/GOING BACK TO WORK.. any xenia type people around? need advice re. long term career plans

[preggerspoppet]

been thinking about the future.....

I a a sahm and pt childminder and I do agency work as a paediatric nurse. I am loving my lifestyle at the moment but I know that these precious years will be gone before I know it...
so, I have been pondering what it is I might like to do in the future when my kids don't need me so much.

I had kids very young and somehow managed to scrape myself through a nursing course at the same time, but nursing isn't something I can see myself doing.

I want to do something related to psychology and law and children. I need advice on what sort of jobs are available and how do I get there? I guess I need to start with A-levels in psychology and law but then what?

I need a master plan! I am aware that this could take years but I am hoping to study flexibly and part-time as of this september.

xenia? anyone?!
have searched online a bit but I feel I need some 'real' advice......

Educational psychologist ? - Not sure whether you will have to do teacher training first on top of your degree .

I was thinking more to do with law than education iyswim?

www.psychologyinfo.com/forensic/

have a look at above link

interesting... that's the sort of thing, if anyone knows anything about this type of work, what's the best route to getting there? the quickest is never usually the best route. I have just realised that time goes so fast that 5 ,6, 7 years is nothing in the grand scheme, so I might aswell aim high!
thanks pants.

.

Some universities offer things like psychology with criminology. Worth checking if your local one does. Make sure that the degree will offer enough psychology to lead to BPS registration though, or you'll end up having to do something on top. Have a look at the OU as well.

You may not need to start with A levels as a mature student.

hmmm, I was wondering about OU, will do some research, I need some inside info as I am guessing this kind of work is rare and popular, so need to choose the best training route. psychology with criminology sounds perfect. thanks yurt.

pp, I know someone who works as a lawyer for the local council in adoption cases, possibly social services-type cases - perhaps that combines psychology, law and children.

But I don't know any more than that or how best you can get there. Perhaps check with your local council?

There are quite a few prison psychology jobs going although not that well paid at assistant psychologist level. My supervisor does some kind of criminology/psychology research which I always think is incredibly interesting.

Hi preggers, I wouldn't bother with A levels in law unless it is just to find out whether you actually think it is interesting IYKWIM. Do you have any A-levels at the moment?

A lot of local authorities (County Councils or Borough Councils who do childcare) will have legal departments who deal with education (including school admission challenges, prosecutions for failure to attend school/ exclusions/ setting syllabus etc) and will also do social services including taking children into care and monitoring children in care.

Local authorities are usually IME quite approachable and are happy to let people do work experience (unpaid natch) to find out if that sort of thing is for you. If it is, you could do the degree in psychology for your own interest but you would also be able to do a lot of on the job training so it would be worth talking over with your LA if that was the sort of thing you wanted to do. HTH

thanks all, that is food for thought

Badger I don't have any A levels, I did my nursing course back when gcse's were enough. I just don't know if I would have the entry requirements for a degree without a levels, I might speak to some uni's direct as it would knock off a couple of years.
Might also knock up an e-mail to the council for a bit of advice then.

what is your work yurt?

is the OU seen as a good degree?

Psychology and law are not proper A levels and a complete waste of time. If you want to do law you need proper A levels in subjects like English, history, a language, a proper science etc. Same for psychology. My sister read it a Oxford (and is a psychologist) and psychology A level is not really regarded as a good A levels. It's one of the beta low grade kind.

You can set yourself up tomorrow offering therapy and life coaching. You don't need A levels, a degree or anything. you are probably very wise having had children. So I would buy a web site and a yellow pages entry and charge say £25 - £50 an hour or whatever you think your local market will bear and just have a go with it and see.

But if you do want qualifications you can become a legal executive I think on the job so apply to law firms and look on the web site of ilex perhaps.

What about setting up a nursing agency providing nurses to NHS trusts? I just think you can be really succesful in loads of area without needing A levels if you just get on with it, do marketing, set up a business and you'll probably earn a lot more than an over worked local authority lawyer or harrassed NHS psychologist.

thanks for your advice xenia, but I somehow forgot that you and I are on totally different wavelengths!

I see your point about nhs/local authority, it is the same thing I say to my dh about his lifelong desire to work within the emergency services, I tell him that it will be hard work, long hours and for little reward and that he should just do something he is reasonably happy to do that pays well.
but I guess that we are just diferent kind of people to you. he runs a sucessful business which pays well now, but he fell into it and he is ready to find work that he will really enjoy..... but anyway....
I am not planning to work properly for a few years but feel able to do some study in the meantime to set me up with a job doing the kind of thing that I enjoy -kids/law/psyc stuff.

I gladly trust you about the a levels bit, so will atempt to avoid them, but what do you think of OU degrees?

A levels are more flexible than they used to be though. When we were at school it was Biology, physics chemistry only if you wanted to be a doc for example. By the time I was teaching A level retake students (1o years ago) who wanted to be docs it was far more flexible and a number got in with Psychology degrees. They needed Chemistry and preferably Biology but otherwise it was fairly flexible.

I;d take advantage of being a mature student and try and avoid A levels. If you have a University near you have a look at them (I think it's easier to study close by rather than via the OU if you can). OU courses are respected though.

thanks yurt, I have quite a few uni's near me, ideally I will continue my sahm-ing while studying as I juggled uni with 1 dc and childcare before and it was quite a challenge so ou does appeal. I'm going to nosey at some old ou threads on here and see if I have what it takes (!?)
according to OU website I don't need a levels and can transfer some of my uni credits which is nice, I wonder if this only applies to OU?

As yurt says I'm sure you could avoid A-levels. With your nursing background at most they'd maybe ask for an Access to HE qualification. But you may even get away without that.

Info here and here They are specifically aimed at mature students and you can often find a fast track version that you can do in a year.

I still think doing a bit of self employed life coaching or therapy for £X an hour now for a few hours a week building that up or something similar and then expanding it as the children get older might pay off better in the long term than a lot of exam passing in the next few years.

But which do you think you'd prefer more - psychology or law? I suppose that's the first question before seeing if you can get on a degree course for either.

yeah I hear you xenia, you might be right...
but I really like the idea of studying and out of the 2 choices I prefer the law degree than psychology, going on course content that is. aybe I could 'life coach' to help pay for it but I would probably need a bit of 'coaching' myself along the way!

I disagree with Xenia's comment about A-level psychology. Although it is not a requirement for psychology degree programmes it is now a well respected course and a recent review by the exam watchdog concluded that (unlike subjects like media studies) it is a rigorous and demanding academic subject. It is certainly better respected than many of the access courses.

www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/education/article3412580.ece

My advice is to decide what course you would really like to do and then speak to their admissions tutor about your options. I would also recommend starting out with a fairly general course (psychology or law) to give yourself a good general background before deciding how you want to specialise. There will be many career paths that you don't know exist and it is better not to restrict yourself too early.

Good luck.

Could you train as a psychotherapist and specialise in children?

The OU does a 'taster' course in law - it's only about £100 and the course starts in June. There is also a college of law (www.college-of-law.co.uk) which I seem to remember offers distance learning - although this may be for graduates (non-law graduates are fine, but you'd have to look into it to see what your options are without A-levels)

I agree with Xenia that A-levels are a waste of time (unless for interest), for law at least - consider the ILEX route (you can do this distance learning I believe). It's a more gentle route in to a demanding subject (my partner is studying this at the moment as he works in a law office - he is not particularly motivated but still managing to scrape through his exams!)

My impression of law is that there's an awful lot of academic and monotonous work you have to go through before you get to the juicy stuff. It's also quite expensive depending where you want to get to so it's worth having half an idea re what you want to do with it at the end.

Local authorities/public sector is definitely something to consider - I do this at the moment, mainly writing contracts and service level agreements. I have no legal experience and fell into it via temping 5 years ago. I work closely with the children's commissioning team, so you might find doing contracts/developing services in that area interesting, as it has an element of law and children.

Another option could be to get some part time work in a solicitors - temp agencies would be ideal - maybe as a receptionist or legal secretary (you don't always need experience). That would give you exposure to the legal side to see if you fancy it.

Hope this helps a little,

Good luck!

Claire