<p>Chatting up Voltaire or Vonnegut with the barista is fine for me. I'm the customer. But the thrill wears thin rapidly for college graduates earning $10/hour and recently saddled with the label "the next lost generation." </p>
<p>Can CC'ers please name some careers @ $35-40K that require just 12 -18 months of technical coursework, perhaps at a Community College? I would steer a dozen B.A.'s I know to start chasing those careers. I mention Community College because they anticipate that many students work or raise families while taking the coursework.</p>
<p>I"ve heard these suggested: Emergency Medical Technician (EMT), Paralegal, Funeral industry, Private Detective, Dental Hygienist, Computer Assisted Design. Please comment on these or add other fields where some retraining is needed, but not years of graduate school.</p>
<p>Nursing is two years, if you have the pre-reqs (and can get in). Accounting would be three years, if you have the pre-reqs (but you can work as a non-cpa/bookkeeper while in school.) Can you really do dental hygienist in 18 months? </p>
<p>Process technology. My son has an AAS in process tech - this year, his first full year, his income will be around the $50k mark. More if he can score more overtime (which seems likely). Really good benefits as well. If he had found a job at an oil refinery rather than a chemical plant, or at a unionized plant, he would be probably @50% higher. </p>
<p>One caveat - he applied for numerous jobs all over the country. Took 6 months to get this job. Of the applications he received responses to, he found himself competing with 500 to 1000+ applicants. Had to pay his own way to go for testing within our state and to Washington state, Ca, the east coast (twice), Texas (3 times). Several people who graduated with him did not find employment (they were also not willing to move).</p>
<p>He will probably always earn more than his sister who is about to finish up her BS, and is thinking of going for a masters. My husband keeps telling her she should go to CC for a year and do the process tech qualification. (she is not amused)</p>
Accounting is a 4 year bachelors degree. I don’t think it fits the 12-18 months technical course work at a community college the OP was looking for.</p>
<p>I would say look at the local CC’s and see what they can do with what their undergrad is. Nursing is 2 years for associates. So is physical therapy assistant. But if they have otehr pre-req’s, they may be able to do things faster. I am sure that CC’s are very familiar with these folks right now, and are able to help them. I have always found the advisors at CC very helpful.</p>
<p>Where I am, nursing is two years PLUS time for the pre-reqs. (and is more difficult to get into than Harvard.) After the first year of nursing school, you could work as an LPN (which is still much better than $10/hour. That’s what my wife did.) Don’t think the programs are accepting students just for an LPN, though.</p>
<p>If you have a bachelors degree already with same basic math courses, you can do accounting in two, but an extra year past that will be needed for a CPA. But you could be working (as a bookkeeper, non-CPA accountant while you do.)</p>
<p>Medical billing, or Medical assistant, can be gotten in less than a year. There’s jobs, though I don’t know if they reach 35K. (probably pay more than baristas, though.)</p>
<p>This reminds me of my grandmother. She received a BA in English in the '30s and after graduation went to secretarial school so she could get a job.</p>
<p>At our local CC Nursing is very hard to get into. Welding is pretty popular. A friend’s son planned to go to his local CC to pursue fire technology but he found out fire departments wanted the students to have a BA first (in any major) before they applied to the CC program.</p>
<p>If someone already has a B.A. in a desired subject, he or she could return to school and earn certification to teach. There are many school districts across the country in need of good teachers.</p>
<p>What surprised me is how high LPN salaries are:</p>
<p>“This is clearly demonstrable by reference to the average starter LPN salary. Using payscale.com you can see that the typical LPN salary that is earnt in the early years is in the range $31,973 – $44,783. This rises to and LPN salary range of $46,014 – $66,112 for more experienced practitioners.”</p>
<p>An LPN around here is only one year (plus pre-reqs.). But you can’t go to school just to get an LPN here. Maybe some of the for-profit colleges have it.</p>
<p>Where we live it was hard to find programs for electrician or plumbing. The electrician training seems (round here) to require an apprenticeship program and it is very hard to get a foot in the door. back before he decided to go for the qualification he has, my son tried unsuccessfully - seemed like a “who you know” type of deal. Recently, one of his good friends did a contract job with an electric related company that actually led to him being invited to do an apprenticeship (journeyman I think it is called). We are so excited for him, he is a few years older than my son and it seems like a great, and well deserved, opportunity.</p>
<p>We actually saw fast-track accounting certificates marketed to college grads by both community colleges and four year colleges that would take as little as 18 months past intro to accounting and still include all the courses needed to sit for the CPA exam. These seem especially popular as a practical add-on to a B.A./B.S. degree.</p>
<p>It is also possible to get a certification as a behavior analyst after getting a B.A. or B.S. degree including an intro to psych course, that would take about eighteen months. This is useful for working with autistic children.</p>
<p>Some schools offer GIS certification to college grads.</p>
<p>I do not know what the job placement rates are for any of these (probably vary by school and also strength of undergrad degree?), their pay scales, or need to relocate to find work.</p>
<p>My admin (with a BA) threw in the towel, went back to school for not very long and became a surgical tech. Hired immediately upon completion of the program and happy as you know what.</p>
<p>I didn’t know they still had LPNs maybe that’s why you’re not seeing programs. I thought that was going away and being replaced with Certified Nursing Assistants or unit techs or patient care techs?</p>
<p>Store management programs are also a path. Once you rise (and quickly) to store manager and then district manager or into corporate (primarily because of the degree) the pay is not all that bad and the rise can happen fast and you really don’t need any additional training unless you’ve never worked a day in your life. We’re seen this personally with a couple grads from 2 years ago who took the jobs as a stop gap and it turned into a (paying) career very, very fast.</p>
<p>Re teaching: at least in my state, there are far more newly minted teachers than there are jobs available. Our local school district, one of the poorer-paying, had a last-minute opening for a three-quarters time business ed teacher, a week before school started. They got over 50 applications. Even science and math teachers are finding jobs scarce.</p>
<p>Re Phlebotomy…In our area, no college required at all.
HS only required, but there are now phlebotomy training programs at CCs that give you an advantage at jobs.</p>
<p>If you have an undergrad SCIENCE degree, apply to a Med Lab Scientist internship.
After 12 months, you can sit for ASCP credentialing exam and be in demand in many hospital labs. Not an easy 12 months though…l.</p>
