Funeral Director

NATURE OF THE WORK
Funeral directors are often called morticians or undertakers. This career may not appeal to everyone, but those who work as funeral directors take great pride in the ability to provide efficient and appropriate services. They also comfort the family and friends of the diseased.
The job of a funeral director is to arrange the details and the logistics of funerals. Together with the families funeral directors establish the locations, dates and times of wakes, memorial services, and burials. They arrange for a hearse to carry the body to the funeral home or mortuary. A funeral director also prepares obituary notices to be placed in newspapers, they arrange pallbearers and clergy, schedule the opening and the closing of a grave with the cemetery, decorate and prepare the site of services, provide transportation for the remains, mourners and flowers between sites, direct preparation and shipment of remains for out-of-State burial.
State laws usually require refrigeration or embalming if more than 24 hours elapses between death and interment. A mortuary science graduate from LaGuardia is also a trained, licensed practicing embalmer. The embalmer washes the body with germicidal soap and replaces the blood with embalming fluid to preserved the body until is ready for burial. Embalmers also reconstruct disfigured bodies using materials such as wax, cotton, clay, plaster of Paris and cosmetics to provide a natural appearance.
Funeral directors must be aware of burial customs of many faiths, ethnic groups and fraternal organizations, for this reason students take classes in History of Funeral Services and Thanatology and Society among others.
Funeral directors also handle paper work involved with the person’s death. They may help families to apply for veterans’ members benefits, notify the Social Security Administration of the death, apply on behalf of the survivors for the transfer of any pensions and submit papers to State authorities so that a formal certificate of death maybe issued and copies to the family of the diseased.

WORKING CONDITIONS
Funeral directors work long, irregular hours. This means working evenings and weekends for a total of 5-6 days per week. Many funeral directors work on an on-call basis, because they maybe needed to remove remains in the middle of the night.
To show proper respect and consideration for the families and the dead the profession requires wearing suits, ties and dresses for a conservative look.

JOB OUTLOOK
Overall employment in the Funeral Service industry is expected to have little or no change through the year 2010. Employment of funeral directors is expected to increase more slowly than the average occupation. As the number of deaths increases so will the demand for funeral services. Although employment opportunities for funeral directors are expected to be good, mortuary science graduates may have to relocate to find jobs in funeral services.

EMPLOYMENT INFORMATION
Funeral directors held about 32,000 jobs in 2000. Most of them worked in the Funeral Service and Crematory industry. The Mortuary Science program at LaGuardia trains students to become Funeral directors that are skilled, licensed and practicing embalmers.
Embalmers held 7,200 jobs in the year 2000.
According to the U.S Department of Labor Statistics the average annual salary for Funeral Directors in 2000 was $ 41,110. The middle 50 percent earned between $30,680 and $57,290. The lowest 10 percent earned less than $22,140, and the top 10 percent more than $85,780.
The median annual earnings for embalmers in 2000 were $32,870. The middle 50 percent earned between $25,840 and $41,760. The lowest 10 percent earned about $18,840 and the top 10 percent more than $52,130.

RELATED OCCUPATIONS
The Job of a funeral director requires tact discretion and compassion because of the dealing with grieving people. Other people that need these qualities are members of the clergy, social workers, psychologists, physicians and surgeons, nurses, physical therapists, occupational therapists and other allied health diagnosing and treating practitioners.