If you missed Part One, check it out here.
If you look at the list of reasons why a student wouldn’t get a job right away (can’t work full-time, has to have a very flexible schedule, doesn’t have high-speed Internet) you’ll notice that none of these reasons relate to Career Step at all. CS doesn’t have control over whether you have kids or dial-up or work full-time. The bottom line is, there is a high demand for medical transcriptionists right now, and as long as you can pass the various company tests, you’ll have no problem finding a job.
So the real question becomes: Does CS produce graduates who can pass the company tests?
Yes. That is an unequivocal yes.
If you can pass the CS final, then you will be able to pass most company tests. Usually the higher the grade you receive on your final, the more likely you are to pass company tests, but even if you squeak by with just an 85% on the final (the lowest grade you can receive and still graduate), you’re still going to be able to pass a lot of the company tests, although you won’t be able to pass them all (just giving you fair warning there.) A lot of people, if they receive a grade under 90%, will retest (which CS allows you to do) to be able to practice some more and hopefully receive a higher grade the second (or third) time around.
As a side note, Career Step offers a service to medical transcription companies where they will administer the tests for the MT companies for a fee, leaving the company free to focus on other things, so many of the tests you encounter out in the job field look a lot like the CS final you just passed. That isn’t a coincidence. 😉 This also means that the grade you receive on your final is usually within a few percentage points of the grade that you receive on the company tests that you take, so if you pass the CS final then you will pass the company test. That’s why people take the time to retest if they didn’t like their score.
The long and short of it is, the Career Step final is difficult, it tests your knowledge thoroughly, and if you can pass it, you can find a job, and usually fairly quickly. All of this of course depends on the condition of the market – if the market gets saturated with new graduates for whatever reason, then finding a job will be harder, but then again, that doesn’t have anything to do with Career Step. They have no control over market need or saturation.
Well, because the question was aimed towards Career Step, I answered it with the CS angle, but I want everyone to know that a graduate of M-TEC or Andrews will also fare extremely well in the marketplace. All three schools are great, they all offer something different to their students, and all three schools produce students who are ready to work and who will find jobs quickly. One of the reasons that the job market is great for graduates is because for the longest time, the MT field was composed of older women who had been doing the job for years, but now these ladies are starting to retire, which leaves job openings for the younger workforce coming in.
Secondly, there is a lot of growth in the field anyway, because MT work allows doctors to protect themselves from being sued and in sue-happy America, that means a lot of need for transcriptionists. 😉 The one trend to watch for is a work being sent overseas, which I will address as soon as I finish covering: Why is there a price difference between Career Step and M-TEC/Andrews? Thanks for reading!
This blog is part of a series on transcription. If you haven’t read the other blogs in this series, make sure to check out the summary page for a listing of all transcription blogs.