The final school bell on Fridays means one thing to junior Kick Poelmann: It’s time to go to work.

In his case, it’s as a lifeguard at Saratoga’s Brookside Club. He is working there to have additional spending money.

“Besides me, there is one other lifeguard that works all the time,” Poelmann said. “Usually what we do is just watch over the kids and make sure they stay safe.”

Poelmann usually stays till 7 or 8 during Friday nights, and earns a salary of $10.50 an hour.

Although Poelmann sometimes finds it depressing and sometimes wishes he could hang out with his friends on Friday nights, he said there is one consolation: “When you come home with an envelope of money, it’s not too bad.”

Also leaving to work on Friday nights is senior Anya Srivats, who works a four-hour shift at the local downtown Starbucks. Usually during her shift, she finds herself ringing up customers, making their drinks and doing other work like restocking, washing dishes and sweeping the floor. She gets a 10- to 15-minute break every two hours and earns $12.50 an hour, plus tips.

Despite the relatively good pay, her job is not always routine or easy. Srivats recalls a Friday night when a whip cream can exploded all over her 10 minutes before her closing shift, delaying her plans to attend the football game that night as she found herself having to go home to wash out whip cream from her clothes and hair.

Despite such moments, Srivats said she loves her job, because she gets benefits and experience she can’t get elsewhere.

“I get to meet really cool people when I’m working there because there are people who don’t take the walk of life that we normally see here,” Srivats said.