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Remember when coeds made some extra cash stacking books at the library or working a shift at a restaurant? Now, with tuition skyrocketing and talk of entrepreneurship and fast and easy millions in the air, students including those attending highly selective schools are turning to a new line of work to pay the college bills.

- IAN FRISCH

Shayna Loren, an advertising student at Boston University, decided to skip her Tuesday morning Pilates class. It was late April and, having partied with her friends the previous day to celebrate the Boston Marathon, Loren woke up a little hungover. She threw on sweatpants, a sweatshirt, and a pair of sneakers and made it to campus just in time for her first class of the day: Media Strategy. From there she scurried to From Concept to Cart, a Shark Tank-style course that focuses on bringing a new product to market (her group decided on a pill pouch that could be attached to a water bottle). And then, Public Speaking, where Loren had to give a presentation about what she hoped her future career might be, and why it was a worthwhile pursuit.

When it was her turn to speak, Loren got up in front of the class and connected her laptop to the projector. Her presentation was called "Influencing: The Perfect Way to Never Use Your College Degree." Loren wasn't going to give a presentation about what she hoped to do after college. She spoke about the business she was running right now: content creation for social media, including OnlyFans, the subscription-based website that has become inextricably linked to adult content. (Loren and other creators agreed to speak for this article on the condition that we use their stage names.) Loren explained to her professor and classmates the demands of posting content to her fan base on various social media platforms (dozens of trend-driven posts per week), the audience she has built (north of 1 million followers altogether on TikTok and Instagram), and the financial return she has seen by producing adult content on OnlyFans (more than $1.1 million in earnings over the past three years after OnlyFans took its 20 percent cut).