This fall, students may be surprised to find that their work-study job runs out of funds a bit sooner than expected.

The federal government gave Boston University its smallest work-study grant in a decade, causing the average work-study award to decrease by $95 for the 2010-11 school year, school administrators said.

"[T]he University's base allocation for Federal Work-Study has been reduced by more than $1.5 million dollars for FY 2011, bringing the award to the lowest level in more than 10 years," said a letter sent to work-study student supervisors on July 30 from the Work-Study Office.

About 3,200 students are participating in the work-study program this year, a total workforce "comparable" to last year and above the decade's average of 3,000 work-study employees, said Christine McGuire, the associate vice president for enrollment and student affairs.

However, the average work-study award for this year is $2,239 &- $95 less than the average award last year, according to McGuire, and $100 less than the average award 10 years ago, even with BU contributing about $1.5 million of its own funds to the program.

The total 2010-11 federal work-study grant is $4,089,849, said McGuire, adding that though this is close to 2008-09 levels, student need has increased since then.

The letter to student supervisors suggested that they hire more than one student for work-study jobs if they have a task that requires more than 20 hours of work per week in order to make student payment last through the whole year &- something many students say they find increasingly difficult to do.

For instance, even making just $8 an hour and working 12 hours a week, students would need a work-study allotment of $3,168.00 for their funds to last all year, according to an earning's chart on the Student Employment Office's website.

Some students find ways around this problem. A case in point are work-study employees in the College of Communication information technology office; students who run out of their awards there are frequently transferred to BU's normal student employment payroll, said Jacob Boucher, a work-study supervisor in the department.

For many students, however, work-study awards leave them suddenly unemployed part way through the school year with little options.

Kaitlyn McArdle, a College of Arts and Sciences senior, said she has been employed through the work-study program all four years of school. And for each year of school, she has seen her work-study grant decrease &- to the point where it is now about half what it was her freshman year, she said, from about $4,500 to $2,400.

"I feel like I'm definitely going to run out midway through the spring semester," McArdle said. "And it's just a hassle to have to apply to get a larger grant for work-study, and that takes like a month and a half for them to process it."

McArdle said she works anywhere from 15 to 20 hours a week at the Disability Services Office, which means she would need an award minimum of almost $4,000 for it to last her both semesters.

Though last year's federal stimulus gave Boston University $984,851 in additional work-study funds, according to recovery.gov, this money was spent entirely in the 2009-10 school year.

Right now, BU is unsure whether or not the student work-study allocation will increase next year, or further decrease amid economic turmoil.

"It is impossible to speculate," McGuire said. "It is purely a matter of funding in the Federal budget."