Can I Get a Job With an Accelerated IT Bachelor’s Degree?

Key Infor­ma­tion:

• With a tech-focused cur­ricu­lum, grad­u­ates of accel­er­at­ed IT pro­grams are in high demand for roles like soft­ware devel­op­er, IT spe­cial­ist, and data ana­lyst.
• Accel­er­at­ed pro­grams often empha­size prac­ti­cal skills, mak­ing grad­u­ates job-ready with hands-on expe­ri­ence and rel­e­vant cer­ti­fi­ca­tions.
• Many pro­grams offer net­work­ing events, job fairs, and indus­try part­ner­ships to help stu­dents con­nect with poten­tial employers.

Accel­er­at­ed degrees are a pop­u­lar option for peo­ple to get their edu­ca­tion with­out spend­ing four years at a uni­ver­si­ty. Career chang­ers pre­fer this alter­na­tive since it offers high­er flex­i­bil­i­ty than the tra­di­tion­al pro­gram. This allows them to get a new job with­out com­pro­mis­ing their cur­rent workplace.

That said, despite their ben­e­fits, one can­not help but won­der: are they well-regard­ed by employ­ees? Do they offer the same types of IT career oppor­tu­ni­ties? The con­cern is under­stand­able since you can get a degree in 1 to 3 years. In this arti­cle, you will learn more about the mat­ter so that you can put your chances into balance.

Relat­ed:

• Fastest Online Infor­ma­tion Tech­nol­o­gy Degree Programs
• Best Online Infor­ma­tion Tech­nol­o­gy Degree Bachelor’s Programs
• Top Bachelor’s in Infor­ma­tion Science
• Most Afford­able Online Infor­ma­tion Tech­nol­o­gy Degree Bach­e­lor Programs

What Is an Accelerated IT Bachelor’s Degree?

An accel­er­at­ed IT bachelor’s degree is a type of pro­gram that you enter to earn edu­ca­tion cred­it, grad­u­at­ing with a bachelor’s degree. The cur­ricu­lum is sim­i­lar to tra­di­tion­al pro­grams but is more con­densed and deliv­ered at an intense rate. For this rea­son, accel­er­at­ed IT class­es take half the stan­dard time to get your bachelor’s degree.

The main cours­es are pret­ty sim­i­lar to what you would get if you went to a typ­i­cal uni­ver­si­ty pro­gram. This can include:

• pro­gram­ming
• com­put­er science
• cyber­se­cu­ri­ty
• data­base management

Most of the core class­es includ­ed will depend on the pro­gram you opt for.

Like a tra­di­tion­al pro­gram, accel­er­at­ed IT cer­ti­fi­ca­tions will need some proof of expe­ri­ence and a high school diplo­ma (or an equiv­a­lent). Most class­es require a min­i­mum GPA, usu­al­ly around 2.5 (the clos­er to 4.0, the bet­ter). ACT or SAT scores might also be nec­es­sary, but even if they are not, adding high scores to your appli­ca­tion could strength­en it.

Skills Developed in Accelerated IT Programs

When tak­ing part in pro­grams to pre­pare your­self for fast-track IT degree jobs, you can expect to devel­op abil­i­ties like:

· Technical Skills

After join­ing fast-track degree pro­grams, you will become pro­fi­cient in net­work secu­ri­ty, pro­gram­ming, and data man­age­ment. You should learn var­i­ous lan­guages like C++, under­stand secu­ri­ty pro­to­cols, and use SQL to man­age databases.

With more and more busi­ness­es rely­ing on tech­nol­o­gy to keep things run­ning, these tech­ni­cal skills become some­thing they val­ue most. You should be able to snatch var­i­ous entry-lev­el IT jobs, even if you do not have too much field experience.

· Soft Skills

Aside from tech­ni­cal skills and the abil­i­ty to use dif­fer­ent kinds of pro­grams, employ­ers also look at soft skills before hir­ing. These include:

• time man­age­ment skills
• prob­lem-solv­ing capabilities
• work­ing well with a team

Aside from tech­ni­cal com­pe­ten­cies, accel­er­at­ed pro­grams also place great empha­sis on your abil­i­ty to be a respon­si­ble and coop­er­a­tive worker.

As odd as it might seem at this point, tech­ni­cal skills are not the ones that get you hired; those can eas­i­ly be brushed at the job. Most com­pa­nies are look­ing at soft skills as they keep the projects smooth. With these cours­es, you can advance your IT degree career paths as they put you one step ahead of the competition.

Career Opportunities for Those with an Accelerated IT Bachelor’s Degree

If you get an accel­er­at­ed bachelor’s degree, you have the same chances as some­one grad­u­at­ing from a tra­di­tion­al pro­gram. You can get every­thing from full-time jobs to IT intern­ships, depend­ing on where you apply.

Role Types and Positions Available for Graduates

Once you grad­u­ate, you can choose from plen­ty of career options based on your pref­er­ences. Many enjoy the fan­cy envi­ron­ment of becom­ing a soft­ware devel­op­er, espe­cial­ly with the recent tech­nol­o­gy boom. You could start in an entry-lev­el posi­tion as a junior soft­ware devel­op­er or try for a mid-lev­el senior soft­ware engineer.

You can also opt to become a sys­tem ana­lyst or net­work admin­is­tra­tor. More­over, con­sid­er­ing the demand for cyber­se­cu­ri­ty ana­lysts is expect­ed to grow by 32 per­cent by 2032 accord­ing to the Bureau of Labor Sta­tis­tics, you might want to try your luck with this job.

Choosing the Right Industry

When putting your IT cer­ti­fi­ca­tions to good use, you must apply in the right indus­try. After all, there’s noth­ing much that you can do with an IT degree if you are inter­est­ed in the arts sec­tor. How­ev­er, plen­ty of indus­tries place high val­ue on IT expertise.

The tech­nol­o­gy sec­tor is like­ly the most obvi­ous domain here. Most com­pa­nies seek exper­tise in:

• soft­ware engineering
• prod­uct development
• infra­struc­ture management 

You are look­ing at plen­ty of net­work secu­ri­ty jobs as well, should you decide to opt for this sector.

The finance area also has great poten­tial, and there’s a good chance you can secure a job at a bank if you have a bachelor’s degree in IT. With elec­tron­ic bank­ing on the rise, many insti­tu­tions want peo­ple capa­ble of han­dling their plat­forms. Health­care also holds great poten­tial as hos­pi­tals are embrac­ing dig­i­tal transformation.

Enhancing Employability with an Accelerated IT Degree

Hav­ing an accel­er­at­ed IT degree can sig­nif­i­cant­ly improve your chances of get­ting hired, as it holds sim­i­lar pow­er to a tra­di­tion­al degree. How­ev­er, as the job mar­ket is high­ly com­pet­i­tive, even tra­di­tion­al degree hold­ers strug­gle to find a job. If you have a soft­ware devel­op­er accel­er­at­ed degree (or any oth­er kind, for that mat­ter), you need to make your appli­ca­tion look good.

Importance of Certifications, Internships and Networking

One of the main rea­sons grad­u­ates find it hard to get a job is that they do not have enough infor­ma­tion on their resume. This applies to tra­di­tion­al and accel­er­at­ed pro­grams because employ­ers will always choose the lat­ter when com­par­ing IT degree vs experience.

This is why you must sat­u­rate your resume with details about your diplo­mas and expe­ri­ence. Cer­ti­fi­ca­tions rel­e­vant to your indus­try can make you look more attrac­tive to employ­ers, improv­ing your chances of secur­ing a job. An intern­ship also gives you the hands-on expe­ri­ence employ­ees seek, where­as net­work­ing can lead to poten­tial refer­rals and job oppor­tu­ni­ties. For exam­ple, a let­ter of rec­om­men­da­tion from an expert in the field could place you above oth­er applicants.

Continuing Education for Long-Term Benefits

One thing to remem­ber about the IT indus­try is that it’s con­stant­ly evolv­ing. For this rea­son, you need to upgrade your skills and stay updat­ed with the lat­est trends. A good idea is to con­tin­ue your spe­cial­iza­tion through work­shops, webi­na­rs, and online cours­es, but you could also pur­sue an accel­er­at­ed master’s degree.

Depend­ing on the job that you seek, sim­ply hav­ing a bachelor’s degree might not be enough. For instance, sys­tem ana­lyst qual­i­fi­ca­tions require deep­er involve­ment and could need a spe­cif­ic course. Since spe­cial­iza­tion can make the mar­ket more com­pet­i­tive, you should con­sid­er get­ting the appro­pri­ate edu­ca­tion at the right time.

Tips for Crafting a Good Resume

Whether you are apply­ing to a small or a large com­pa­ny, the resume acts like a pic­ture of who you are. If the “pic­ture” looks bad, they like­ly won’t be inter­est­ed enough in work­ing with you. This is why you must craft it care­ful­ly, as if you are work­ing on a paint­ing. Below are some resume tips for IT graduates:

• Cus­tomize the Resume: Each IT job is dif­fer­ent, and using the same resume for each one will make you look like you are not invest­ed. For this rea­son, you should tai­lor the doc­u­ment with skills and accom­plish­ments rel­e­vant to this spe­cif­ic job.
• Pre­pare for the Inter­view: Inter­view prepa­ra­tion for IT jobs is among the great­est hur­dles, as this is where the company’s rep­re­sen­ta­tives decide if they want to hire you. Do your research to know what they require of you and be ready to dis­cuss any tech­ni­cal ques­tions they may have.
• Demon­strate Your Abil­i­ties: Both your tech­ni­cal and soft skills should be part of your resume. While tech­ni­cal skills can eas­i­ly be list­ed in a resume, you should also demon­strate the soft ones dur­ing the inter­view (e.g., talk about your experiences).

When answer­ing the inter­view ques­tions, be cer­tain that you are hon­est and keep things short. Embell­ish­ing won’t get you any­where, espe­cial­ly if they have hun­dreds of appli­ca­tions each day.

What Employers Think About Accelerated Degrees

When it comes to giv­ing a job over to some­one, we see a trend occur­ring in the tech world: expe­ri­ence over edu­ca­tion. When ana­lyz­ing IT project man­ag­er careers or oth­ers on a sim­i­lar line, you will notice that most employ­ers place much val­ue on expe­ri­ence and very lit­tle on the type of edu­ca­tion the can­di­dates went through.

Indeed, IT man­agers still val­ue the degree a poten­tial employ­ee holds. How­ev­er, this is main­ly because it proves they have received the appro­pri­ate edu­ca­tion and train­ing. The amount of time they spend in class means very lit­tle as long as they have the expe­ri­ence to show they are the ones for the job. The degree itself mere­ly acts as a bonus. 

That said, for most employ­ers, accel­er­at­ed IT degrees are rat­ed based on the institution’s rep­u­ta­tion. If the pro­gram is appro­pri­ate­ly accred­it­ed and has a qual­i­ty cur­ricu­lum, it will look good in the eyes of the employ­ers. Ulti­mate­ly, it all depends on the com­pa­ny you’re apply­ing for, but for the most part, accel­er­at­ed IT diplo­mas are regard­ed the same as tra­di­tion­al ones.

The Bottom Line

In the end, an accel­er­at­ed IT bachelor’s degree is wide­ly accept­ed by employ­ers, hold­ing more or less the same pow­er as a stan­dard one. Most jobs rely on expe­ri­ence, so the degree will act as the bonus that paints you as the best can­di­date. So, besides enrolling in an accel­er­at­ed pro­gram, make sure that you also get hands-on expe­ri­ence and keep up to date with every­thing that hap­pens in the tech sector.

Sources:

• Forbes
• Har­vard Busi­ness Review