|
Feature Article | |
| ||
|
|
Considering Careers The decision to go back to college can be quite straightforward. If you want to change careers, you need to be retrained. But how do you find out what education you need? Will you need a bachelor's degree, a master's degree, skill certification, state licensing? Here are a few suggestions for using the web to start researching the education you'll need to enter a new career. 1. The best starting place is the Occupational Outlook Handbook published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Organized into general categories, it gives you types of jobs in the field, job descriptions, skills needed, employment outlook and average salary ranges. There's also information on the level and type of education needed, and whether or not state licensing is required. You'll find many cross-links to related sites – usually industry trade associations – for further research. 2. Two other comprehensive career information sites are America's Career InfoNet and O*NET's Occupational Information Network. ACINet gives you information about wages and trends, occupational licensing requirements, career resources and many links to job-related sites. Career tools include a database of licensed occupations, employability checkup and employer contact information. There are also extensive state-by-state resources. At the heart of O*NET is a database of worker attributes and job characteristics. Using the database, you can match your skills and interests to appropriate job categories. You can search for an occupation, learn the skills needed for it and find related occupations. 3. For more in-depth, industry-specific information, research your selected industry's trade association web site, e.g. the American Psychological Association. These often have extensive student resources. There are even entire organizations focused on students in a field, e.g., Council on Social Work Education and the National Student Nurses Association. 4. If your occupation requires licensing, visit your state's Department of Education web site. You can locate the state site here. 5. Industry trade publications are excellent sources of career information. Many, such as InformationWeek in the IT field, publish annual salary surveys. 6. Of course, there are plenty of off-line resources, too. Talk to your school's career services center, attend local job fairs, and keep your eye on local classified ads to see what's available in your area, what level of education is needed and local salaries offered. But what if you don't have a clear picture of where you're headed? I've seen people hesitate to return to school because they aren't sure what they want to do with their education. The desire to further your education – whatever your ultimate goal – is good enough reason to go back to college. Once you're there, you have many opportunities to reconsider your future. College is an exploration – an intellectual adventure best approached with an open mind. Your studies may introduce you to entirely new fields of inquiry – fields you never knew existed or you thought would be uninteresting or too difficult. Your professors and classmates may see talents in you that you've ignored or suppressed. So don't worry about being undecided, and don't be afraid to change your mind midstream. College gives you the opportunity to find your passion. 10/05/01 TOP |
|
|||||||
Home About NDG Contact Us Privacy
| ||||||||||
