-
Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
How to get in-and-out of the business while retaining maximal benefits and minimal consequences.
1) Get a college education. Aim for a BA or a BS in a field you're interested in pursuing. No matter how much you may want to, do NOT drop out of school.
2) Get hired at a strip club
-Save as much of your money as possible.
-Seriously. In 4 years, you will want to stab yourself in the face if all you have to show for stripping is a pile of clothes and shoes.
3) Get a Roth IRA (I use Fidelity.com)
-Put as much money as you can afford in your Roth every month
-Pay taxes on ALL of the money you invest
4) Determine how much you must pay in taxes, and pay them. H&R Block has a great student rate for filing.
-Come up with anything aside from 'stripper' to put on your taxes. "Model" or "Cocktail Waitress" both work.
-Don't try to claim everything as tax deductible. Make sure it passes the "Housewife Test" (You can only deduct things that are essential to your job: professional-grade makeup, costumes, etc.)
-If you are a dependent, and your parents are paying for tuition / residence, then you cannot claim more than the IRS estimates half of what your parents pay. You can only claim 50% of what your parents pay to support you. This means that you cannot invest more than this amount!!!!
-If you are an independent and don't want to be thrown into jail, and also want to be able to sleep at night, then pay money on all of the living expenses the IRS tracks (i.e. tuition, housing, investments)
5) GET AN INTERNSHIP AND/OR VOLUNTEER
-Your goal is to gain future references. This can also include professors.
-Treat your internship/volunteer position as a JOB, since this will be what you use for future professional references.
-Show up on time, be an independent worker, learn everything you can, network, and constantly remind yourself that even if working for free sucks, you're doing it for your future.
-It is absolutely essential that you graduate with some kind of practical work experience. If you have time to get a second, legitimate job, then this works too.
-There is nothing worse than graduating and realizing that the only thing you have to show for 4+ years of stripping is a pile of money, no job skills, and no references. You will suddenly understand that the world doesn't give a SHIT that you worked your ass off for your money, the world does NOT respect your "sales experience" as legitimate, and NO ONE will advocate for you.
-If you don't know where to start, or need motivation, then check out job openings on job websites to get an idea of how unqualified you are to apply to anywhere as an illegitimate stripper. This should light a fire under your ass.
-Try to get an internship or volunteer position in an area where 1) You work consistently for someone (i.e. you don't just volunteer random hours at random organizations) 2) You're interested in that field and 3) You can gain skills that are applicable to job positions.
6) Graduate
-You can now stop stripping if you'd like.
-Start applying for 'legitimate' jobs.
-Ask your references if they'd feel comfortable acting as references for you.
-Use the money you saved from stripping for your living expenses while you apply for jobs, or continue stripping during this period.
7) Get a job
-Use your acquired references to build a resume and use the money from stripping to create a professional persona (invest in resume books, how to get hired books, interview clothing, etc.)
8 ) Keep your job, and make it your priority
-Since the money you make at your 'legitimate' job will probably automatically deduct taxes from your paycheck, you can use this money for investing / housing, and continue stripping for supplemental income (day-to-day money and other cash expenses) if you'd like.
-Or you can just say goodbye to stripping forever. (Congrats! You got out!)
__________________________________________________ ___________
At the end of the day, the most important thing to do is #5. Feel free to disagree with everything else, but unless you're a career stripper (who knows she has what it takes to be a career stripper), do yourself a favor and live by #5. (I know, I know, Melonie...this isn't how you'd do it. :D)
I'm currently applying for jobs, since I'm graduating this December, and I'm realizing just how invaluable my internship/volunteering experience is in this process. My resume would look superlame without these things on it. So I hope this advice helps someone out on here.
__________________________________________________ ___________
Feel free to chip in with your own advice if you have an alternative way of doing this!!! I just typed out what came to mind: I'm sure I'm missing things.
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
^^^ Starts singing "This is you why you rock, this is why you rock..."
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Mindy Bares All
^^^ Starts singing "This is you why you rock, this is why you rock..."
I'm glad this was helpful! It pisses me off that stripping is not seen as legitimate experience in the 'professional' world. I can't imagine a job that could prepare you better for the cutthroat business world, among other jobs.
Instead of putting stripping on my resume, I'm putting down that I was a self-employed photographer for 4 years (since I'm really interested in photography). This gives me a way to talk about the intensive customer service experience and sales experience I incurred while stripping in an acceptable way.
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
It's like I knew about doing the self-employed thing and calling it anything but stripping, but the internship is a really great idea. Never would've occurred to me.
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
^ Absolutely. Even if you can only get an unpaid one. Actually, unpaid ones can look really great on resumes, because they say that you're willing to work/learn for free and pay your dues.
The whole idea is to take advantage of the fact that you have a job where you can work minimal hours for lots of money. This frees up your time, allowing you to do things that other college students don't have the time/ability to do (like intern/volunteer for free).
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
im interested to hear why you recommend going to school. Are you suggesting to do it at the same time as your dancing career?
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
basically im looking at the difference between you and melonies point of view on this
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
Quote:
Originally Posted by
yogibear179
im interested to hear why you recommend going to school. Are you suggesting to do it at the same time as your dancing career?
Yes, absolutely.
Going to school...
1) Proves to employers that you're dedicated and can stick with something
2) Gives you a foundation of knowledge/education off of which you can build a career
3) Gives you something to fall back on in case being a stripper until you're 40 doesn't work out
4) Proves to employers that you have a brain that can function academically
5) Makes you look smart
6) Makes you smart
Just off of the top of my head there... Again, this is something I would recommend, but others on this site will claim that having an undergraduate degree is essentially worthless, and can wait until later in life. In my experience, this is not the case.
Many employers, when they're sifting through resumes, especially during a recession, automatically throw out peoples' resumes who have no formal higher education. Even if only because it's so easy to find other candidates who do have this asset. And I know this because my mother uses this method: I'm sure she isn't the only one.
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
thanks so much charlie!
bah. one of these days i woke up dreading starting a BA next year. 3 more years of stripping!!! D:
you must be really organised if you have the time to stay on top of your BA, dance at night and find time to intern & volunteer, how do you do it? just school holidays, or weekends....
especially in creative industries [im pursuing film & fashion] work experience is invaluable. i have learnt more volunteering for someone else than at times in class, especially if theyre a big name in the circles you wish to break into, it cant hurt to namesdrop...
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
To second Charlie, studies have shown that women who have a college degree are A.) more likely to marry, and B.) more likely to marry someone with a college degree.
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
And obviously my advice is not for career strippers. Which is why career strippers like Melonie (and NXREM (sp?) and possibly Zinaida?) will give you very different advice. Many women just starting out in stripping think they can handle stripping until they're 40, but most women on this site can attest to the difficulty (and near impossibility) of this. Women who can do this successfully are rare. Very, very, very rare.
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Mindy Bares All
To second Charlie, studies have shown that women who have a college degree are A.) more likely to marry, and B.) more likely to marry someone with a college degree.
And they are more likely to marry at older ages, and are more likely to wait to have children.
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
i too second studying while stripping:
when youre older eg late 30s you may not have the look or the drive to study fulltime and dance many nights
also
if you plan to dance for eg 5 years fulltime before getting a job in your field, you will have a 5 year gap in your resume that would need a great cover story..... studying for 3-5 years = cover story
i hope we can all be smart about this
including myself
im guilty of having a pile of clothes and shoes to show for my year in stripping so far
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
Quote:
Originally Posted by
anouk.oui
thanks so much charlie!
bah. one of these days i woke up dreading starting a BA next year. 3 more years of stripping!!! D:
you must be really organised if you have the time to stay on top of your BA, dance at night and find time to intern & volunteer, how do you do it? just school holidays, or weekends....
especially in creative industries [im pursuing film & fashion] work experience is invaluable. i have learnt more volunteering for someone else than at times in class, especially if theyre a big name in the circles you wish to break into, it cant hurt to namesdrop...
-I took 12-14 credits a semester (full load, but not a super heavy load).
-As a freshman (easier classes), I worked 2-3 times a week in the summer (this was before I was burned out) and 2 times a week during the school year (except around exams).
-During exam weeks, I didn't work at all.
-During weeks I worked, I would work 1-2 weekend nights, and then one weekday night (on a night when classes started later the next day, so I could sleep in)
-I got an internship my senior year that only required 4-8 hours a week, and it's a 5 minute drive away from my apartment. I tailored my school schedule so I had Mondays and Fridays free, though this was more time than I needed.
-I began volunteering my senior year. Volunteering is cool because you can do it for as much or as little time as you can afford.
Through it all, school was my top priority. Internship the second. Volunteering the third. And work the last priority. Saving money is crucial to this.
Oh, and also: You might try to get in the most stripping time your freshman and sophomore years. Once you hit your junior/senior years, this is when you want to start volunteering/interning. So focus on school and saving money for the first couple of years, and then start working on your references later (and strip less often during your last two years). If that makes sense. Or if you're a workaholic, then do it all at once. :)
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
i guess aside from Mel's age argument theres also state of our economy at the moment. It seems like many people are going back to school, probably going to be competing for jobs alongside with you.
also depends on if you want to be employed by someone after dancing. I do get that its something that you will always to fall back on have and that you might end up not wanting to be a career stripper.
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
this is awesome advice :)
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
Quote:
Originally Posted by
anouk.oui
if you plan to dance for eg 5 years fulltime before getting a job in your field, you will have a 5 year gap in your resume that would need a great cover story..... studying for 3-5 years = cover story
i hope we can all be smart about this
including myself
im guilty of having a pile of clothes and shoes to show for my year in stripping so far
Exactly, yes.
And I hope I didn't sound judgmental about the clothes/shoes thing. At least you're aware that it's a problem! Even the fact that you recognize that shows that you're ahead of where a helluva lot of other strippers are.
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
the cover story is something i need to fill for the past few years and it is a problem
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
Last tidbit of advice:
If you're feeling unmotivated, spend a couple of hours trying to write a resume.
Seriously.
Pretend you're applying for a job on Monster.com. Be sure to pay attention to the list of skills they want job candidates to possess. And remember that you have to tie these skills to actual experience, not just to your personality. Remember that the hiring manager is probably a judgmental white male who would laugh in your face if you tried to bring up stripping as legitimate experience.
Unless you've been really on top of all of the stuff I mentioned up there, you might be frightened to realize that you don't have any skills or experience to put on your resume. Hell, you can even have a college degree and still have a super sparse and lame resume.
This should help motivate you!
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
what if you had a degree then continued dancing full time? would you just keep doing internships to fill that time? or is the plan that you strip part time after a degree
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
^^^ Shit, I may do that. I'd love to hit the pole dancing competition circuit. :)
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
I think that regardless of people's opinion on whether or not it's necessary to get a degree as opposed to just being a career stripper, an education is never, ever, EVER a bad thing. Even if it's just knowledge for knowledge's sake. College can be surprisingly inexpensive. Go to a community college, or a state university. The community college I attend is about $2,000 for full time. The state university that I am transferring to soon is about $2,750. When you look at it, that isn't actually a lot of money. For someone with a parent who is a veteran, you're eligible for Dependent's Education Assistance, which means the VA pays you $936 a month for every month you're enrolled in school full time. See the website for payments for part-time:
http://www.military.com/education/co...tance-dea.html
Also, a Pell Grant is relatively easy to obtain. Just file a FAFSA, and they will let you know how much you're approved for. It peaks at around $5,550 for the year.
With all of these benefits and aid, college can be pretty much free. Going part time and taking night classes is ridiculously easy.
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
Additional Notes:
-I mentioned in my OP that you should stay in school no matter what. I'd like to add that, despite being a very self-motivated, forward-moving person, during my sophomore/junior years in college, I found myself wanting to drop out of school. Because I could make so much money stripping with so little effort, I thought it was a viable option to drop out of school, make a shitload of money, and come back to school later. This was a very seductive thought. In retrospect, even though it was painful to stay in school at the time, I am SO SO SO glad I did not drop out. It turns out that I only had a year or so of stripping left in me, after which I burned out severely. Before this happened, I thought I could strip forever and enjoy it. Pft.
-You have to remember that life is not all about the money. It is possible to become a career stripper, strip for 20 years, make lots of money, and then retire out of the business. A very few strippers can do this and be happy. However, even if you can do this, unless you're one of the VERY few strippers who can enjoy this process, think of what those 20 years of career stripping entail. For most people, this is the opposite of happniess. While you may be able to retire out of stripping at 40, you will have wasted your prime years inside dark clubs, and you will probably have some emotional/physical consequences to deal with as a result of stripping for so long. IMO, my method allows for as much enjoyment of life as possible with very few consequences.
-Volunteering is also an important thing to do because, ater you graduate and are looking for a job, you might not find a job immediately. So during your search for a job, you can volunteer more often to ensure that your resume doesn't have any awkward gaps. And while you volunteer, you can either continue stripping or live off of the money you made while stripping.
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
I have a few things I'd point out on this.
First, I am a HUGE proponent of waiting to go to college until you can claim independent status , which I believe is 24 now unless you fall into the other categories. There are so many reasons for this, but the biggest one is financially you will spend less money once you are seen as an independent per the FAFSA form. You will be eligible for more grants, & interest rates on student loans will be a lot less. Plus, your interests can change quickly once you are out of high school & have had time to live out in the real world. In addition, if you are dancing full time you can save up enough money to not really have to work a full time job (or at all) while you are in college, which allows you more time to study.
Second, I always had real jobs while in college & danced on the side as well. I hear a lot of people talk about internships & volunteer work. However, at the end of the day I always made a lot more money than my peers because I had real work experience which meant that when getting hired after college my resume went to the top of the list, since there references & experience were seen as being better quality. A lot of students these days are pretty smart right out of high school, so for many the real world experience will do them more good. A great way to obtain a real job in your field is often through temporary agencies in your industry. Most positions end up being temp to full time, which means the company pays the temporary agency a large sum to basically buy you out of their system. Temporary agencies also usually offer more training through online classes & sometimes you can get training other ways as well. Another great way to get a real job in your industry is simply to network, especially BEFORE college. Join clubs & associations which relate to your industry, many of them often offer discounts to students. These allow you to meet more people who know of jobs that may not be advertised, as well of executives who might be in a position to hire new staff. Finally, real work experience is actually more impressive to most people because it shows a long term commitment & the ability to balance a full schedule, something that most people don't associate with volunteer work & internships.
As far as career dancing goes, I can't comment on NREXM or Zinadia... I don't think I've ever seen either one of them call themselves a career stripper. I know NREXM was/is going to college, which means she has other aspirations... possibly beyond this industry. I think Zinadia might only be doing webcam now, which I see as being a bit different & long term possibly more marketable do to the ability to appeal to more fetishes as well as search engine optimize for the fetishes. Anyhow, I consider a career dancer someone who plans to dance longterm for the majority of the years he/she works before retirement... so probably between 10 to 30 years. I think for many dancers that isn't really planned, but rather just happens... most start out thinking they will only dance for X number of years or until something is paid off that they are working towards. Very few of us stay in the industry past that, especially outside of the realm of feature dancers. For many being a career stripper means they will spend their entire work career in this industry, either dancing (I've seen strippers in their 60's & 70's) or move into ownership, management, bartending, or being a house mom. If they are lucky & smart like Melonie they will bust their butt during the peak of their career to save money, then retire somewhere that they won't need to work or can start a small company doing something they enjoy.
I have multiple college degrees, finally got sick of the corporate world, & became a career stripper. I wish someone would have told be years ago that you don't have to "keep up with the Joneses" aka don't try to go to college right out of high school just because everyone else is. I was so frustrated when I was younger that neither of my sets of parents cared about me going to college, but plenty of my siblings went... what it really came down to is that my family has a bunch of entrepreneurs in it who DIDN'T go to college or finish college. They are all successful, which is probably why they didn't care if I went to college. College isn't the end all be all of success, & for some people (myself included), it can actually be a waste of money as well as time. Make sure if you go that you go for something you could be successful at without college, & that it's something you REALLY want.
-
Re: Charlie's Guide to Stripping Through College
I cant stress enough the importance of college. I have my degree and I know that I can put it to use one day. The cliche is - Its something that can never be taken away from you.
If you want to ever do anything above entry level you need a degree. You make a million more dollars or something like that for having a degree.
Ive thought about going to law school myself but I couldnt handle it without getting my adhd under control. Its also hard being a single parent but at least with my bachelors I can do more than entery level clerical or retail.