Long story short- I went to college for music education, taught HS band for 7 years and finally through an interesting series of events decided that it wasn't for me and ended up landing a facility manager/TD position for a high school PAC. I've been in charge of AV tech at my church for a few years (PT hourly at a 3,000+ member church) and now have been in the FT TD job for about a year.
I love what I do and ideally would be happy to continue doing it for some time. I have a lot of autonomy with running the building and can upgrade/enhance/alter pretty much everything inside the four walls. Where I get concerned is outside these walls and the powers that be controlling things like my salary and whether or not I work a full 12 months (read: pay cuts). Things seem to be good for the time being and I'm guaranteed at least another year on my contract, but a vote on a sales tax could change that for the following year and I like to be prepared.
My question is, possessing a Bachelor's in Music Education and having limited paid experience, what would you do to stay competent and competitive? When they were talking about cutting our jobs for the summer, I was thinking of trying to find a company to go push cases for to start meeting people. However, they thankfully kept us safe and I'm guessing I'm not much use on a typical event when I've also got to do a day job.
I'm most comfortable in live sound reinforcement, but I'm familiar with how to hang and focus lights and operate a console. Theatre rigging is an area where I need the most help. If nothing else, what can I do now in this job to broaden my experience? I've looked into the ETCP (either electrician or theatre rigging) route as a long-term goal to shoot for, but I don't think my current job would apply as the required experience. Any insight from those on the path would be appreciated.
I love what I do and ideally would be happy to continue doing it for some time. I have a lot of autonomy with running the building and can upgrade/enhance/alter pretty much everything inside the four walls. Where I get concerned is outside these walls and the powers that be controlling things like my salary and whether or not I work a full 12 months (read: pay cuts). Things seem to be good for the time being and I'm guaranteed at least another year on my contract, but a vote on a sales tax could change that for the following year and I like to be prepared.
My question is, possessing a Bachelor's in Music Education and having limited paid experience, what would you do to stay competent and competitive? When they were talking about cutting our jobs for the summer, I was thinking of trying to find a company to go push cases for to start meeting people. However, they thankfully kept us safe and I'm guessing I'm not much use on a typical event when I've also got to do a day job.
I'm most comfortable in live sound reinforcement, but I'm familiar with how to hang and focus lights and operate a console. Theatre rigging is an area where I need the most help. If nothing else, what can I do now in this job to broaden my experience? I've looked into the ETCP (either electrician or theatre rigging) route as a long-term goal to shoot for, but I don't think my current job would apply as the required experience. Any insight from those on the path would be appreciated.
