Biotech Jobs Pitched to High School Students

Responding to demand from the region’s biotechnology companies for more skilled workers, Ventura College has unveiled a new outreach program to encourage county high school students to pursue such careers.

Beginning this fall, students in science classrooms across the county will be told of the increasing job opportunities in the local biotechnology industry.

Several companies have recently announced plans for significant new hires. Baxter Health Care Corp. said it plans to add 200 employees to its Thousand Oaks facility by year’s end. And biotech powerhouse Amgen Inc. hopes to fill 1,000 new positions in Newbury Park in the next seven months.

But executives complain they have trouble finding enough people locally for such openings.

“There really is a shortage of candidates in the county,” said Chris Meissner, president of Camarillo-based Meissner Filtration Products, which manufactures filters used in the production of pharmaceuticals and semiconductors.

Under the Ventura College outreach program, students will receive guidelines detailing the types of courses required to prepare for a career that blends biology and technology to create everything from pharmaceuticals and vaccines to pest-resistant plants.

With such information, college officials said, high school students can get a jump on college by completing their basic science courses before graduating.

“You can get some of your chemistry, math and physics out of the way before you get to college,” said Bill Thieman, project director and head of Ventura College’s biotechnology program. “This is an opportunity to get serious four years earlier.”

Thieman distributed sets of customized course guidelines to science teachers from 14 of the county’s public high schools last Friday. The new guidelines indicate which science and math classes at each high school correspond to freshman college courses. Three high schools at the county’s east end--Royal, Oak Park and Simi Valley--declined to participate in the program.

“Biotech is one of the fastest-growing industries in the county,” said Richard Smith, a science teacher at Buena High School in Ventura. “This is an excellent way to provide future employees.”

Because of the large number of jobs available, teachers said they wanted to get their students thinking early about their careers.

“The potential for growth is phenomenal,” said Moorpark High School biology teacher Norman Chung.

The outreach effort, which is also aimed at drawing students from across the county to Ventura College, was funded by $125,000 in state and federal grants.

The college offers a three-semester biotechnology program that trains students for entry-level laboratory technician jobs.

The training offered, with an emphasis on research and development, is different from that available through a similar Moorpark College program, Thieman said, and may be of interest to students outside the west county campus’ traditional service area.

Entry-level salaries for graduates of the program employed at larger biotech companies average around $36,000, Thieman said.

Moorpark College’s biotechnology program, which emphasizes biomanufacturing, will host an open house at its training facility and laboratory on Cal State Northridge’s Camarillo campus Friday from 4 to 6 p.m. Graduates of Moorpark’s four-semester program have earned starting salaries between $26,000 and $33,000 at a wide range of companies in the county, said program coordinator Maureen Harrigan.

Harrigan said she also plans to prepare and distribute brochures for high schools students before the end of the year.

Biotechnology executives said this early recruiting effort may eventually help increase the local labor pool of skilled workers. But they cautioned that most of the openings in their companies are for prospects with at least a bachelor’s degree in molecular biology, chemistry or related fields.

Meissner said a benefit of the high school outreach program will be to persuade those with technical aptitudes to consider a well-paying career as a scientist. Many of those students traditionally envision becoming physicians, he said.

“I think this is a step in the right direction for students who are good at math and science and don’t relish the idea of going through medical school,” he said. “It could catch students before they go too far down the wrong path thinking they have to give up science.”

David Kaye, Amgen’s director of communications, said only a handful of the current openings at the company’s 5,000-employee facility could be filled by students who completed the lab tech training program at Ventura or Moorpark colleges.

“Most of our labor is [more] highly skilled,” he said.

The two colleges, as well as Oxnard College, also offer the standard courses needed by transfer students intending to major in the sciences at a four-year university.

The lab tech training programs at Ventura and Moorpark colleges are open to both high school graduates and those who already hold bachelor’s degrees. Often college graduates make up the majority of students in the program, officials said.

Scott Eaker said his job satisfaction--and pay--increased significantly after completing the program at Ventura College five years ago. He joined the program after earning a B.S. degree in microbiology from UC Davis.

Eaker, 29, a quality control supervisor at Baxter Health Care, said his starting salary at the company was $7 more an hour than the $10-an-hour veterinary technician job he held after college.

“And I’ve been promoted a couple of times since then,” he said.