Where the Jobs Are

Erica Carroll had never considered working as a nurse. But when the construction industry dried up, taking her career with it, she stepped back, looked around and saw that healthcare is where the jobs are, so she headed back to school to become a licensed practical nurse.

Her sister is doing the same. So are thousands of others.

Physician assisting, registered or practical nursing, health information technology, medical billing and coding, surgical technology—courses in all aspects of healthcare are filling up in Southwest Florida’s higher-education institutions as workers return to school to enhance their skills or find new careers altogether.

“Healthcare is slowing, but there is still positive job growth,” says Rebecca Rust, chief economist for the Labor Market Statistics Center, Florida Agency for Workforce Innovation. Many industries will see some recovery over the next seven years, she says. But healthcare will not only stay strong in the future, it is also one of the best bets for job seekers today. “For those that need a job now, healthcare is really our only industry that’s growing,” Rust says.

Local career and education leaders have stepped up to try to meet the need.

Since the Southwest Florida Workforce Development Board received federal funding through the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act to help retrain people who have lost their jobs, it has been working with education providers. The board hopes “to let them know about the funding and make sure there’s a link between training and jobs that are offered—or will be,” says Pat Riley, executive director for the Alliance of Educational Leaders. The Alliance, which is affiliated with the workforce development board, is made up of the leaders of Southwest Florida’s education institutions that are accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools.

The funding is available to victims of the economy who are pursuing jobs in targeted industries, such as healthcare, information technology and early childhood education, which can provide high-skill, high-wage jobs and could help stimulate the economy.

“We don’t want to offer training for jobs that no longer exist or are in a declining trend,” Riley says. “This is one of those situations where you need to invest in the direction that is anticipated.”

Not only have waiting lists for Lee County High Tech North’s nursing programs grown, says Assistant Director Bob Fain, “We have different kinds of people coming. It used to be people looking for a first job; they might have had a GED and worked for minimum wage and were looking to improve their salary. Now we’re finding people who had good-paying jobs—in real estate, for example—who came back.”

Enrollment at Hodges University’s health information technology courses spiked even before President Obama’s push for electronic medical records, says Carlene Harrison, dean of the School of Allied Health. It has more than tripled in the past year, from 25 or 30 students to 100, she says. Hodges’ pre-physician’s assistant program, which prepares students for Nova Southeastern University’s master’s program, also has been in demand, she adds.

Students can’t be sure that a job will be waiting for them on the other side of a degree in healthcare, however. “I think, as in every other occupation or career, there are not as many available jobs as a couple years ago,” says Sheila Sarver, health occupations coordinator for Lee County Schools. Employers in healthcare, like most other industries, have been laying off workers and cutting hours.

But graduates are finding jobs, Sarver adds. “I would say the chances [of landing a job] are better coming out of a medical program than most programs currently. There continues to be an acute shortage of healthcare workers, and as the economy turns around, they will be in greatest demand.”

Of the students we spoke to who are switching to healthcare from other careers, all see a brighter future in the industry.

Age: 29
School: High Tech North
Course of Study: Licensed Practical Nurse
Length: 1,350 credit hours (about 11 months)
Cost: approximately $4,200 (in-state)

Carroll had a customer-service job with a good salary at First Home Builders. But after she left in 2006 to have her first child, she says, “There was no construction industry when I came back.”

In September 2008, she started the LPN program at Lee County High Tech North, which takes only a year to complete. (She took time off when her second child was born, and expects to finish in January.) Her 22-year-old sister, Martine Veilleux, was six months pregnant when First Home laid her off as drywall superintendent. She has also joined the LPN program.

Neither had considered healthcare before the economy derailed their careers, Carroll says. They opted for it “basically because it’s a sure thing.”

Carroll plans to follow her sister’s lead and sign up for an RN program in an online school to accelerate the process. She wants to go into administration, while Veilleux hopes to pursue a master’s degree in Nova Southeastern’s physician’s assistant program.

As an LPN, Carroll expects to be able to get a job in home healthcare or a nursing home at $17 to $21 an hour. “I was 25 and making $50,000 a year without a degree, so this will be a bit of a pay cut,” she says. An RN position could boost her to around $28 an hour, she adds.

“Academics are pretty rough,” she says, with regular tests and three days every week of clinicals—working alongside hospital nurses, which could help her land a job. “I just wish I would have done it when I was younger. This year’s been rough.”

Michelle Simmons
Age: 42
School: Hodges University
Course of Study: Pre-Physician’s Assistant
Length: Up to three years
Cost: $44,160

With a B.A. in political science from Purdue, Simmons worked in her family’s grocery business, as a pharmacy tech, a drug rep and then started selling real estate. “I’ve been a realtor five years, and I definitely saw the writing on the wall last year,” she says.

The housing crash opened the door to do what she’s always wanted—become a physician’s assistant.

She enrolled last fall in the pre-P.A. program at Hodges and hopes to be accepted into Nova Southeastern University in 2010 to earn her master of medical science in the Physician Assistant program, which will be another two-year program.

Hodges is more expensive than some of the other colleges she’s attended, but with the individual attention and quality of education, she says, “It is totally worth it.” Since starting at Hodges, Simmons has jumped into campus activities and is president of the new Allied Health Club. “It’s very much the college experience I had 20 years ago without the ‘What am I going to do with the rest of my life?’” she says.

With college-age stepchildren, her husband, a doctor, is carrying the financial load, and Simmons’ decision to go back to school wasn’t easy. The Hodges program is 96 credit hours at $460 per hour, and Nova’s program, which lasts another 27 months full-time, will cost around $23,790. Because she already has a degree, Simmons is not eligible for the Florida Resident Access Grant (FRAG), but she hopes to receive scholarship money.

She’s confident she made the right choice. As a P.A., she expects more security and a salary of at least $70,000 per year.

“I’m older. I need to have a career I can do until I retire, and this is something you can do where it doesn’t make a difference how old you are,” she says.

Mark Johnson
Age: 60
School: Edison State College
Course of study: Registered Nursing
Length: Two or two-and-a-half years
Cost: $9,320

With a degree in psychology and a 30-year career as a television reporter, Johnson was laid off—twice, in rapid succession. Facing foreclosure and bankruptcy, he decided a career jump was the most promising way to secure his future.

He had worked at South Florida TV stations and as a medical reporter at Lee Memorial Health System, where he was laid off last September. Two weeks later, Shell Point Retirement Village hired him, but in December, it laid him off, too.

He decided to go back to school to study nursing; he’d come to love the healthcare industry in his 23 years as a medical reporter. “Every day going into work, it was fascinating,” he says. “Doctors used to watch my shows to see what other doctors were doing in their fields,” he says. “Why should I go back to television when job cuts could happen again?”

Unaware of Edison’s Rapid Recovery program when he started in May, he paid for the first semester. If he’s accepted to receive federal funding, he won’t have more school expenses if he finishes within two years.

He’ll graduate with an associate in science degree in nursing, which, if he chooses to continue, would prepare him to enter Edison’s bachelor degree program in Registered Nursing. (That would cost an additional $8,700, says Edison’s Kim Gresham.)

“This way I can work anywhere in the world I want,” he says. Some nurses have the flexibility to work seasonally if they choose, and, he says, “You can work until the day you die.”

Lourdes Delcher
Age: 38
School: Rasmussen College
Course of Study: Health IT
Length: 18 months
Cost: $32,550

With a bachelor’s degree in electronics from her native Cuba, Delcher found work in Montreal for a telecommunications company and as a college-level math teacher. Since moving to the United States five years ago, she’s run into one wall after another.

Unable to find work in her field, she’s worked as an attorney’s assistant, a staff accountant, and is now a housekeeping supervisor at a Punta Gorda hotel and teaching aerobics on the side.
She’s also had trouble going back to school to improve her work options because some schools won’t accept her transfer credits. Rasmussen has assured her it will accept them, and Delcher, now enrolled in its Health Information Technology program to receive an Associate of Science degree, is waiting to hear what will transfer.

With full- and part-time jobs and children, she isn’t able to attend traditional classes, so she’s taking them online. She hopes to finish the degree by December, depending on how many credits are accepted.

Since starting in April, she has received a loan of $3,000, has paid $1,000 for one semester and is waiting to find out whether she’ll receive financial aid for the next semester. She hopes to get a job in coding, which would pay a base wage of about $22 an hour. “I feel pretty good, but sometimes I have concerns,” she says.