If you are an amateur scientist with high expectations and a desire to excel, being a Chemistry Laboratory Technician may be your thing. Now, if you want to be a new Jesse Pinkman (Breaking Bad), better think about another professional career.
The Chemistry Laboratory Technician uses special equipment and techniques to assist chemical engineers or chemical graduates in their researches. To fulfill these tasks, the Chemistry Laboratory Technician must know the usual processes and materials within a laboratory and follow orders with absolute precision. Although some consider it secondary, this role is of vital importance for any company with an investigation department.
Some colleges offer Chemistry Laboratory Technicians training courses, which last between 18 months and two years. However, some companies hire young high school graduates and offer them basic training to get started on the job and learn along the way.
Depending on the level of studies, a Chemistry Laboratory Technician can earn between $32,000 and $47,000 a year. It should be noted that the job possibilities are vast for these technicians.
There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a chemistry laboratory technician. For example, did you know that they make an average of $20.26 an hour? That's $42,149 a year!
Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 2% and produce 1,200 job opportunities across the U.S.
There are certain skills that many chemistry laboratory technicians have in order to accomplish their responsibilities. By taking a look through resumes, we were able to narrow down the most common skills for a person in this position. We discovered that a lot of resumes listed ability to use technology, observation skills and time-management skills.
When it comes to the most important skills required to be a chemistry laboratory technician, we found that a lot of resumes listed 12.8% of chemistry laboratory technicians included lab equipment, while 11.0% of resumes included chemistry, and 6.3% of resumes included test results. Hard skills like these are helpful to have when it comes to performing essential job responsibilities.
When it comes to searching for a job, many search for a key term or phrase. Instead, it might be more helpful to search by industry, as you might be missing jobs that you never thought about in industries that you didn't even think offered positions related to the chemistry laboratory technician job title. But what industry to start with? Most chemistry laboratory technicians actually find jobs in the education and health care industries.
If you're interested in becoming a chemistry laboratory technician, one of the first things to consider is how much education you need. We've determined that 66.0% of chemistry laboratory technicians have a bachelor's degree. In terms of higher education levels, we found that 13.0% of chemistry laboratory technicians have master's degrees. Even though most chemistry laboratory technicians have a college degree, it's possible to become one with only a high school degree or GED.
Choosing the right major is always an important step when researching how to become a chemistry laboratory technician. When we researched the most common majors for a chemistry laboratory technician, we found that they most commonly earn bachelor's degree degrees or master's degree degrees. Other degrees that we often see on chemistry laboratory technician resumes include associate degree degrees or high school diploma degrees.
You may find that experience in other jobs will help you become a chemistry laboratory technician. In fact, many chemistry laboratory technician jobs require experience in a role such as laboratory technician. Meanwhile, many chemistry laboratory technicians also have previous career experience in roles such as research assistant or laboratory assistant.
