The need for pharmacy technicians is currently rising and
demand continuing to trend upward according to a leading job site, indeed.com. While
a lot of people are interested in getting into this profession, a majority of
them do not know what education is needed and that’s what we’ll talk about here
in this post.
The first educational requirement that most pharmacy boards
require is a high school diploma or a G.E.D. certificate. This is the most
basic academic requirement that you will need when applying for a job, even
without a certificate or license. If you see yourself becoming a pharmacy
technician as early as high school, do yourself a favour and take science and
math courses and study hard to get good grades. This goes a long way in getting
a job.
Second educational requirement you will need is a
certificate from an accredited pharmacy training program. This may be from a
school program or an employment program offered by a number of companies.
Program length may vary, some as short as 6 months to as long as 2 years. Cost
of training will vary, typically between two and four thousand dollars and plus
a few hundred more on books. There are also online courses available for those
who don’t want to travel but be careful when choosing an online program as
there are a lot of fly by night schools out there. Some pharmaceutical
companies like rite-aid and even hospitals offer training programs as well so
you may want to look into that as well.
The third one isn’t a requirement but rather a supplementary
one to further acquire knowledge. These are supplementary courses that they can
take to broaden their knowledge in this field. You can take these courses from
the National Pharmacy Technician Association and it is free to their members.
The fourth requirement is on the job training. Not all
programs will have this as part of their curriculum especially online programs,
but this is essential in your success as a pharm tech. If you weren’t able to
get this type of training in school, you may apply for internship programs or
apply as a part time technician. This is not a strict requirement but an
important training process. While there may be successful technicians who didn’t
go through this type of training, it would be beneficial for new pharmacy techs
to get on the job training whenever they can.
