No job training money for me
I start documentary filmmaking school Tuesday at George Washington University. It's a six-month program leading to a graduate certificate, and i hope to be able to direct documentaries or work in television news production once I finish. With newspapers dying more quickly than any of us ever imagined, television and film seemed the logical area to continue to do the big (and small) investigative and feature stories I specialized in as a print journalist.
The cost of the program is $8,000, or $8.063 once you add in the student association fee and "voluntary" library contribution. I knew when I applied that I would be able to pay it out of my severance money from the Patriot-News, but wondered if there was any state program that would pay all or part of the cost of retraining me for a new profession. I figured it was worth a shot. If I got even partial hep, the severance check would go a lot further.
I drove to the state CareerLink office, which is located in a former Polyclinic Medical Center building on Wiconisco Street. Ironically, I recognized it as the building where, in its former life, my wife and I went for childbirth classes prior to the arrival of our first daughter 15 years ago. The staff was friendly, but the intake counselor told me before we even completed the walk to his office that Pennsylvania has nothing to help white collar professionals retrain for the jobs of their choice. Many come in, he said, but the only job training money available is for things like truck driving.
He thought my plan to retrain for documentary filmmaking was a great idea, and with my background at the Patriot-News, he said, I would very likely succeed in making the transition. Some of their clients don't, he said, because they have unrealistic expectations about the job they want. Some who are attracted by the good wages of unionized truck driving don't realize you have to be able to operate a standard shift and spend nights away from home. I thanked him and went on my way, wishing I hadn't put as many quarters in the parking meter as I had.
President Obama and the Congress might do well to create a program for the unemployed to get financial help in paying for job retraining. An individual decides what he or she wants to do, finds a training program, and applies for a grant to help pay the cost. A program like this would both create jobs in the training industry and get white collar professionals like me back to being fully productive members of the economy doing something we actually want to do.