Plenty of UNPAID internships to go around at PCOM. Paid jobs? Does Minimum wage count?

Plenty of UNPAID internships to go around at PCOM. Paid jobs? Does Minimum wage count?

A friend of mine recently received an e-mail blast from ‘career’ services at PCOM offering paid massage positions in NJ.  I’m blogging about this because paid positions from PCOM are almost unheard of.  My friend responded and received a curt response from Cynthia Neipris that the position is only open to current PCOM students.  Is that why it was sent to the alumni distribution list?  I guess even though she graduated PCOM, has an NJ massage license and is eminently qualified doesn’t count for much when PCOM has to parse out jobs because career services sucks.  

That being said, I’d like to bring your attention to the NYT article that recently came out regarding the pushback employers are receiving when they depend on unpaid internships.  People who peruse the PCOM NY job boards probably have to scroll for a few hours before finding PAID (minimum wage) jobs and then scroll until their computer equipment gives out to find anything remotely above minimum wage.  Why would students pay $200K for a degree that only nets them unpaid internships and minimum wage jobs? 

That brings me to my next topic:  Gluttony.  I think there are 2 kinds of gluttony in this world.  Honest gluttony (where you treat yourself well from the fruits of your labor) and repugnant gluttony.  Repugnant gluttony is what I feel PCOM NY engages in because they scam students into believing that they’ll earn a decent living when they graduate while charging them an arm and a leg.  Employees at PCOM (I really hold the career services department to be the main culprits) are really fat (metaphorically, if not physically…but sometimes both) from repugnant gluttony.  

Pacific College of Oriental Medicine, Acupuncture and Job Prospects

I’m glad you’re a successful student and that you feel PCOM’s Career Services/Cynthia Neipris is doing right by you. In all sincerity, I hope that my grim opinion on the income potential for PCOM acupuncture students is wrong and that every single PCOM acupuncture graduate earns a living wage.

Acupuncture is a fascinating field of study and the decision to walk away from the degree and my spent tuition money wasn’t easy. I took a hard look around and assessed the ROI of a potential L.Ac. I spent my clinic shifts talking to the advanced students and didn’t hear of any success stories. I looked at the people who obtained the degree and where they were in life. It wasn’t a very compelling outlook.

Every single one of these people were passionate about acupuncture and did well in school. I tried to find success stories when I searched using the terms ‘acupuncture, salary, pay, income’ and I found a whole community of acupuncturists who agree that making a living is ridiculously hard. Do the search yourself (https://www.pocacoop.com/ is a good place to start, as is http://www.theturningpointacupuncture.com/SoYouWantToBeAPunk.html) – I have absolutely NOTHING to gain from this blog.

As to your suggestions on how I can help Career Services, what would Cynthia do with any extra money she receives when she thinks she’s doing a great job thus far?  I spent 2 years at PCOM and recall that the only e-mails she sent out were for overpriced CEU credits, calls for UNPAID volunteer work, UNPAID internships, UNPAID externships (look up the difference between internships and externships), and ‘exciting opportunities’ to work as an UNPAID assistant at an acupuncturist’s office.

I have the following suggestions for improving career services:

1. Publicly post the number of PCOM graduates (broken down by campus) working full time as acupuncturists. Include the mean, median and mode salary and all info relevant for statistical integrity (total # of graduates, total respondents, definition of acupuncture field, etc).

2. Allow students and prospective students to see the alumni job boards – they should know what they’re getting themselves into.

3. Like the students who are on the hook for student loans, Cynthia should have some skin in the game. A significant portion of her income should be based on the percentage of graduates earning $55K or higher per year (this bar is set LOW for NYC — and no cheating, only income from acupuncture work counts).

4. Have the SBA or a management consulting firm come in and review the career services program. I graduated from a good school and I know that job boards should consist of real employment positions – not unpaid ‘opportunities’.

5. Students pay a LOT in tuition money and they deserve an innovative career services department. 

Pacific College of Oriental Medicine NY Issues

Cynthia Neipris, the director of Career Services at Pacific College of Oriental Medicine’s (PCOM) NY campus recently responded to my posting on the livelihood of acupuncturists. I considered taking the conversation offline and addressing the hurt she felt over the posting and make it clear that I am not into causing pain or distress. I re-read my posting to see if I was unfair, cruel or hateful and then I read her post again to try and see things from Cynthia’s point of view. Here are my thoughts on this:

1. My existence would be truly blissful if everything I read about myself were positive. However, this isn’t a realistic scenario. I need my friends and family to be there and tell me all the negatives so I could be an even BETTER person. I need my bosses and co-workers to tell me what they see so I could do an…

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