Teaching to tech career change

[NewDogOldTricks]

Happy Saturday!

I’m currently a manager in an FE college, I’m a very experienced maths teacher with a science degree and I’ve had various management roles across different sectors but have deliberately avoided senior management.

My earning potential has basically ceased and the lack of flexibility in my working life absolutely does my head in. My intention is to retrain in tech. I’ve no experience in this sector but I have taught IT/informatics up to level 3 and gaming is a hobby of mine so I’m not tech-averse.

I’m 38 and my sprogs are 10 and 8; I won’t have any more and they’re pretty self-sufficient so now seems like a good time.

The money though…I know I’ll need to sacrifice this for a bit. I earn 42k at the minute and the thing I worry about is losing my salary for a while, whilst I adjust.

Any advice on how to transition from profession to profession with minimal losses? Or on choosing a skills bootcamp? I’ve signed up to do some coding workshops and I’m starting Python this week.

Is business analysis a gateway option of interest for you? You may be able to spin existing experience to sound relevant, self study a BCS certification and look for roles developing learning and development systems? I'm thinking this may be a route to preserve income.

In tech areas there is often a lack of the softer skills - stakeholder engagement, requirements gathering, documentation and training. That could be a good route in for you.
These roles often command a higher salary than you are on now. You can transition to a more technical role then if you want

Thanks so much for the responses and advice. I didn’t consider either of those options.

I’ve actually done quite a bit of both of those as strands of my job. I’ve worked within apprenticeships too so in terms of stakeholders, there’s quite a bit involved there. Most of my day job involves analysing data and putting intervention in places and quality assurance with external agencies and of course ofsted.

I’ve also worked management roles in retail (supermarket) and leisure (gambling) so in terms of general needs analysis I have a general working knowledge of those industries.

If I could just wedge my foot in somewhere, I know I will make it work.

Do you both work in the industry? If so, are there many more middle aged career changing women?

I work in analytics. Used to do but not I manage a team and do the stakeholder engagement. These roles are quite rare but more companies and realising the need for someone with a business mindset. Often it’s not a skill set the most technical people have. Often these roles are badged as product owners - if you’re not familiar with agile methodologies then learning this will definitely help you.
There are quite a lot of roles for business analysts (requirements gathering) and project managers.

Good luck!

Which area of tech are you interested in? Networking, programming, infosec, AI, or something else? You can do COMPTIA A+ certification for networking credentials by studying it out of a book at home then entering yourself for the exams at a Pearson centre (where they do driving theory tests). You can study CISCO in most community FE colleges. Otherwise you can teach yourself programming. The most important thing is to build a portfolio to show what you can do so getting a website or blog where you can put your portfolio is a priority.

Yep, first thing is to really figure out what you mean by 'Tech'.

I work in Information Security, it's more about establishing what the baseline requirements are for the company, what security frameworks we will work within, establish the policies and work with the various IT functions to implement those controls. I need to understand the Domains, know about Privacy regulations, have a decent understanding of the technical and logical controls (technical eg firewalls, encryption, authentication, availability zones. Logical eg Training, rules that people need to follow, visitor sign in books).

Within Info Sec there are specialities like:

• Threat Operations - malware, phishing, Social engineering, SIEM solutions, email gateways,
• Security Operations - Incident management, vulnerability testing
• Governance, Risk & Compliance - Policy development, Risk management, Internal and External audit

Then there are the various IT team 'tech' roles

• Software development/engineering
• Network engineer
• DevOps
• Cloud architect
• System administration

......

I've taken some screenshots of a salary benchmarking site we use, couldn't specify your region as don't know it but it gives some idea of salary ranges for different types of tech roles.

Won't let me attach them for some reason so I've put them in a google drive folder photos.app.goo.gl/A3RSjQK6H2jVy3qR6

This is all incredibly helpful, thank you! Re. Information security, I used to teach a level 3 Forensic IT unit which was just that! Obviously it was more of how those things are used and how hackers and crackers differ and how firewalls work (I can’t DO any of those things but I taught the theory around it).

My career interests would mainly fall with programming and UX I suppose. I have a personal interest in data science as I’ve taught bits of that too but that’s not what I want to do as a job, I just love maths 😂.

I’d like to work with clients that want apps or software that help people in their daily lives. I’ve thought quite a bit about people who are new to the country and what could help them. Or even those who have specific medical or educational needs.

This? getintotech.sky.com/courses/get-into-tech/

I did look at that link, thanks!

I quite fancy it but the 5 dayer at the start just isn’t feasible around my job (there’s that flexibility issue again!). It’s definitely the type of thing I’m after though.

I've just done two Code First Girls sessions. Quite possibly the worst online teaching sessions I've ever encountered (and I've seen hundreds). I could have taught the first one better myself. No interaction, no decent examples and shocking explanation of mathematical concepts when asked. If anyone managed to retain anything from the second one, I'll hand deliver them a medal. It's a shame because the lady delivering it was clearly very, very knowledgeable! I'd give my left leg for that knowledge at the moment. Unfortunately there's a very stark difference between knowing something and being able to teach it to others. Back to the drawing board for me!