High tech wage slave jobs to avoid in Silicon Valley (San Jose: apartment, rental)

[kyle242]

Originally Posted by PhoenixSomeday

Nothing decent even at De Anza? It's a community college in Cupertino. I think of the area community colleges, it would have the best chance at having something like that, although I don't remember one way or another if it had something like that from my days of going there.

I found something close decent from affiliated Foothill College. Thanks for your tip!

[gnomatic]

The jobs you listed actually aren't that common in SV. Most of the major tech company have those positions else where, if they do it in house at all, else they contract it out. Data centers in particular are pretty rare in the bay area due to the high real estate & energy cost.

Have you look into Heald College? One of the networking company I worked for down in San Jose had a lot the lab admins were Heald College grads. I believe they had a job placement and/or internship relationship with Heald (which was just down the street). And at another company in the peninsula, the IT support staff were contractors, but a lot of them were Heald or DeAnza grads.

What ever college you decide on, definitely ask about their job placement, and internship programs, and their relationships with local employers.

[kyle242]

Originally Posted by gnomatic

The jobs you listed actually aren't that common in SV. Most of the major tech company have those positions else where, if they do it in house at all, else they contract it out. Data centers in particular are pretty rare in the bay area due to the high real estate & energy cost.

Have you look into Heald College? One of the networking company I worked for down in San Jose had a lot the lab admins were Heald College grads. I believe they had a job placement and/or internship relationship with Heald (which was just down the street). And at another company in the peninsula, the IT support staff were contractors, but a lot of them were Heald or DeAnza grads.

What ever college you decide on, definitely ask about their job placement, and internship programs, and their relationships with local employers.

Here is my situation. I already have Bachelor of Science in IT from university in Chicago where part of my curriculum covered networking (but I could have taken better BS in Network Technology which would have been better), had CCNA in 2010-2013. Now I have Net+, preparing to retake CCNA (the new one) and get CCNP. What I particularly look for is certificate preparatory classes, although I am probably better off doing on my own with books, video courses and simulators if I wanna advance quickly, because with college courses it may take as long as 1 year before I finish enough material to take exam and all I am preparing for is just cert, not degree. I am also thinking of taking MCSA, MCSE since my company will pay for the exams anyway (and CCNA though they won't pay for CCNP). As for training I am on my own cost.

I did also 2+ years in IT before taking data center job position in help desk with other large top 500 companies, not network admin, but more windows server support, troubleshooting because thats how is as far as I could find. I am looking to advance into network engineering but its a tough job market out there.

[economix-nole]

Originally Posted by kyle242

Data center tech jobs is little more than help desk but it does not require bachelors or many years of experience.

I chose this job so I could have better chance someday to get job as network administrator or engineer. I heard on average those jobs pay much better. Its difficult to get into networking field with no experience. Its little easier as system admin. I am studying for CCNP and other certifications to help me land better job but study on own from books or video online.

I was looking for cheap community college cert training programs in SV and I found nothing like that which was available to me before moving from Illinois. It came a little shock to me Silicon Valley community colleges in San Jose offer no low cost good adult training programs in those fields.

I am thinking if I should skip searching for cheaper room to rent which hard to find nowdays and focus on searching entry level jobs in high tech somewhere else in the country, maybe move back to Chicago or move to Seattle , Texas or Virginia.

I'm a big fan of CBT nuggets and Train Signal videos. Although they are a little pricey, you can watch the videos again and again. I even watch lectures on Cousera to fill the gaps in area I'm not so familiar with and UWash is putting more and more great content on there for hardware/network/admin types.

[economix-nole]

Originally Posted by gnomatic

The jobs you listed actually aren't that common in SV. Most of the major tech company have those positions else where, if they do it in house at all, else they contract it out. Data centers in particular are pretty rare in the bay area due to the high real estate & energy cost.

Have you look into Heald College? One of the networking company I worked for down in San Jose had a lot the lab admins were Heald College grads. I believe they had a job placement and/or internship relationship with Heald (which was just down the street). And at another company in the peninsula, the IT support staff were contractors, but a lot of them were Heald or DeAnza grads.

What ever college you decide on, definitely ask about their job placement, and internship programs, and their relationships with local employers.

I would strongly advise against Heald College and other for-profit universities in similar areas. A quick Google search of Heald and Corinth colleges will show the low ROI and deceptive marketing they have used to attract students.

[kyle242]

Originally Posted by economix-nole

I would strongly advise against Heald College and other for-profit universities in similar areas. A quick Google search of Heald and Corinth colleges will show the low ROI and deceptive marketing they have used to attract students.

Even some non-for-profit universities have questionable programs and degrees. All of them just keep raising tuition faster than inflation while not really providing anything in return.

The moment I visited Heald College, it seemed to me on the same league as ITT, University of Phoenix, DeVry, ETC, that you have to sign up in order to find even more details about classes, curriculum or tution. Normal college websites don't do that and let you preview class schedule before registration, detail costs, etc.

[neutrino78x]

Kyle, I work at a charity right now and I make minimum wage, $10.15 an hour. $20 an hour would change my life. I've had some very promising interviews lately for tech support jobs like what you identified, and they quoted similar numbers. One company said they would be very interested in me once I got CCNA. So when I move back into downtown I plan to resume studying for that one (where I'm living right now is a very distracting environment, hard to study).

I've never heard of a Valley company requiring a BS or higher for data center or tech support, though. The main thing they want is knowledge (demonstrated by either a degree or certifications) and experience. A friend worked as a tech for 20 years, making more than double that figure, and she never had a degree.

[neutrino78x]

btw De Anza is awesome, I don't have an associate's from there yet, but I have taken many courses, including after high school and before the Navy. As a community college their tuition is $31 a unit. Edit: a typical course is 5 units so $155.

Here are their computer science programs:

https://www.deanza.edu/cis/degrees.html

[Huckleberry3911948]

Originally Posted by kyle242

1. Data Center Technician

- you will make maybe more than help desk desktop support at around $21 instead of $15 an hour but its still low relative to high cost of living in the Bay Area.

2. Help Desk Support

3. Customer Service Rep (callcenter) for a high tech firm


So if you are thinking about moving to California, do not move for these.

Work --the introduction to center stage of lifes most significant activity and its largest character former
Work
For many young people full time work is an enormous reality shock

[kyle242]

Originally Posted by neutrino78x

Kyle, I work at a charity right now and I make minimum wage, $10.15 an hour. $20 an hour would change my life. I've had some very promising interviews lately for tech support jobs like what you identified, and they quoted similar numbers. One company said they would be very interested in me once I got CCNA. So when I move back into downtown I plan to resume studying for that one (where I'm living right now is a very distracting environment, hard to study).

I've never heard of a Valley company requiring a BS or higher for data center or tech support, though. The main thing they want is knowledge (demonstrated by either a degree or certifications) and experience. A friend worked as a tech for 20 years, making more than double that figure, and she never had a degree.

Be careful. $20/h don't mean a thing if you have student loan from college (smart investment??????) even if not big, adding on to that high cost of apartment rental in Bay Area (unless you can find cheap room for rent in a shared apartment or live far like in Stockton which latter is not worth). Gas cost a lot, San Jose area and Bay Area in general requires lot of driving around. Insurance for car is pretty expensive too (like mine from Geico just for Corolla cost nearly $140 a month for standard, not minimum coverage). I remember insurance was half cost of that in Chicago suburbs but it could also be higher due to the fact I live in east SJ. As for food, when you work 10 hours a day (thats long day) in a place that does not provide food to employees, you'll spend at least half week on buying outside 2 lunches that quite adds up. Also remember you also pay quite a lot for health insurance (which cost me $150 a month) and if you are not 100% healthy and go to doctors you'll be sucked out of some money. Its better than I would have with Medicare or Obamacare, but still with 20% copay and out of pocket expenses, I find it quite expensive.

My advice is to you, when you get your first better job, don't be afraid to negotiate for higher wage but realize at entry-level you may not have much leverage in negotiation. Start investing in 401k as soon as possible when company offers it to you unless you have debt like credit card balance to pay off first but do it anyway at minimum if you get company's match Good luck on getting your CCNA. I recommend you set up lab at home or at least get virtual simulator.

I hope a troll won't spoil the discussion on this thread.