While everyone dreams of being successful and leading a happy life, the path to success is never straight. Some people are lucky to get a good education, proceed to college and on to a job of their dream. Others are not as lucky as their paths tend to meander.
If your life isn’t going as well due to a lack of papers and skills, don’t to worry too much. Not in this era of the internet anyway. You can, for instance, enroll for a paralegal online program and join one of the most rewarding careers in the country.
1. Escape exorbitant fees.
In a country where over 70 percent if the graduate students owe an average of $37,172, the cost of education is prohibitive. A typical graduate with less than five years of experience is likely to take home less $50,000 a year. Most people graduate from college already burdened by debt.
On the flip side, an online course doesn’t give you the college experience but won’t saddle you with a fortune in school fee either. You won’t have to move away from home to live in an expensive city. Or attend classes full-time.
The cost of online programs varies widely between schools with some coming in as low as $110 per credit. On average, you’ll need to earn at least 60 credits to graduate. Most programs take two years to complete and are purely online.
2. Make use of your free time.
Not everyone can afford to take time off and attend school fulltime, not when you have bills to pay or a family to feed. With online learning programs, you have the best of both worlds. You can keep your day job and attend classes during your free time.
You can spare a few hours each evening to catch up with the lesson after work. Or take advantage of the commute time and listen to lectures as most of them are delivered in forms of videos. If your day job entails driving long hours, you can catch up with lessons as you make deliveries.
The beauty of taking classes is that you can take the materials virtually everywhere you go. That let’s make good use of every free time at your disposal to catch up with lessons. That could be anywhere from waiting in life at your favorite coffee shop or waiting for an appointment.
3. Think of the good future prospects.
Earnings as a paralegal vary considerably based on location, the field of specialization, experience, and a host of other factors. The U.S. Bureau of Labor and statistics put the average annual pay scale for paralegals at $49,500.
That puts you in the range of other college graduates — of course, minus the crippling debt burden. There’s a growing demand for paralegals and legal assistants with the sector looking at a 15 percent annual growth that is predicted to run until 2026.
That places it among the careers with the highest rate of job creation. Given that you get to escape a crippling debt, joining such a program is an incredible way to improve your life.