Paraprofessional Salary

Many paraprofessional lines are among the highest paying jobs. But before looking at the salary of a paraprofessional, let us understand what a paraprofessional is. A paraprofessional is a person who is trained to assist professionals. They are not license holders but can assist the main stream professionals. It means that even though they have the required knowledge and training they cannot be called professionals e.g. a compounder in medical jobs. A paraprofessional is in various fields like the legal, educational, technical, health related fields, scientific fields, etc. and with posts like a nurse, paralegal, operators, radiation therapists, etc.

Comparative Salary
Profession	Salary	Paraprofessionals	Salary
Nuclear Medicine Technologist	$35,000	Radiation Therapist	$34,200
Pharmacists	$55,900	Audiologist	$41,550
Teachers and Instructors	$31,150	Librarians	$32,950
Computer Engineers	$41,350	Engineering Field	$31,100
Management Analysts	$37,100	Management	$30,000
Lawyers	$59,100	Paralegal	$27,750
Medical Scientists	$59,200	Science Technicians	$27,400
Surgeons	$93,000	Laboratory Technicians	$23,800
Psychologists	$44,900	Emergency Medical Technicians	$20,550
Post-Secondary Teachers	$39,600	Teacher Aides	$12,900

As it is evident, salary of radiation therapist is the maximum and that is one big reason for being one of the highest paying jobs in the US. Then comes the audiologist and speech pathologist salary. A speech pathologist, as the name suggests, deals with speech related problems like stammering, etc. whereas a audiologist job description includes checking the hearing capacity of a patient, checking whether have problems in balancing because ear related problems tend to have an effect on the body's balancing mechanism and an audiologist also gives proper hearing aid equipment to patients prescribed by the doctors, repairs them, etc.

While comparing the salary with the related counter professionals, we see that the only exception where the paraprofessional's salary is more than a teacher is a librarian's. The teachers' category here is that of a post secondary school's. Coming to the next entry is the engineering field. We all know what computer engineers do, they are into the hardware as well as software sections of the computer related lines. But the engineering paraprofessionals are the technicians and people who not only repair computer parts but also operate machines in various engineering fields like mining, production, construction sites, which is a civil engineering line, etc. Then follows lawyers and paralegal. A paralegal assists lawyers in researching, which is one the biggest time-consuming tasks of a lawyer. He also does documentation, interviews clients and witnesses in a case which has come to the lawyer for the first time.

Now medical scientists are professionals who are involved in researching and developing break through inventions or work on certain medicine improvement whereas technicians in this field may include people like X-ray technicians or who operate high-tech equipment or maintain them e.g. centrifuge machine for medicines. Paraprofessionals in teaching jobs, especially schools check homework, assist the teachers in making proper schedule and planning the syllabus, etc.

So these were the paraprofessional salary ranges for jobs in various fields. Although the figures are lesser compared to the counter professionals, the job that paraprofessionals do is remarkable and important. Imagine a teacher who has around a hundred children in a class, is it practically possible for him to pay personal attention to each and every student? No. Imagine a surgeon who has to pay attention to the intricacies of operating on a human heart, can he afford to adjust the lights or the air conditioning temperature while the operation is going on? No. Who does these jobs? The paraprofessionals. Thanks to them that they choose to be in a field which gives little recognition.