Go Back to School, Your Job May Depend on It!
by Barbara Reinhold

Here's an important set of questions: Who was your all-time favorite teacher? What class do you remember as being the most fun and challenging at the same time? And, then, what class did you absolutely hate? Which was easier for you to remember and count multiples of -- the
classes you loved or the ones you hated? If you're one of the "I loved school" types, then you're in luck. But if playing hooky was your idea of a good day at school, then there's probably some reprogramming you need to be doing. Why? Because your livelihood may depend on it. What differentiates the folks whose incomes have risen over the past decade from those whose checks have decreased in purchasing power is the e-word: education. Now, "education" doesn't necessarily mean finishing a degree -- associate's, bachelor's, master's of some kind or doctorate -- even though you can usually count on those degrees more than paying for themselves over the course of your career. Challenging, exciting, boost-your-earning-power learning also comes in all these sizes:

Certificate programs in various technical or professional fields -- you can usually find both evening and summer options, for which employers are often willing to pay at least half the tuition.

Weekend retraining programs -- some of which come with continuing education credits in fields where that requirement applies.

Evening and day-long training sessions -- the back pages of trade magazines and the bulletin boards in HR are filled with flyers. Again, the organization will often pay.

Training inside your organization -- Because the shelf life of the average job skill is not much more than a year in most cases, organizations know that they're going to need to retrain all the time. In fact, corporations now spend more per year on educating their employees than all the
four-year colleges in the country combined. If it's been a year since you took a course or attended a seminar, you're getting stale and might not even know it.

Online courses and educational programming -- you can buy a CD-ROM to teach you almost anything.

Correspondence courses -- learn about a topic or even pursue a degree through satellite institutions, most of which are listed in Bear's Directory of Distance Learning Opportunities.

Private tutors -- increasing numbers of folks are turning to personal tutors and coaches to help them develop the skills they need. I know lots of 50-year-olds paying high school and college students to teach them computer skills, for instance.

Reading -- the lost art. If you want to learn about something and don't have the time or inclination to take a course or find a tutor now, then take yourself to the library or a bookstore and come home with one book, about your field, about the world at large, or about stuff you've never read and wished you had. Here are two reasons why you need to go over this list, find some items that might work for you and get started on a learning campaign now. The first is easy: because your income usually increases in direct proportion to your skills. The second is more subtle: because being bored makes you sick. According to a major Irish medical journal and the reports of numerous health care providers, people who are bored are much more likely to develop major health problems, such as heart disease. Wouldn't you really rather be
learning a little something?

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