Frequently Asked Questions About Our Trade School in Atlanta
Looking for a career training school or trade school in Atlanta? Altierus can help. Located just off Interstate 85 in Norcross, we offer skilled trade ...
Looking for a career training school or trade school in Atlanta? Altierus can help. Located just off Interstate 85 in Norcross, we offer skilled trade ...
Posted Wednesday, Mar 17, 2021 by Altierus
Interested in our dental assistant diploma program? Read answers to some of the most common questions we get about training to become a dental assistant with Altierus—and about the dental assistant career path—here.
Dental assistants perform office support in dental practices and also assist with chairside procedures.
A dental assistant’s office duties may include:
At chairside, dental assistants may help with:
Dental assistants can also offer patients advice on practicing good oral hygiene.
Learn more about what dental assistants do all day in our article, A Day in the Life of a Dental Assistant.
Dental assistants and dental hygienists are similar. Both work directly with patients, and both work under the supervision of a dentist. Their duties and scope of practice (what patient care they can perform) are different, however.
Dental assistants:
Dental hygienists:
At Altierus Career College, you can complete our dental assistant diploma program in as few as nine months. The program combines classroom instruction, hands-on training in labs, and an externship.
To apply to a dental assistant training program, you should have a high school diploma or an equivalent qualification (such as a GED). It helps if you took applied science and math electives, but it isn’t required.
Dental assistants need a blend of office skills, clinical skills, and customer service skills.
Office skills a dental assistant needs may include:
The clinical skills a dental assistant needs may include:
Customer service skills dental assistants need may include:
You can read more about the skills and qualities a dental assistant needs in our article, Six Qualities a Dental Assistant Needs for Success.
You don’t need a degree to become a dental assistant, but you do need post-secondary training. Most states require dental assistants to have a diploma. Altierus Career College offers a nine-month dental assistant diploma program to our students in Florida, Texas, and Georgia.
Students in Texas also receive help meeting requirements for that state’s registration process.
To become a dental assistant, you need in-person training in labs and externship settings—training you can’t get online.
At Altierus, we offer dental assistant students the flexibility to complete part of their coursework online. When they come to campus for hands-on labs, they’ll be able to spend more time practicing key concepts with guidance from experienced instructors.
It depends. Regulations vary by state, and sometimes there are different types of rules depending on the duties you perform as a dental assistant. Dental assistants with x-ray training, known as “expanded-duty dental assistants”, may be required to obtain certification.
Altierus Career College teaches expanded duties in its dental assistant program. Of the three states where we train dental assistants (Florida, Georgia, and Texas), only Texas requires certification for dental assistants who take x-rays. All of our Texas students become Registered Dental Assistants (RDAs) by formally registering with the Texas State Board of Dental Examiners (TSBDE).
Nationwide, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that the median annual salary for dental assistants was $40,080 in May 2019, the most recent year for which statistics are available. The bottom 10% of dental assistants earned less than $27,980, while the top 10% of earners made more than $56,930.[i]
It’s important to note that the salary a dental assistant makes varies depending on the employer and the local job market.
We think so. Being a dental assistant offers you the chance to make a difference and gets you into a growing career field.
Dental assistants are the first members of staff patients encounter at the practice, so they have opportunities to help patients feel comfortable and cared for. They also provide the support (and extra hands) dentists and hygienists need to keep their patients’ smiles healthy.
Dental assistant jobs are part of the healthcare sector, which is set to offer plenty of job opportunities over the next decade. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the healthcare sector will grow faster than any other industry over the 2019-2029 period. This is due to rising demand for healthcare, including dental care, as the population ages.[v]
The BLS projects that jobs across all industries will grow by 4% over the 2019-2029 period. Job opportunities for dental assistants are projected to grow by 7%—almost twice as fast.[vi] By training to become a dental assistant, you can set yourself up to get on a stable career path that offers plenty of opportunities to make others smile.
Learn how Altierus Career College’s dental assistant diploma program can help you prepare for new career opportunities—contact us today!
[1] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/healthcare/dental-hygienists.htm#tab-3
[i] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/healthcare/dental-assistants.htm#tab-5
[ii] https://www.onetonline.org/link/localwages/31-9091.00?st=FL&g=Go
[iii] https://www.onetonline.org/link/localwages/31-9091.00?st=GA&g=Go
[iv] https://www.onetonline.org/link/localwages/31-9091.00?st=TX&g=Go
[v] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/healthcare/home.htm
[vi] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/healthcare/dental-assistants.htm#tab-6
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Our Houston campus hosted Roadtrip Nation on their screening tour of their documentary film, One Step Closer.
One Step Closer follows roadtrippers Melanie, Armand, and Becca across America as they listen to personal stories about how community college shaped the careers of working professionals. Roadtrippers engage in honest dialogue with all kinds of professionals and asked honest questions about their struggles as well as their successes.
We’re excited to continue the conversation about postsecondary education and how Altierus Career College is providing options in career technical education.
Altierus Career College nursing students completed their first round of clinical rotations at Genesis Healthcare. Before graduating with an Associate of Science degree in nursing, students must complete 600 hours of clinical rotations in addition to their program coursework.
During their clinical rotations, students practice what they’ve learned in the classroom in a real healthcare setting, taking vital signs, transferring patients from the bed to the wheelchair, re-positioning patients who can’t get out of bed, assisting in providing oxygenation, as well as administrating medications, inserting and maintaining IVs.
This year, we started some great conversations with key industry partners about closing the HVAC skills gap at all three of our local campus locations. Altierus Career College hosted local HVAC businesses to talk about how to create awareness for career technical education (CTE) and train the next generation of HVAC workers and possible apprenticeship programs so students can earn while they learn.
In addition to local HVAC servicers, we also met with Tim Elliott, CTE program specialist with Georgia’s Department of Education. Tim was excited to talk about to how partner with high schools to create awareness of CTE.
This past March, 12 medical assisting students from the Norcross Altierus campus in Atlanta competed against 4,000 other students from 84 different schools in the region. Betty Wilkins, a Medical Assisting instructor for Altierus, applied for and received a Campaign for Innovation grant from the ECMC Foundation. The grant paid for HOSA membership fees, student uniforms, travel, and other expenses.
Students participated in competitions which tested their healthcare knowledge and skills. Five of those students placed in their respective events.
