My Prior Career
Healthcare industry: medical assistant, health educator, medical library tech
My Current Career
Unemployed
Why I Wanted to Change Careers
I developed a serious allergy to latex, which is not uncommon among career health care workers. [Three out of ten people in the general - not just health care workers - population have some degree of latex allergy.] Changing careers is quite literally a matter of life and death for me because my latex sensitivity is so much worse than most.
How I Changed Careers?
I went back to school at a State University to get a Master's in Education where my focus was on Instructional Technology, more specifically: designing and creating educational offerings for adult learners in the workplace or school environments. I was out due to sudden, unexpected illness and when I attempted to return, I learned that my Master's program had been discontinued.
The staff of the Education College informed me that there was no demand for Instructional Designers because the jobs were being sent overseas, the exact opposite of what I had been told for two years by the Instructional Technology department staff. At present, I am 3 classes short of my Master's degree and maxed out on financial aid...if I go to another college, I will have to start over [30 - 65 credits to earn] and pay cash. I have not been able to talk to anyone at the college to see if I can apply my credits to any other degree.
To make a long story short: funded by the Workforce Investment Act, the local unemployment department offered an introductory course in Project Management, which I am completing this week. The course is not as it was represented, but a vocal group of students got the local unemployment department to change the class 6 weeks before it ended. They are also providing assistance to help us locate employment and I hope to be working within 4 to 6 weeks.
Lessons Learned
- Never trust information or advice that you receive from someone who has a vested interest in the program.
- Review options available in the event of a major change, like how the state budget deficit impacts state colleges.
- Having a Plan B is good; having Plans C, D, E and F is better.
- Despite having done market research on the subject, I was fooled into believing that the program was sound and employment in the field was destined to grow.
- Moral: when a person does an informational interview with you, you need to be totally, brutally, honest about absolutely everything.
