which umschulung or not to umschulung?

[bojan23]

hi,

first of all i'm sorry that i write in english and not in german, but my test fuer zuwanderer (b1lvl) wouldn’t be enough to write what i want in few hours.

i live in germany for 2 years (i plan to move to berlin in september or october) and since my contract in company i’m working right now is expiring i went to arbeitsagentur for advice. i worked in media for 10 years in my home country, but since i can’t do that here i’m looking for new beruf. the guy from agency offered me voucher for fachinformatiker anwendungsentwicklung or for fachinformatiker systemintegration. he said that i could do it even though i have only b1 german level, that i will learn more language by going to umschulung, that i’m not the only auslaender and if others can pass ihk i can as well. that’s very nice from him from motivations side, but the things that are worrying me would be that if i get fachliteratur from several hundred pages i can spend weeks and months trying to go through and books for learning IT with 900 pages are pretty usual thing. if someone is speeking german, situation is a little bit better, ‘cause i can’t understand every word, but i can mostly understand what is it about. i also believe there is plenty of english words and phrases in learning IT anywhere, but still… so, as a first and biggest thing that concerns me would be language. then there are things like, i learned math and physics 20 years ago in school, everyday use of both is somewhere still here but everything else is long long gone. the things that i like for both options are that they are very perspective, that i can much easier find a job when i have a real beruf, especially one of those two, that i always loved IT and i was always happy to learn something new. since my friend installed in front of me my first windows 98, i installed every other system to myself aloneand most of my friends ofc. I was always the guy which was called by friends to solve their pc problem or to tell them what to buy. i learn practically and when i see how something is done i can usually easily remember it. i know it’s not something spectacular in comparation with real things that most of you know, but i do think I have some predispositions for learning in IT.

I would be very thankful if anyone can give me their opinion or any kind of advice connected with this topic.

[a3quit4s]

Hi,

nearly 90% of the present Fachliteratur are written in english, that won't be a problem in my opinion.

The "everyday math and physics" will be good enough, binary algebra is the only "real" math you're doing.

[Goulasz]

Hey bojan23!

First: A few paragraphs would have really increased readability

There is an ever-ongoing debate in this board, which discusses whether "Umschulungen" are valued equally when compared to regular trainings in a company and school, I'll try to keep that out of the advice here.

Do you know the difference between the two job titles? If not, here's an (awfully) short breakdown:

Fachinformatiker - Anwendungsentwicklung

• Mainly Software engineering
  
• Containts "Concept, development, testing, implementation, customer workshops" of software products
  

Fachinformatiker - Systemintegration

• Mainly Networking, Monitoring, Support and IT-Infrastructure
  

Be aware of the fact that Systemintegratoren are restrained to "fixing single PCs" in the fewest cases. The majority of those are responsible for tasks, which are needed to keep your IT-infrastructure up and running.

Typical "Help Desk" tasks can belong to your field of application, depending on your job offer and your employer.

If you're interested in "Anwendungsentwicklung", you should know that a lot of the time spent there is doing concepts for software products, of course programming them and testing the final result.

It's fair to say that there are a lot of people in my class, who did not give a damn about the commercial aspects of the profession for a reason. But still, it belongs to the job and there are a lot of employers, who will count on their Fachinformatiker to do those jobs, for both specializations.

Is there a bit more of information, which you could give us? Your age, your references and experience in the IT-field, maybe? Basically, you don't need any experience for a training or a re-training, but if it's solid, it's better than nothing.

Regards, Goulasz

/€ The language and literature should not be a problem. The majority is available in English and the german students tend to be quite well when it comes to speaking English.

Bearbeitet 11. Februar 2013 von Goulasz

[bojan23]

Is there a bit more of information, which you could give us? Your age, your references and experience in the IT-field, maybe? Basically, you don't need any experience for a training or a re-training, but if it's solid, it's better than nothing.

:new

i'm 35 years old. i made and administrate network for 5 pc's in winXP long time ago, i worked on software sales in one IT company for few months, i was it journalist for 8 years and i considered my interests in IT always as hobby so far. so, all in all, no real experience, just good will and interest in this beruf. since i'm in position to choose which kind of job i would like to do in my future and since i need to specialize in something in my life, then i would like that something to be something i like and something i'm at least interested in. although florist would be very interesting choice as well. :uli

[neinal]

i think it wouldn't be a problem... try to find a job and just do it

i think you will get support from your colleagues...

where are you from? maybe we can give you tips or advise for detect a company..

[bojan23]

well that's a thing, this is how and what i understood and what i do not ... for umschulung i guess it’s different than with ausbildung. i go to some kind of school for 2 years and i have praktikum (during or after the school don’t know yet for sure) in companies which have relationship with that school. i guess it’s possible to find on your own as well and it last for 6 months or so.

what i don’t understand still is more about what i actually learn there and what kind of job i can apply after D' umschulung. :upps

i saw few movies on berufenet and youtube about both fachinformatiker anw. and sys.

for anw. is pretty clear. for someone without any experience it seems really hard to follow that tempo and learn language after language in programming. also i think lot of more math is involved, which could be a problem. for this i do believe that lot of stuff is in english and that after u can find a work pretty easy. Positive would also be that I can do that from home, from park or from space :bimei

for systemintegration i don't know did i understand what do i learn in school. i saw some videos where they r calling ppl to come for umschulung and they r showing class which is learning microsoft and linux administration and it looks like a course for mcsa(mcse), lpic or ccna or all in once. also some hardware, how to connect, how to put all together etc. so that would be like what i have in company’s IT support right now. support for pc problems, installation, cisco ip phone support etc. that job i find much easier and i already know something in that topic, but i think it’s less perspective and paid than anw (no offence :pssst:).

on berufenet i also saw movies for IT systemelektroniker and for systemelektroniker (ohne IT ) they are showing some stadtwerke, some airport, how azubi’s working on some smoke alarm systems and some other things. also for the other various electronic systems, but i guess that’s not important for this forum and it’s something completely off-topic, although i would like to know about those as well.

...and... i live in münchen right know, but i think i'm gonna move to berlin and start umschulung there. anyway, thank you all so far for responces and any tips (about companies or anything else) are very welcome.

Bearbeitet 13. Februar 2013 von bojan23

[neinal]

Why you wanna leave Munich?

In my opinion it's better to do an apprenticeship instead of a 'Umschulung'.

I think it's more practical work and not only theory. But you have to choose by your own.

My apprenticeship as an software developer is realy nice and i think you don't have to know very much math and physic things. It's enough if you have a technical understanding and you are able to ability to reason...

[bojan23]

Why you wanna leave Munich?

In my opinion it's better to do an apprenticeship instead of a 'Umschulung'.

I think it's more practical work and not only theory. But you have to choose by your own.

by apprenticeship i guess you think on praktikum? if yes, than because after my contract i'm gonna be on dough money and arbeitsagentur will pay voucher for umschulung and i'll get 60% of my salary till the end of school. if i go only for praktikum, i get some funny amount of money for full time and i can't live from that. especially not in munich. what i earn is what i spend and there's no money floating from anywhere else. so main resone is legal, not that i like to spend 2 years in school again in my age.

and why do i want to leave munich is question on which i would gladly give you one long, long answer. i don't want to do that though because i guess many ppl would be offended and not all of them deserve that. in short, i think i would feel nicer in more international city (or so i've been told), i come from bigger city and would like to live either in bigger or much smaller place, i find munich as village which want to be a city but it's just boring. it's hard to make friends here (at least for me), i stumble on people's arogance everywhere, there's to much racism around and last, but not least is drug policy which i find repressive and depressive. i like to sit on a river or park and smoke what i want to smoke, i don't think thats anyone's business cause i'm not a kid anymore. here not only that i can't do that, but i even can't find anything even to hide like a mouse in my own little hole which i paid like its with golden furniture. (900 for 50 sq.m is just seek). so all in all, for me, munich su:floet:

Bearbeitet 13. Februar 2013 von bojan23

[bojan23]

after reading about this umschulung and checking what could i do after i finished it, i would like to ask you am i wrong in my thoughts or there is something right in my conclusions.

so my first choice would be umschulung for Anwendungsentwicklung. let’s say for example that i would go in one of those two schools (they both have program of study): Fachinformatiker Anwendungsentwicklung Berlin: GPB Berlin

WBS TRAINING AG: Umschulung zum/zur Fachinformatiker/in FR Anwendungsentwicklung (inkl. Vorbereitung auf die IHK-Prüfung) - WBS TRAINING AG[quarter]=30&cHash=cafb572c74b98870517f7eaef9787a3c

in the best case scenario (with full optimistic approach) i can follow german classes and learn lots of stuff in english and i pass ihk exam. now question is what did i learn in school and what can i do in real life? after looking at jobboerse, i don't see how i can apply anywhere

and i think i need to know much more even for entry level jobs.

with Systemintegration i think i get not such a cool and perspective job, not so much money from it, but after finishing the school i have a feeling that i could find a job from what i learned in school. even if that would be in worst case scenario some job in pc store. if i would choose this umschulung i would like to learn about linux, networks and do something like network admin or whatever and i would like to avoid to work as customer support.

any thoughts?

[cry88]

in the best case scenario (with full optimistic approach) i can follow german classes and learn lots of stuff in english and i pass ihk exam. now question is what did i learn in school and what can i do in real life? after looking at jobboerse, i don't see how i can apply and i think i need to know much more even for entry level jobs.

with Systemintegration i think i get not such a cool and perspective job, not so much money from it, but after finishing the school i have a feeling that i could find a job from what i learned in school. even if that would be in worst case scenario some job in pc store. if i would choose this umschulung i would like to learn about linux, networks and do something like network admin or whatever and i would like to avoid to work as customer support.

any thoughts?

if you pass the ihk exam, you are ready for almost every junior Softwareentwickler job (they are especially for newcomer) and many other Softwareentwickler jobs depending on the job offer and your skills. You will learn the necessary skills in your Umschulung. Of course you should inform yourself about the quality of the Umschulung, they can vary very much.

One more thing: A Fachinformatiker für Systemintegration will mostly work as a Systemadministrator, but of course he can work as a consultant, Projektmanager etc. Also these jobs are as perspective as a Softwareentwickler and the money isn't bad either. But they have one thing in common: they have nothing to do with a pc store salesman or "Hinterhofschrauber", there work i have done with 15 in a Praktikum...

[bojan23]

what are the chances to pass or to fall on that ihk exam at the end? and if i can't pass it for some reason did i throw 2 years of my life or i can nonetheless find entry level job with things that i learned for those 2 years of umschulung?

[Tracker]

if you dont pass the exam first time, you can do it again a second time a year later. But in the 2 years you should work a lot to learn the german language or ask you IHK, if you can do the exam in the englisch language.