Before I finalize what I am going to study I have a last question about IT. Is it possible at all to start at age 32, not being able to quit my current job because I am supporting a family. Get some education in Network administration, or Web Developmentmaybe a cert or two and somehow break into the IT field? The key here is I can't quit and take a $10 an hour job to get a career going since I am a sole provider. I am wondering if it is possible.
Not web development - no money in it anymore. Network administration? Maybe, but you'll need a CCNP or a firewall cert to break in at the level you desire. DBA is another option, and is easier to study at home than network administration.
I started at 28, and had family also, my only differnece was I had a crappy job so I was able to take a cut in pay to get started. I would suggest getting some certs, and looking for contract work. At one time I picked up a lot or work from a company called the Computer Merchant (www.tcml.com). They were short job, usually a couple of hours, but a good rate (25-30$/Hr) and were excellent exposure and very very scripted. This made it easy work. Also, start your own businss from home and focus on what you want to do. Even if you only have a couple of client, it will help pad you resume and get you an interview. The interview is the key and were you need to shine. Do you have a degree already? Alot of state jobs require a degree and that may be another avenue. Also, what industry do you work in? If you work in Finance or medical areas you may be able to combine some experience since business exp is becoming more important. Good luck!!!!
Im a bus driver. Trying to find a way out into a real job pretty much, but I make 45k a year as a bus driver with full benefits. DBA? You mean a database admin? How do you go about that cause I looked into that, but didn't find much education in it. I have no Bachelors. A bachelors is what I really want right now so I was trying to get myself some education so I could career change.
You're not just a "bus driver", you work as a transportation professional. Find out how IT is used by your own organization. The transportation industry is complex and has many unique information systems - GIS and remote sensing to support capacity planning, databases, networks that tie it all together, security systems which protect it all. Show an interest in your own employer's IT system and develop a training plan.
One of my first IT jobs in college was with a trucking company. I have to ask what part of the country you live in. I lived in a rural area and it made it Really tough to break in. Are you with a school system? One way to build experience is to, gulp, volunteer. Get the training, and try to break in via the school system. The government and govt systems like to promote from within. One other thing to check out is how college like Excelsior, TESC and COSC give credit for Certs. They just started taken the ICCP test and they will give you major credit toward a degree. Then go to www.cramsession.com and find out what the surveyed difficulty is for that test. I have seen a couple of people break in the a A+ at 18/hr, but not in that 45k range.
I live on the west coast.. oregon to be exact. People with an A+ here make $10/hr or less working at Best buy.
You could look into a career in digital forensics upon completion of the Bachelor of Science in Computer & Digital Forensics at Champlain College. I am enrolled in the Professional Certificate option. The tuition is a bit steep at USD420.00 per credit hour but they are recognized by the National Institute of Justice and the Champlain College programme is well thought of by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. You could complete the degree within a couple of years provided you test out of the general education courses through CLEP and DANTES. Also, Fort Hays State University offers a bachelor degree with a specialization in INT. BlueMason can tell you more about that programme since he is enrolled himself. Good luck!
Yes. Get the degree. Forget A+ stuff. At some point, set up a home network. At some point, volunteer at your church of other non-profit (ask for a letter of acceptance of your services as a tax-deductable contribution). Focus on what you enjoy. Use the volunteer work to build your resume. You'll be fine.
Hi again, Xarick! Charter Oak State College www.cosc.edu , Excelsior College www.excelsior.edu , and Thomas Edison State College www.tesc.edu are known as the Big Three because of their generosity in accepting transfer credit, "testing out" procedures (AP, CLEP, DANTES, ECE, PEP, TECEP, etc.), portfolio credit, industry certifications, and corporate/military training toward their degrees. Western Governors University www.wgu.edu is a young, up and coming university with competency based degree programs which has IT as one of its particular strengths. My recommendation would be to check with these schools on how much credit they would give for various IT and computer certs and then, armed with that good information, go out and get a whole raft of IT certs, get that computer job, and transfer your certs into one of the DL IT/CS degrees. Also, get yourself copies of _Bears' Guide to the Best Computer Degrees by Distance Learning_ and _Get Your IT Degree and Get Ahead_. Another thing: you say that you live in Oregon and work as a bus driver. Where? More importantly, for which bus system? I lived in the Greater Seattle area for the fifteen years from 1986 to 2001 and, for about half of that time, rode the bus as my primary form of transportation. I got to know a few of the drivers for Metropolitan King County Transit quite well. Apparently, Metro has a very generous tuition assistance policy. I'm told by one of the drivers that there are quite a few Metro Transit bus drivers who earned their PhD's while driving bus. Indeed, in my time, I have given away two of my old Bears' Guides (10th and 11th editions), and at least one of those went to a Metro bus driver. So, look into the tuition benefits offered by your bus system or, if such benefits are non-existent at your bus system, get a new job with a new bus system that does have generous education benefits. Peace!
Thanks ted. I work for Trimet which is portlands public transit system. So it would be just like Metro up there in seattle. Benefits are good pay is good, but it is the hardest job I have ever done. and trust me.. it is HARD. I have done physical labor jobs, digging ditches, fixing pumps and I have done technical jobs. I worked in telecommunications for a while designing voice and data circuit paths. But nothing in the world prepared me for being a driver. As for tution reimbursement. Ya we have it, no it's not that great, but yes I am gonna abuse every ounce of it I can. Also my learning styles make it difficult for me to go to places where you TEST out of stuff. I need a more structured format to be successful. I can do the testing thing, but I won't walk away with much knowledge. I am one of those guys who will get As on everything and flunk the final. or pass the final and wonder what was on it. In fact I was the #1 student in my last calculus class. Every homework assignment I aced. I had the highest grads. I was able to answer all the questions. and I missed all but 2 on the final. I got the lowest grade on the final, luckily all the rest of my work kept me on top. But for some reason my brain dies during tests.
The schools I mentioned above - COSC, EC, TESC - offer their own structured coursework, they are very generous with transfer credit - BYU, LSU have large numbers of relatively inexpensive independent study classes to choose from - and they will offer substantial credit for any IT you may either already have or may acquire in the future. The BS in IT at WGU has eight IT certs built right into the program with no additional coursework.
IT and Bus Systems One way that bus systems use IT is like this. Somebody at Trimet (and any other bus system, for that matter) is going to have a cushy little office job inputting information into a computer to figure out where the bus system ought to have its routes and how frequently each route ought to run. Find out who does that job at Trimet. Find out what the criteria are for determining the location and frequency of the bus routes and putting them into the form of bus schedules. Ask the person who does this job what his/her frustrations are with the existing software and figure out how to write a better bus scheduling software. When your software is ready and available, write up a sales letter and send it out to every transit agency along the I-5 corridor from British Columbia to California. Find out what trade magazine(s) transit agency executives read and advertise your software therein. Just a thought.
Re: IT and Bus Systems A course in artifical intelligence will give you the basic knowledge necessary to develop such a model. I once developed a routing determination system for a freight carrier to simplify my job in calculating the optimal routing for multi-drop truckloads. I programmed the system in Prolog.
The western governors or the Fort hayes degrees really appeal to me. Do any of you hard core networking guys have any comments on them? I realize the WG certs are somewhat generic, but some are better than none.
