Pharmacy Technician Degrees online are available at four levels – Associates, Bachelor’s, Master’s, and Doctoral and the Pharmacy Tech arena can vary depending on your choice of career endeavour. The majority of the pharmacy technicians out there work in retail pharmacies similar to the ones at your local drug stores or inside the larger retail entities (i.e. Wal-Mart). Other pharmacy tech’s fill prescriptions in hospitals, or work with government organizations or in online or wholesale pharmacies.

Benefits of Earning a Pharmacy Technician Degree Online

There are so many benefits to earning a degree online versus the traditional education methods. First and foremost is the freedom factor – the freedom to take what you want and when you want to take it. There is no schedule to follow and you can work at your own pace. Some online degree programs can be completed in as little as 9 months or up to 24 months.

Of equal importance is the fact that anytime you earn a degree, either offline or online, your are improving your chances of increasing your wages. In other words, as you progress up the degree ladder, your earnings will increase since you are compensated by the level of degree that you earn. Other benefits include not having to stand in line for registration, not having to worry about parking, and no crowded classrooms.

Becoming a Pharmacy Technician

If you have considered becoming a pharmacy technician, consider following these steps in order to achieve your goal:

Step #1 – Make sure that the Pharmacy Technician online degree program that you enroll in is with an accredited online college or university.

Step #2 – Take your state Pharmacy Technician Certification exam and take it until you pass (there’s no limit on the amount of times you can take the exam).

Step #3 – Whenever possible, try to schedule as many interviews for a Pharmacy Tech position that you can.

Step #4 – Once you have become certified, keep that certification current (you are required to take 20 hours of CE courses every two years when you’re a Pharmacy Tech).

Most Preferred Pharmacy Technician Online Degree Programs

There are a variety of Pharmacy Technician Degrees available online. What is most important is that they are accredited and it is the right degree to have in order to achieve your career and financial goals. Here are the most preferred Pharmacy Technician Online Degree programs:

• Associate of Arts in Health Care Administration-Pharmacy Practice
• Bachelor of Science in Pharmaceutical Sciences
• M.S. in Pharmaceutical Sciences
• Working Professional Doctor of Pharmacy

I found a program from a small accredited college in Indiana that had a self-study curriculum that used proctored exams that worked perfectly for me and I began taking classes.

That was cutting edge back then but now there are so many more options available, particularly online, for what used to be called distance learning that it can be very confusing in finding a good online school.

Stay Away From Diploma Mills

There are many shady operations that will sell you a fake degree from a bogus college that isn’t worth the paper it’s printed on. Stay away from these as they will only end up causing you problems if you try and use one to get a job. You will eventually be found out and terminated for lying about your credentials and could easily ruin your career.

In fact, there have been several high profile people in business and government recently that have been exposed for using fake degrees and as a result lost their jobs and all credibility.

Avoid Life Experience Based Degrees

Some phony colleges will grant you a degree based on your life experiences. Sometimes you need to write up a few small reports to show that you have the knowledge but really I think this is so you think you are doing some work towards earning the fake degree.

These degrees are also pretty much worthless and any colleges that promote this type of higher education should be avoided.

Be aware though that there are legitimate institutions that will grant some credit for life experiences provided that you can detail (and I mean detail) your knowledge of a subject sufficiently enough to convince a professor that you should be granted the credit.

I got credit for a few classes this way but there were some where I failed to show enough knowledge in the subject to get credit so I had to take the classes.

Usually there is a limit to how much credit you can get this way because the bottom line is you need to take real courses with real homework and projects and tests in order to get a valid college degree you can be proud of.

Accreditation Is Key

The most important thing to consider when you are evaluating an online college program is whether or not it is accredited by a legitimate accrediting board. There are many online programs that say they are accredited by XYZ, etc. but many times these are not state recognized and have no validity in the real world.

You want to look for a program that is accredited by the same boards that accredit real brick and mortar colleges and universities so you can be sure you are getting a legitimate education.

Since many mainstream colleges are starting to have online programs you can be assured that taking classes from one of them will be OK but for others do your due diligence before signing up.

Remember, there are no shortcuts to getting a quality education that not only benefits you but your employer so remember the old adage that if it’s too good to be true…

There are vocational schools, community college and private college programs for aspiring pharmacy technicians and many employers prefer applicants who have gone through one of them.  In busy pharmacies it’s often difficult to provide on-the-job training -  in-store training can often just slow things down further.

A training program student in this field will learn about medical and pharmaceutical terminology, calculations, pharmacy record keeping,  techniques, and pharmacy law and ethics.  There is a vast store of knowledge about drugs in general that pharmaceutical technicians need to absorb, some of which is covered in the training program and some of which is garnered on the job.

• Pharmacy techs need to know which medications require a briefing for the customer by the pharmacist.  There are FDA regulations about entire classes of drugs that include this requirement, and it’s not one that a pharmacy technician is allowed to do.  Acting as an assistant to the pharmacist, a technician may pick up the job of filling prescriptions by counting pills and labeling bottles while the pharmacist talks with customers about their medications.
• Pharmacy employees must keep a careful eye on inventory, and the periodic chore of conducting inventory may fall to the technician.  The job of reading and filling prescriptions is also permissible in most cases for a pharmacy technician; when the store is busy a technician may be answering phones, taking refill orders, filling prescriptions and making cash register sales depending on where the most urgent need is.
• Pharmacy technicians can get up to speed much more quickly on the job having been through the formal training program than if they are starting out cold.  Completion of a diploma program in the field will also make it easier to find a job.  The other element that has appeal to many employers is certification.

The Pharmacy Technician Certification Board and the Institute for the Certification of Pharmacy Technicians both administer national certification examinations.  While there is no general requirement for certification, some employers insist on it; and all of them are more likely to hire a pharmacy technician that has obtained and maintains certification status.  In both cases there are continuing education requirements that keep certification status current.