<p>Hi, i would just like to see some responses from parents about their jobs and why they love it, what makes it fun, rewarding, and unique. I’m looking outside the traditional jobs such as doctor, lawyer, or teacher. If you have an unique job, please share! (of course if you are doc, lawyer, or teacher, i’d like to hear your reasons too)</p>
<p>I’m a student. Though I’ve cut down on business dramatically since starting college, I worked for seven or eight years as a freelance musician playing weddings, background jobs (at parties, dinners, receptions, fundraisers, and other events), and orchestral work including pit orchestras. I also played occassional concerts for charities and put on presentations for school children. It’s a strange life, really. Since I was never full time (except for one of my orchestra jobs), I didn’t teach private lessons, and I never had to support myself solely on this income. You can charge a good amount per hour, but your money also needs to feed back into professional development and instrument upkeep. Much of your “work” time is spent practicing, which is a reason why the per hour fee can appear so high. It’s really interesting, and you can learn a lot. The costs of such a job are strange, not always obvious, and not the same for any two people. It’s also, of course, not a job any college student can simply choose to do, and it requires extensive work, training, commitment, and effort.</p>
<p>I have a unique job, sort of. When I tell people what I do, most of the time they don’t know anyone else with the same job. I am a Medical Technologist, also known as a Clinical Laboratory Scientist. I do testing on blood and body fluids in a hospital laboratory. I actually just started in this career - I went back to college at age 38 and got a B.S. in Clinical Laboratory Science. I graduated just a few months ago and immediately started working at a local hospital. I like my job very much; it’s interesting, detail-oriented, and I am (indirectly) helping patients.</p>
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Congratulations, Oregonianmom!</p>
<p>Way to go Oregonian Mom - I’m a pathologist and Medical Lab Director, actually right now I’m medical and administrative director of our hospital’s lab, because our admin director retired - we need you and about 1000 people like you, want to relocate???</p>
<p>By the way, Einnco, there are several allied health professional jobs that are well paid, very portable (you can go almost anywhere and get a job) and each different, that is each appeals to a slightly different type person.</p>
<p>i work in a substance abuse intensive outpatient center. i work on a research study helping people from all walks of life to stop drinking and smoking</p>
<p>For those of you not familiar with medical technology, this term refers to clinical laboratorians who have 4 year degrees and perform clinical laboratory tests. Most work in hospital laboratories. Those with 2 year degrees are are typically called medical technicians or clinical laboratory assistants. It is nice to see at least a stray person or two enter this field. Very few people have entered this field in the last 30 years. The labor shortage has been offset by increasingly more powerful automated analytical systems. The field is now reaching a crisis due to the shortage of trained technologists. Unfortunately supply and demand does not seem to be operating very well. MT salaries lag behind nursing by at least 30% and nationwide MTs are paid less than other healthcare jobs which do not require a 4 year degree; e.g. ultrasound tech, dental hygienist. Clinical labs operate around the clock so most new jobs are for 3rd shift, weekends or both. Due to the pay, working conditions and limited numbers of jobs in the past, most training programs shut down or scaled back. Schools are now producing less than 1/3 of the numbers which will be needed. In addition, about half of the medical technology graduates never work in the field. Within a few years a very substantial number of MTs will be reaching retirement age. This could be a great field to enter assuming that supply and demand ever starts to work.</p>
<p>I work as a private librarian for a rare book collector. I started off after grad school working in a bookstore, then went to a rare book auction house, and then to a rare book and map dealer. I took a few years off when my kids came along, and when I was looking to re-enter the workforce 10 years ago this amazing job fell in my lap. It’s part-time, with flexible hours, which was particularly important when the kids were small. It doesn’t pay very much compared to some jobs (nothing in this business does), but it’s endlessly rewarding both intellectually and because of the people I get to meet and interact with.</p>
<p>I’ve worked various times in libraries including being the head librarian of a small campus library. I loved that job, but unfortunately the pay is terrible. I helped kids with papers, kept a clipping file, and did the grunt work as well.</p>
<p>Now I’m an architect. What I like best about the job is the satisfaction of seeing something you designed as a finished product. I also like that I both work at a desk and get out in the field and tramp around. I learn new things every day as I keep up to date on new materials and construction techniques and code changes. When I worked for a bigger firm in Germany I also learned about the business’s of each project. I worked on a Montessori school, a laundry for a mental hospital and a factory for producing train cars. What I don’t like is the feeling that I never know quite enough and that my education didn’t prepare me particularly well for how architecture really works. Another nice thing about architecture is there are so many ways to be an architect - big and tiny firms, big and tiny projects.</p>
<p>I am an institutional researcher. That means I do research on the University itself, analyzing data that informs university decision-making. </p>
<p>I like it because it’s a nice mix of writing and quantitative work, and because what I produce goes to a great cause–making higher ed work better for students, faculty, and society. It’s satisfying to be able to provide the information that helps the administration really get its hands wrapped around the challenges of running a university. </p>
<p>I also like that it has fairly set hours (makes it easier on family life) and doesn’t require much travel. A big plus is that almost every day is different–you never know what’s going to come down the pike next, what the administration is going to need to no more about. Student satisfaction, salary equity, economic impact, graduation rates, yield on merit awards, instructional costs… there’s a lot to explore.</p>
<p>I didn’t know about this kind of job until I graduated from college. I worked in admissions for awhile and while I didn’t particularly like recruiting, I did like the number-crunching parts of the job, and the higher ed environment. I was thrilled to know people did that kind of thing full-time, so I went back to school and here I am.</p>
<p>I just started a new job last month working for a local winery. The pay is nothing to brag about but the location and atmosphere are beautiful and fun!</p>
<p>DrDrewsmom:</p>
<p>Congratulations!!</p>
<p>:)</p>
<p>I think I have a good story that shows how one degree can take you to different places.</p>
<p>I graduated with a BS degree in child development/psychology - basically trained to be a preschool teacher. Many would see that degree as low paying and narrow in vision. Over the past 25 years I have had many opportunities each very different, but based on my original goal - to work with children and families. Jobs I’ve had
- Children’s Mental Health Agency - working with children w/behavioral probs and their parents.
- Started and directed a diocese early education program including daycare, preschool, creative arts program and afterschool program.
- Child life specialist - pediatric floor of children’s hospital - provided activities/play therapy/parent groups for hospitalized children and their families.
- Program director at hospital for teen parenting program
- Hospital based services coordinator for Neonatal Intensive Care Unit/Pediatrics - linked families with community services.
- Currently: Program director of national pediatric literacy program managing 14 clinic literacy programs and 2 community literacy programs for young children and their families (hopefully, one of my last stops - I have a GREAT job!)</p>
<p>The ORIGINAL degree provided the base for my knowledge and interest but it was the JOB EXPERIENCES that gave me the opportunites/contacts to have many varied jobs - all very much enjoyed and each one progressively more satisfying (personally and $$-wise!).</p>
<p>In other words, a degree is your basis - where you take, what you do with it, is up to you and the opportunities around you.</p>
<p>-Lower fifth in HS class and sub-1100 SAT
-Low-tier college, thrown out by my parents
-Another low-tier college-quit
-Got into Duke graduate program without undergrad degree-quit
-Got a job living with 16-17 year old boys in moderate security prison(welcome to the real world)
-Vietnam era Vet - worked as Psychiatric Technician (incedibly interesting -learned more than any educational institution could offer)
-finished BA and MS while in military
-got PH.D based upon work done while in military - interface between individual and organizational pathology
-Professor at U of KY, the U of MN, now at decently ranked LAC where my father graduated from (psychological closure on that family neurosis) -side consulting business
-looking to retire early; would love to make a living off of writing about whatever I want to write about</p>
<p>I hunt for people, organizations, groups and movements that are perceived to be very, very bad, either by legislative definition or political ideology, and market the results back to communities of interest (think large corporations, federal government agencies, law firms, etc.) My focus is on terrorists and those who commit economic crimes on a global scale.</p>
<p>What makes it unique is that no one else really does anything quite like it, and, I work very differently than someone does a traditional nine-five sort of position. Also, it’s forced learning, because I am constantly having to evaluate new items of information through the lens of the presumed political beliefs of the entity who holds the originating information. (A terrorist in one country is a hero, or religious leader, or even just a benign person in another country.) I also have to stay reasonably up to speed on issues like drug trafficking, immigration, organized crime, money laundering, fraud, WMD, etc. </p>
<p>It’s rewarding because I truly believe I’m stopping bad people and organizations, and by extension, bad things from happening. And if I’m not stopping them, hopefully I’m at least slowing them down. It’s fun because there are infinite ways I can measure my accomplishments, and because I get to choose what I want to do every day. Also, discovering some of the crime people commit is endlessly entertaining, in the intellectual sense. </p>
<p>I got here because even back in high school, I have always wanted to be an investigator of some sort, but, found the traditional bread and butter of a private investigative career icky (picture spying on a suspected cheating spouse - yuck). I also have little tolerance for bureacratic organizational structures such as what you would find in a police department, or federal or state law enforcement agency. But I love private industry, as it’s pay for performance, financial reward for value; I am the only person who has the power to limit my income, influence, and position. And since 9/11 the opportunities are endless, as you might imagine, and private industry can legally do things that government agencies cannot, either because of laws, or budgets, or political will. </p>
<p>I read somewhere once that a person should do whatever it was they wanted to do when they were five years old. This is as close as I think I can ever get to doing what I used to dream about doing, going as far back as I can remember. I cannot imagine ever doing anything else, and I cannot imagine being happier with any other career choice.</p>
<p>Thanks for the responses! </p>
<p>calgan: could you give me just a few examples of allied health careers that are interesting and paid well that are perhaps not as well known?</p>
<p>hoedown: you said that you went back to school, may i ask what degree you obtained? what educational background is required of an institutional researcher?</p>
<p>My second…third…hmmm…career is as an office manager for a child psychiatrist. I took it to get out of the house when my kids got bigger. Although it’s not something that needs particular training or schooling, my psych degree helps somewhat. What I love about it is writing the psychiatric evaluations of the at-risk kids, the dangerous threats, the severely depressed, the extreme OCD kids, and all of the others who come through. I find it absolutely fascinating, and it makes my kids seem so functional. It also keeps me aware of how lucky I am. This job, while it provides a scary window into an unknown aspect of our area, has many moments of hope as well.</p>
<p>I acquired a masters in PhD in higher education (that is, the study of education beyond the K-12 level). Yes, you can actually study that. However, it’s not necessarily required to go into my field. Many IR people do not have PhDs, or their degrees are in other fields.</p>
<p>I am a mammography technologist. I am not sure what my kids tell their friends that I do.</p>
<p>I used to be a film projectionist.</p>