Lost College kid looking for advice

In education, most areas have one or more alternative school or autism school at this point. They need one-to-one staff and teacher’s assistants. Also, some states have programs where, if you pass the special Ed praxis, you can teach for up to four years while earning a teaching degree. Also, look into local college engagement programs and local colleges. They like psych majors for recruitment, especially if you have a bachelor of science because you can speak to a wide variety of offerings.

In the field, there’s Pysch rehab (PRP) and case management services to look into. You can get a certification in PRP without a degree. In addition, you have residential services, day programs, job coaching/skills training centers, etc.

At the state level they tend to want licenses, and that means you’ll need a masters or a social work degree, unfortunately. However, there are usually lower level positions with your health department, HRDC, food stamps, etc departments. Most states keep an online list of jobs.

Finally, there’s almost anything else. Employers are starting to see the need for soft skills and that’s what you’re getting from the right psych major. You can train them up for almost anything else from there. I’m also seeing a trend of case managers for fellow employees. These are people responsible for addressing staff issues to help retain staff and deal with problems before they get to the point of requiring additional resources.

I’m also holding out some degree of hope states start to recognize the license or certificate is a more accurate measure of current ability than the degree and all people with bachelors to “Test up” with continuing education requirements in order to get more qualified therapists in the field. They’ve had to do a similar thing with nurses which seems to be going well and the mental health field needs all the help it can get.

/r/biology Thread Parent