Career Change - Firefighter

[wlgorman]

PM sent

[Treeshark]

Mesquite FD is where I retired from. It was an excellent city to work for. It’s always super competitive to get hired in metroplex cities. Mesquite and most of the larger cities will send you to school and pay you a salary as you go. Apply for every city that’s testing, people often tend to do better with each test.

[firemanjj82]

Test and get in classes as you can at the same time. If you can do day class for academy that's the best, but I did night because I had to work too. The time goes fast and you'll be hired in no time because there's more open positions than there are applicants. I got on in '05 when there were more applicants than positions, so it was a much harder process then compared to now.

The fire part is the best, but it's heavy EMS, so don't get your hopes up on a bunch of jobs (fires) because it just doesn't happen as often as you think (or as often as I'd like [emoji16]). It's the best job in the world. I'm typing this while at the station.

You won't get rich, but it does pay well, and it can be one of the most rewarding things you do so long as you don't get caught up in the negative that can be at any job.

PM me for any advice.

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[Captain39]

First, what is your age? Most Civil Service Departments cut off at 36. If you want to get hired quick and get certified, apply with Houston. With that said you will also make by far the most fires and runs if you put yourself in the right station. HFD will be hiring 250 plus next year alone. The pay is not as good as the Metroplex, but the schedule is better, and the retirement is better than TMRS. Even if you just do HFD to get paid to get certified, get out of the academy, then put in for other jobs. We have no living radius either. Guys come in from all over the state.

[popeandyoung151]

Just out of curiosity, how difficult is it to get hired on with one of those that send you to the academy?From what I have seen and heard these departments will have hundreds of applicants for maybe 10-20 openings. Do you know if they base the interview priority based on the exam score? I’ve taken one practice test and made a 90 something on it but will be taking more if I can find them.


I can only speak to the Fort Worth test/ interview. Yes, there will be hundreds or possibly thousands that will take the entrance exam. If you test high enough you will go through the full hiring process (physical, background, polygraph and interview) Your interview is a pass/fail. If you pass, you will be offered a job. Fort Worth is running several classes a year trying to catch up.

[flywise]

Just out of curiosity, how difficult is it to get hired on with one of those that send you to the academy?From what I have seen and heard these departments will have hundreds of applicants for maybe 10-20 openings. Do you know if they base the interview priority based on the exam score? I’ve taken one practice test and made a 90 something on it but will be taking more if I can find them.


I can only speak to the Fort Worth test/ interview. Yes, there will be hundreds or possibly thousands that will take the entrance exam. If you test high enough you will go through the full hiring process (physical, background, polygraph and interview) Your interview is a pass/fail. If you pass, you will be offered a job. Fort Worth is running several classes a year trying to catch up.

Hard
Like you said, hundreds or more for a couple or few spots. Good
To try but best to go ahead and get certified

[Jon Stewart]

Learn how to cook. You will find out why after you are hired, lol.

[Smokeater]

If you plan on spending any time/money on training...go to medic school. You get the national registry paramedic cert and you'll get snagged up in no time. They spend a lot of money trying to get peeps certified so if you show up with it, most likely they'll get you quick no matter what their quotas/affirmative action numbers are. Otherwise, just make a list of all the ones hiring, jump in the game and start testing. Can't imagine doing anything else...especially 8 to 5 every day. PM me if you try Dallas and need anything. Maybe you can come hang out in Oak Cliff with us bruh! Best of luck to ya amigo.

[J-Carp]

Go to a nice suburban dept. get paid well and treated well.

Don’t go to Houston. Some good firemen left there but the city ran off most the young ones. Place is a crap hole

[BigRed323]

Great job and career. You will develop relationships with some guys that will remain your brothers for life no matter where the future takes you.

I started working as a medic in 2009 at the age of 18 and got on with local VFD. My aspirations were to always go to veterinary school and graduated vet school in 2017. Worked EMS through all of undergrad and vet school and kept working a few shifts here and there to keep my cert up until about a year ago. I’ve still got my National and texas medic license, but between work and family, I haven’t had time to pick up a shift. I will say, I miss it 100%. Miss the station camaraderie, miss the adrenaline rushes, and helping people at their absolute worst days. But all of my buddies now are guys I worked with for years.

BUT, I will say, the job and work schedule can be hard on families. I’ve watched plenty of guys go through tons of marriage hardships in this line of work that resulted in depression, divorce, etc. Please make sure your family is supportive And is 100% on board with possibly being gone long hours (days sometimes) before you take the full plunge.

[FIRE59]

There are a few departments in the metroplex that will allow you to test without having any certs, however those departments are more competitive to get hired on due to the number of applicants vs. open positions. Having your Paramedic cert is equivalent to having a gold ticket these days. It will open up tons more opportunities to test and will allow you more options to choose a city that may be a fit for you.

I do understand the difficulties of having to work full time and try to go back to school but if you can do an online or night EMT course then online Paramedic course you will be so much more marketable as a candidate. There are several community colleges and private programs that offer both EMT and Paramedic. A lot of departments will hire medic only and send them to fire school. EMT takes about 6-8 weeks to complete and Paramedic school takes anywhere between 8-14 months depending on the program you choose. Fire School only takes 12-16 weeks.

Paramedic school is the toughest part of the process. Doing it on your own will also put less pressure on you should you not pass the first time. If you are hired by a department and they send you to Paramedic school the expectation of continued employment will be to pass EMT and Paramedic school or you could be terminated. I always say there is a reason that they give you 6 chances to pass the National Registry exam, its not easy for most folks.

I am over the hiring process for Rowlett FD. We started our hiring process in November 2021 to hire 18 personnel. We just hired our final candidate last week. We went through three hiring process to get 18 candidates. The biggest issue we had was not applicants, it was people that would actually show up. We even allowed the candidates to choose between two different dates and times that fit their schedule for testing, interviews etc. We had more either cancel or no call no show. Things are way different these days than they were 28 years ago when I started in the fire service. I served as the Fire Academy Coordinator and Instructor for Navarro College Fire Academy for several years. My advice to anyone that ask where they should start is always the same, go to EMT then Medic school then fire school if you can.

I would be glad to meet up with you and discuss more details about hiring process etc. Would also invite you to come do a ride-out with us in Rowlett to get an idea of how station life is. We run a 48-96 schedule, which has been an awesome change for us.

PM me if you would like.

Chris Brown
Battalion Chief
Rowlett Fire Department

[Sparkles]

Career Change - Firefighter

Nevermind
Already posted

Good luck OP
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[nursejenn]

If you plan on spending any time/money on training...go to medic school. You get the national registry paramedic cert and you'll get snagged up in no time. They spend a lot of money trying to get peeps certified so if you show up with it, most likely they'll get you quick no matter what their quotas/affirmative action numbers are. Otherwise, just make a list of all the ones hiring, jump in the game and start testing. Can't imagine doing anything else...especially 8 to 5 every day. PM me if you try Dallas and need anything. Maybe you can come hang out in Oak Cliff with us bruh! Best of luck to ya amigo.

You get over to the BUMC side much?

[Smokeater]

You get over to the BUMC side much?

Not much at all. Haven't ridden a whambulance in 20 years so pretty much stay in my part of the hood. If a big y'all come event takes place we end up downtown from time to time.
You in the E.R.?!

[Ryan81]

A lot of helpful information. I’ve replied to some PMs as well. I look forward to this process and journey and am thankful for all the helpful information everyone has posted. At this point I just think it’s just up to me for testing and interviews.

If I decided to go the certified route myself, will it take about a year to get my paramedic cert or does anyone know if there are some self-paced courses to where I could get certified a little quicker? Just curious cause I don’t mind burying my head in books if that’s what it takes.


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