Careers

Take your career to the next level! 

There are many career opportunities in the human services field, in a variety of areas:

• Developmentally disabled care, including day programs and institutional daycare.
• Elderly care, including nursing homes, senior centers and rehabilitation programs.
• Health care, including hospitals, nutrition and wellness.
• Addiction services, such as drug and alcohol, eating disorders and sexual addictions.
• Environmental services, such as housing, public service and park and recreational programs.
• Educational services in daycare, schools, colleges and universities.
• Income transfer services such as youth corps and job training.
• Criminal justice, which includes law enforcement, jails, halfway houses and legal advocacy.
• Family services, which include domestic violence and abuse, shelters, family crisis and marriage preparation and counseling services.
• Mental health care, including institutions, crisis centers, halfway houses and legal advocacy.

Human services graduates work in a variety of roles:

• Outreach worker – provides access to people with problems, refers to appropriate services and does follow-up
• Broker – helps people access existing services and ensure that the services relate to the client
• Advocate – fights for services, policies, rules, regulations, and laws on behalf of the client
• Evaluator – assess client or community needs and problems in many settings
• Teacher/educator- performs a range of activities planned primarily to change behavior, ranging from coaching and counseling to casework, psychotherapy, and behavior therapy
• Mobilizer – helps to get new resources for clients and communities
• Consultant – works with other professionals and agencies regarding their handling of problems, needs and programs
• Community planner – works with community boards and committees to assure that community development enhances positive mental health and self-actualization, or at least minimizes emotional stress on people
  
• Caregiver – provides service for persons who need ongoing support of some kind, such as financial assistance, day care, social support and 24-hour care
• Data manager – performs all aspects of data handling, gathering, tabulating, analyzing, synthesizing, program evaluation, and planning
  
• Administrator- carries out activities that are primarily agency or institution-oriented rather than client or community oriented