because why would something work out easily

[jazzfish]

Well, a year of GIS school was a fun dream while it lasted.

Good morning and thank you for your inquiry.

They current waitlist is quite lengthy, at this point, so I'd probably suggest you apply to the next intake.

Other options include: a "part-time" online-only two-year program, which sounds great except for the 'two-year' part seeing as I run out of money halfway through; going back to tech writing; something completely different that I haven't figured out yet.

Bah. Yesterday, when I saw the 'apply for waitlist,' I was disheartened and depressed (also a known side effect of looking at the first page of my college transcript). Today I am mostly annoyed: at BCIT for not noting that they were full up, at myself for emotionally investing in this.

Onward.

Comments

[ironymaiden]

Is remote ok? I think University of Washington extension may have a GIS cert. I did Python with them and it was good

[jazzfish]

Remote would be ideal, honestly; I was only looking at the in-person thing because it would have only run nine months, so minimizing the time I'm not employed. I'll look into UWash, thank you! (Unsure how cross-border stuff would work, for either 'enrollment' or 'certificate transfer', but at least I'm a dual citizen so it won't be as bad as it might be.)

[aamcnamara]

booo, waitlist!

I will say, in my experience GIS jobs are generally either for oil companies or for public sector orgs; and definitely public sector organizations need people to do documentation, translating between tech and human language, etc. Probably the pay is a little worse than tech company, possibly the benefits are better (they definitely are in the US). Could be worth looking into? (At least here, it's usually most productive to just go to a government jobs listing page and scroll through clicking on anything that looks vaguely plausible--a lot of them are union and have very standardized titles that don't necessarily reflect the actual role.)

[jazzfish]

Yeah, up here it's forestry companies or various government orgs. I'm mostly looking at the provincial government at the moment. Pay's definitely worse than I'd been getting; benefits are questionably better (but retirement is pretty good, should I live so long). But they're pretty likely to be able to work with a four-day week, which is something I'd really, really like to do.

[sartorias]

At least you gave it a shot. Though that probably has zero comfort.

[jazzfish]

I am trying to look at it as "at least i am thinking of other options." And to be honest this is a case where I went away from it and took a nap and it was way less frustrating when I came back to it. Still disappointing but probably not end-of-world disappointing.

[greenstorm]

If you work for the BC gov for three years* they pay off the provincial part of your student loans (I think all student loans are no-interest right now) re: funding.

*three years starting I think with the beginning of fiscal after you begin, or maybe the beginning of calendar after you begin, so it can in practice be closer to 4, but it's still 1/3 per year.

I think Lakehead and a couple other places out east in Canada have programs too, IIRC it's always cheaper if you live in-province, next-cheapest if you live in the country, and most expensive if you live in another country (I think all universities have this sort of rate schedule?)