage of you drunkenly doing the worm on the Catacombs floor). Otago is the place to be, making up a steamy 14% of national vacancies and an extremely seductive 6% of national application numbers. Keep going – we’re close.
Comparatively, Auckland has 33% of national vacancies and an unfortunate 51% of national applications (suck it, Craccum magazine). To make more sense of these numbers, the average number of applications per job vacancy in Otago is 2.5 compared to 9.5 in Auckland. “All of this paints a clear picture, that right now, students in Otago are more likely to secure work than in many other regions,” Louise told Critic Te Ārohi. “That’s fantastic news for Otago students!”
SJS reports that over the two days they visited Tent City during O-Week, over a thousand students registered with SJS. “It’s clear there is a demand for work,” Louise reiterated. “The knack is connecting keen student workers with suitable job opportunities and that’s where SJS really shines.”
In February 2025 alone, SJS reported over a thousand jobs were listed in the Otago region. One-off jobs make up 60% of these vacancies, followed by casual roles (17%) and part-time roles (10%). SJS loves a quick buck. FYI -- signing up for SJS is gonna give you a much better chance of employment with far less competition, as it is an exclusive service to university students. “Given it’s free to advertise with Student Job Search, there are no barriers for employers to list roles on our site,” Louise explained. SJS has engaged in marketing campaigns focusing on boosting employer registrations and vacancies to much success. “We have more initiatives planned for 2025,” Louise told Critic.
Being a student right now is rough (especially given the news of pint-flation at U-Bar and some Rob Roy prices increasing by 20 cents) but being an Otago University student is certainly less so – as long as you sign up for Student Job Search. Students have a far higher chance of getting employed than Critic Te Ārohi has of getting our couch cushions back (we miss them more every day).