How do they all survive?

Rachel Halliburton, who paid her way through college playing the piano in a pub, looks at how students learn to live within their limited means

Sarah Jillings did not go to Leeds to read maths, but discovered, like many other students, that an aptitude for figures was to prove vital in maintaining a workable lifestyle. As university life swallowed her up into activities that involved everything from boozing to putting on extravagant theatrical productions, she came to the conclusion that without the money she had earned the year beforehand, such an existence would be almost impossible.

"I worked in Madame Tussaud's in my year out, both as an exhibition guide, and as an assistant in the shop. I saved up pounds 1,500 which really helped," she says.

As the daughter of a City executive with an above-average income, she did not qualify for a local authority grant, and instead lived on an allowance from her parents of pounds 1,000 a term - almost pounds 100 each week. This went towards her rent at pounds 38, food at about pounds 15, household bills, travelling expenses, books and study materials, and still left money over for "luxuries" such as clothes and socialising.

Even with an income above the level of a grant, however, she found she was straining at her financial boundaries, and has been working during the summer as a steward at St Paul's Cathedral in order to pay off her debts.

This problem of staying within financial limits, which will be recognised by students all over the country, is summed up by Jonathan Edwards, a second-year zoology student at Bristol: "I'm sure a better person than myself could live on my allowance."

The choice is open to every student either to spend their time at university chained to the baked bean tin and the library desk, or to explore the exciting, chaotic and often expensive world that meeting new people and developing further interests often involves. While the former option may be a financially desirable existence, it is not widely popular among students. As Jonathan puts it: "It depends what you mean by life."

He is living on a modest budget of pounds 30 per week. His rent, which is pounds 42 each week, is covered along with bills and expenses by a local authority grant of pounds 1,200 per annum. An enthusiasm for the Internet, to which his college has free access, means that time which could otherwise be devoted to frittering money is spent in front of the computer screen. Even so, Jonathan goes out on average three times a week, and spends each time a minimum of pounds 5 at the union bar.

His key to financial survival? "You just eat a lot of boring food." He reels off a list of student diet all-timers: pasta, eggs, cheese. This is in marked contrast to Sarah, who decided that she "didn't want to economise on food", and averages pounds 15 each week at the supermarket.

The difference in their attitudes could be at least partly due to the very different cost of living in the cities where they are at university. As Sarah puts it: "There's no doubt that food is much cheaper in the North. When I went into the supermarket the first time I was expecting to spend pounds 25, but in fact the bill came out pounds 10 lower."

Although she was surprised by the comparative cheapness of a good-quality diet, Sarah's rent, which rose from pounds 34 a week to pounds 38 in her last year, did not produce such satisfying results. "My last room was like a flea- pit," she says.

Students often find landlords will take advantage of their need for cheap accommodation, and bargain rents can lead to domestic hell. One undergraduate tells of a house with dangerously faulty gas heaters, damp, low security, and heating that was so ineffective that the cooking-oil froze in the kitchen.

After two years of that kind of existence, Bee Marshall and Jackie Macdonald have taken drastic action to improve their standard of living for their final years in Manchester. "We were paying almost pounds 40 a week each to live in a slum," Bee says. "To be honest, I'd have given it up rather than face another year." They decided to find rented property on the open market, rather than through student channels.

Next month, they take a one-year lease a modern, two-bedroom with the option to renew for a further year if they stay on for postgraduate work. "It's a lot more expensive - pounds 60 a week each, but just the thought of being able to take a shower in hot water every day makes it worth every penny," Jackie says.

To raise the extra rent the two are working 12 hours a day, six days a week, throughout the vacation as cocktail bar waiters in London's West End. Both sets of parents - who were horrified at the standard of their previous accommodation - have loaned them the deposit, and will also give money instead of Christmas presents and Easter eggs.

Both Bee and Jackie are hoping to find weekend work in Manchester's when the new term starts - but they are reluctant to consider working during the week. As Sarah points out: "Many courses demand a minimum of nine- to-five attendance. Once you've finished that, you need time to study, to relax - and to participate in non-academic activities. Otherwise, what's the point of going to university?"

With student finances increasingly stretched, holiday work is often the solution. Jonathan lists fruit-picking, working as a hospital porter, playing the piano in nursery school, and giving guided tours as some of the many ways in which his friends keep the bank manager at bay.

Despite all efforts, however, many students end university with significant debts. Jonathan admits that although he has two more years to go, he can see himself heading that way, "Every term last year, I inched further up the overdraft stakes."

It may be of some comfort to both of them that most graduates eventually earn more than non-graduates. By the sounds of it, they need to.