EL CAJON -- Grossmont College will help students obtain new office skills
or brush up on old ones to enhance their value as office professionals, with a variety of short-term classes commencing
with the Spring Semester in January.
Whether students desire positions as office clerks,
secretaries, administrative assistants or even as stay-at-home entrepreneurs marketing
their services as “virtual assistants,”
Grossmont College is providing
short-term programs for them through its Business Office Technology (BOT) and
Business (BUS) Departments.
On Facebook,
one may find information on Business Office Technology at
https://www.facebook.com/grossmont.bot .
Here are some classes the faculty wishes to draw to the
attention of prospective students:
Course
No. Brief Description Start End
On-Line Courses
BOT-120 MS Word Jan 27 March 21
BOT-123 MS Excel Jan 27 March 21
BOT 111 Virtual Assistant
Jan 27 June 2
BOT 150 Microsoft Pub. Feb. 3 April
4
BOT
104 Filing, Records Mgmt Feb 18 April
26
On-Campus Courses
BOT-102A Keyboarding Docs Jan 27 June 2
BOT-102B Keyboard/ Docs II Jan 27 June 2
BUS
148 Cust. Relations Mgmt Jan 27 March
21
BUS
252 Global Sources Jan 27 March 21
BOT
094 Internet Basics Jan 27 June 2
BOT 299A Social Media Basics Jan 27 June
2
BOT
151 Microsoft Outlook Jan 27 June 2
The Virtual Assistant course (BOT 111) teaches students how to open a home
office and then via email, fax, phone and other communications devices market
themselves to small companies needing assistants to provide administrative
support.
Instructor Tom Smerk recommends
the course to the following groups: 1. People whose career drive and success
goals are not being recognized by their employer 2. People who have to take
care of children or a parent 3. Workers with disabilities 4. Those who want to
hold a full-time job but use the virtual assistant business to make some extra
income on the side 5. People who like to travel. More information about this
and other Business Office Technology courses may be found at
http://www.grossmont.edu/bot
Per the chart above, the Business Department is offering Customer Relations
Management (BUS-148) and Global Sources, Buying and Manufacturing (BUS-252).
The ‘ Microsoft Publisher ‘(BOT-150) course will help students create flyers,
brochures, business cards, letterhead, logos
among other items, said Prof. Linda Snider, BOT coordinator.
Information on how to enroll in all these short-term courses, as well as others
programs such as the “Security Academy” (AOJ-1761A) course offered in the
Academy of Justice program, may be obtained by visiting Grossmont College’s
website,
www.grossmont.edu
OPT Program
A separate, intensive
program which is free to students, thanks to grants from industry and proceeds from volunteer fundraising, is the
Office Professional Training (OPT) program that begins Jan. 6. Nearly 2,300 students have graduated this
program since its inception in 1985.
In addition to free tuition and textbooks, the program provides personal/crisis
counseling, job placement assistance, and professional clothing for students
who cannot afford to purchase new wardrobes to wear on interviews or to work, said
Dr. Mary Leslie, OPT Lead Instructor.
Dr. Leslie, who has headed the program for 27 years, said intensive classes
meet for 20 weeks on Mondays through Fridays from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Any California resident looking for a job may
apply for the program, which includes six core courses as well as several
electives in the semester.
Core courses include job search, office systems and procedures, business
English and communication. Core software
classes are Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, and Keyboarding. In addition to their core courses, students
elect to specialize in one or more of the following: Accounting, Banking, Insurance, and/or Office
Support.
Leslie said up to 50 students per semester may enter the program, with the
approximate value being $3,000 per student, which is defrayed through grants
and contributions from individuals, foundations, and government agencies, as
well as various fundraising events organized by OPT faculty, alumni, and
students.
New and lightly used office clothing is donated by friends of the program. Each student may have as a gift three
complete outfits, and then, through “OPT bucks”—which are awarded for punctual
and regular attendance—the students may acquire even more outfits.
Other fundraising is done through a golf
tournament and a fashion show sponsored by the Professional Women in
Insurance; special Grossmont College OPT days at local restaurants in
which the program receives a percentage of the revenues; sale of pizza
in the Main Quad; auctions of donated items at Mentor Night; a spring
Walk-a-Thon; and the pre-Christmas sale of decorative bricks and other
craft items made by OPT alumni at regular weekly get-togethers.
The
OPT program was started under the federal Job Training Partnership Act,
and then continued under the Workforce Investment Act. Initially the
federal government provided funds in an effort to move welfare
recipients into jobs. Today, the program must raise its own funds, and,
while welfare recipients continue to benefit from the program,
applicants no longer are required to demonstrate financial hardship. To
donate to the program, contact Leslie at (619) 644-7533.
“This
program is so valuable,” Leslie commented. “You can really change
people’s lives, not by giving them a hand out, but a hand up. If people
are willing to work for it, they can enter a career that has a ladder
so they can move up.”
-DHH-