TOWARD A TECH JOB Pilot project: a six-month training course to prepare workers for technology jobs, including on-the-job training. Number of trainees: 24 Tuition: $2,400 Run by: Northern Virginia Community College Funded by: Northern Virginia Regional Partnership Participating employers: BTG; BDM International; Cable and Wireless; SRA International; Space Applications; Avatar Solutions; Mindbank Consulting Group; Navy Federal Credit Union

By Peter Behr
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, January 29, 1998; Page E01

Vicki Althaus was a personnel management specialist at the Interior Department. James Fortmuller had worked 17 years in food service management. And Meredith Jackson had quit her job as a technical writer 15 years ago to raise a family.

Their paths have crossed, improbably, in a crowded classroom in Falls Church, where they are immersed in a six-month crash course to transform them into that hottest of work-force commodities -- computer programmers and network technicians.

They and 21 others in the class are guinea pigs in an innovative pilot project testing ways to deal with the region's gaping shortage of technology workers by enlisting recruits from other walks of life.

The project rests on a unique compact between the students and eight Washington area employers in dire need of technicians: The students pay their own way through the first three months of training. They are then offered paid internships at the companies, including several big information technology firms. They will combine on-the-job training with classroom work for the final three months.

Run by Northern Virginia Community College and financed through a state grant, the project is one of the first efforts in the region to close the tech worker gap through training the likes of English majors, accountants and retirees. Other initiatives are cropping up, as the area's supply of college graduates with the latest tech skills is filling only a small part of the burgeoning need.

The internships should lead to jobs -- although there are no guarantees, said Kay Haverkamp, director of continuing education and work force development at Northern Virginia Community College.

"The companies will come in, describe what they do. We want them to meet with the students, then have the students make their choices and have the companies choose. We hope to make some happy matches," Haverkamp said.

Starting salaries will be in the high $20,000 range, she said. "We've told them if they're successful, there is no reason why, within five years, they can't be making $50,000 to $75,000 -- if they continue to grow," she said.

To Fortmuller and others in the class, some of whom earned more than $50,000 a year, it was a risk worth taking in return for the internship and an inside track into a technology career, a goal that had seemed frustratingly out of reach for many of them.

"It looked like I would be spending years of evening classes just to get past the intermediate courses," he said during a lunch-time break in the instruction recently.

"You read all those stories about the technology worker shortage," Althaus said, "yet the companies seem unwilling to take a chance on people. It's hard to figure out what they want."

Some companies are starting to reconsider their positions.

The shortage of technology workers -- estimated at more than 25,000 in the Washington region last year -- has worsened, many company officials said. As the need has grown so has the realization that the pool of technology workers must be quickly expanded by looking in unusual places.

In another effort, Greenthumb Inc., an Arlington-based nonprofit organization, is seeking federal funding to train lower-income seniors and others in the D.C. area to handle Microsoft Corp.'s primary office software products. A U.S. Labor Department grant is financing three such programs by Greenthumb in Baltimore, Austin and Sacramento, with Microsoft providing the software and arranging training. About 30 to 50 people will be enrolled in each city.

The project for the Washington area would be offered to seniors, those who've lost jobs and possibly some welfare recipients, said Greenthumb president Andrea Wooten. It has support from the Private Industry Councils in the Washington area -- business organizations that administer federal training assistance for displaced workers.

Haverkamp's project was funded by a $43,000 grant from the Northern Virginia Regional Partnership, an industry-university group based in Fairfax that received a special $2.6 million state grant last year for technology education.

To improve the chances of its success, the training program was limited at first to people with college degrees in fields unrelated to computers. Two newspaper ads last month initially attracted 250 applicants and that number has since swelled to more than 600, Haverkamp said.

The candidates had to take a technology aptitude test and the highest scorers were invited into the program.

They range in age from 25 to 55. Some were retired. Some had been waiting on tables, she said.

The first three months is an introduction and exploration of computer and telecommunications technologies, from the innards of desktop machines to programming. At that point, students will choose to concentrate either on programming or computer network administration.

The material will be poured in quickly. The students spent one recent morning working through a popular spreadsheet program. Some were running ahead of the instructor and some were lagging several steps behind, with faster students helping some slower ones. "We all feel we have to help pull each other along," Althaus said.

"Of course, we haven't met the companies yet," Fortmuller quipped.

It's not light duty, particularly for people years out of college, with many commitments.

"After being in class the whole day, it's hard to find time to practice and have enough energy and time to do all the other things you have to do," said Monica Epstein, a former quality assurance manager at an area hospital. She is reentering the work force after seven years at home caring for her children.

The tuition charge is $2,400, about one-third the cost of NVCC's regular non-degree technology program and much less than that typically charged by technology schools, she said.

The companies are: BTG Inc. of Fairfax; BDM International Inc. of McLean; Cable and Wireless Inc. and SRA International Inc. of Arlington; Space Applications Corp., Avatar Solutions Inc. and Mindbank Consulting Group Inc. in Vienna; and the Navy Federal Credit Union. Nine more employers are interested in joining the program, and Haverkamp hopes that two additional sessions can be organized this year.

A clear sign of interest by these employers was a big part of the program's appeal, the students said.

Some have gotten a cold shoulder from other technology companies who told them their previous jobs made them "overqualified" to start again as entry-level programmers. They suspect their age is the real, unacknowledged barrier, they said.

Others didn't know how to get started in a new technology career.

Althaus, 46, the Interior Department human relations specialist, had been trying to convert her government job into a technology position by automating some of the processes she used. There wasn't much top-down support, she said. "It wasn't happening.

"I saw this little ad in the paper and decided to try it. I gave up my job.

"It wasn't as wrenching as I thought it would be," Althaus added. " It seemed like a gamble -- risky -- but a very calculated one.